Slippery Slope

Something just happened that caused me a significant level of anxiety. I went from confident and positive about the semester to angry and pessimistic in about ten minutes. Mood swings are not a new phenomenon for me, but this one was swift and sudden even by my standards.

The problem is not just the situation but my response to it. A little while after the initial confrontation, I went to talk about it with a few others. There was a bowl of crappy candy on a desk. Candy that doesn't appeal to my tastes. I ate a bunch of pieces out of sheer stress and frustration. I couldn't stop.

I went back to my office and fumed some more. Ended up eating a thing of oatmeal even though I wasn't hungry. Sure, it's healthy (or at least healthier than the candy), but I ate it out of stress.

I came home and ate more than I wanted. Felt full. Ate dessert that I didn't have the points for. Went and did some reading. Ate some popcorn. Felt stuffed. Drank a second pop for the evening--something I normally would not do.

This is not okay. Not. Okay. I'm lucky that most of the food in my house is moderately healthy or else I would have been in a much worse place right now. And I'm lucky I was able to stop myself because, emotionally, I currently want nothing more than to gorge some more. I'm refusing to let myself go any further with it. I have to stop this behavior pattern because it's a slippery slope from justifying overeating on a bad day to justifying it on a moderately annoying day, to just plain justifying it.

I have to learn that a good response is a healthy response. If that's not exercise, then it needs to be something else: reading for pleasure instead of work, some quiet deep breathing in the dark, watching a little TV. No matter what, I need to focus on reminding myself how overeating will only lead to another kind of stress if I start gaining the weight back.

Lastly, I need to remind myself that no negative person or event deserves the power to destroy all my hard work and the progress that's resulted from it. Overeating is surrendering that power to the negativity, and that is so not happening.