COMFORT and JOY

I found myself in dire need of comfort yesterday afternoon.  It's Christmastime again, and I miss my mom.  A lot.  More than last year even.  The hole in my heart -- in my world -- is wrecking me.  It isn't working, trying to stay occupied, busy.  Nothing is enough distraction to make me stop thinking about her, about how much I miss her.  How I need her.

Finally, after spending the entire afteroon yesterday jumping from task to unfinished task, a desperate attempt to deny and suppress the gnawling ache of my emotions, I decided to eat Cheesy Bread from Little Caesar's. (What? I don't really even LIKE Cheesy Bread.) I ate a few sticks, then tore the cheese off the top of the rest of it, ate the cheese, and threw all the rest of it away, washing it down with a DIET A&W Rootbeer. Diet. Of course, diet.

I later ate jelly beans.  Old ones.  I don't much like jelly beans either.  And I ate a few Chipins -- chips made from popcorn.  Now those WERE satisfying. 

And then it dawned on me:  The only thing you have accomplished in eating this shit is making yourself sick, bloated, and miserable.  It was a very tiny -- TEENY TINY -- bandaid on the gaping wound of your bleeding heart.  It wasn't enough.  Nothing is.  There is no elixir for this kind of hurt.

So why did I eat that food?  I asked myself:  WHY IN THE HELL DID YOU EAT THIS SHIT? 

And then I found myself face to face with my dilemma:  I'm hurting. 

Stop running from it.  You can't run from it.  You can't cover it up.  You can't drink it away, or eat it away.  It is what it is.  Relentless.

I must come to terms with this emotion.

Comfort food is only gonna make matters worse.

There is no TRUE COMFORT in comfort food.  It's temporary 'JOY,' but it is not comforting.

A lesson I've had to learn over and over and over again.

"There's a compelling reason for the pint of premium ice cream in the freezer, the supply of candy bars in the office desk drawer, or the collection of cereal boxes in the pantry. These are all examples of comfort food, those concoctions which provide a sense of nostalgia or self-satisfaction for the consumer. Comfort food is not designed to be especially healthy or politically correct, but it supplies a welcomed respite from the stresses of the outside world."