It’s 11 o’clock, and I’m supposed to eat.

It’s 11 o’clock, and I should eat. It says so on my food plan – evening snack. My food plan that my very expensive and talented dietician developed for me that I still don’t understand. But I’m not hungry, and I don’t want to eat. I ate enough today – I had to eat twice as much at breakfast because I was hungry, and I really hate that. It set my whole day off, having two breakfasts. I didn’t have much of a choice, my sons and husband were sweet and made me breakfast, but it wasn’t the right thing or I don’t know but I was hungry so I ate more. I shouldn’t eat more. I shouldn’t eat more than I need to get by. It’s better when I just eat less. Then I don’t have to worry about getting fat.

It’s 11 o’clock – the grandfather clock just chimed – and I’m supposed to eat now. I had popcorn, does that qualify as a snack? I think it was maybe 3/4 of a cup – maybe even a cup. It tasted buttery, but it was low-fat. I know because I wouldn’t buy it otherwise. I only ate it so my kids and husband wouldn’t think I was being weird. I do a lot of things so my family doesn’t think I’m weird.

There’s a part of me that’s awakening, that remembers not being weird. A part that reminds me that I used to be able to eat a regular piece of toast without freaking out. That I used to be able to go to community spaghetti dinners, eat pizza, and drink beer. I bought beer today for DH and Skinnygirl cocktails for me, because Skinnygirls are 35 calories and a beer is 138. I can’t have a beer. I could, I suppose, but instead I could have half of a potato and a cup of green beans plus my 1.5 oz of Skinnygirl.

My dietician said that she talked with T and they agreed that my ED was worsened by stress. That when I am stressed I continue to volunteer for more or work more or write more or sleep less and make myself more stressed. I don’t think I’m a masochist, I think that if I stop for too long whatever it is I’ve been running from my whole life will catch up to me.

In the meantime, I’m supposed to eat. I don’t know what to eat. I want someone to put a tube in me and fill it with stuff so that I don’t have to think about what to eat. D says I should eat whatever I feel like eating. But it’s 11 o’clock and I don’t feel like eating anything. But I will go into the kitchen and find something not terrible which I will eat with my Skinnygirl, because that’s what good girls do. We do what we’re told, and I was told to eat, and for some reason the night time eating was really important, and so I’ll eat. It’s 11 o’clock and I don’t want to eat. I just want to disappear for awhile. I just want it all to go away – everything – the emails, my students, the bills, the hearth rug I’m supposed to order and the huge box that needs to go to UPS. The taxes I haven’t done and the medical bills I need to gather for my father’s accountant. The checks I need to write, and the laundry I need to put away. I’m running from my life, because I’m just so damned tired I want it to stop, for just a little bit.

And so I’ll eat, at 11 o’clock. Because my plan so far? Sucks. And any plan is better than mine.