Remember yesterday when I was talking all about “I can’t” and how evil it is and how no one should say it ever?
Karma. She’s a bitch, you know?
Today’s lesson was entitled “Kitchen Makeover” and before you jump to conclusions, no, they weren’t giving away free appliances and cabinets (damn!). Instead they were talking about the stuff inside the appliances and cabinets — all the crap food that hides out in there — and going through and getting rid of anything that wasn’t healthy.
Here’s an excerpt:
And want to know what my immediate reaction was? “I can’t throw out everything that’s not remotely healthy! I can’t do it! I can’t! I can’t I can’t!!” I almost stomped my feet like a toddler having a tantrum too, but managed to refrain. Barely.
Nice, eh?
And yes – it’s not “I can’t” it’s “I don’t wanna” (said with my lower lip sticking out). My house doesn’t have a whole lot of stuff on the list, but I definitely have some of them. Within the past few weeks, I’ve made a point of not buying any of my trigger foods — chocolate, ice cream, marshmallows (yup, that’s right) — so it wouldn’t be easy for me to binge when things got tough. But I’ve got offenders from the list: candy, soda, alcohol (nothing better than Iced Cake Vodka served over ice!), frozen dinners, etc. For me, some are foods of convenience, some are just to fulfill cravings when they come up. The bargain I made with myself was that I wasn’t allowed to have anything in the house that I couldn’t stay away from or just eat one portion of. And I’m living up to the bargain. Sounds reasonable, doesn’t it?
I mean, sure, I know that in a perfect world, I would be better off without these foods, but I’m feeling a huge resistance to actually making this happen. I tell myself that I really don’t want this to turn into a “diet” — I don’t want any food to be off limits — but the fact of the matter is that not having it in the house doesn’t mean I can’t ever eat it. It just means that it’s not on-hand and easy to get to, that’s all. And still…
So, I’m working on this “I can’t”. I’ll do a survey of my pantry and fridge, see what’s in there that is on the throw away list, and figure things out from there.
(know what I just noticed? … cookies aren’t on the list… oooo I found a loophole…!!!)
It’s hard to throw away perfectly good food, there’s the whole “children are starving in India” guilt trip to deal with.
I struggle with this lesson as well. I managed to clean out all the opened, old cereal and that was about it for now. I also struggle w/ throwing out perfectly good food.