Sugar undoes me; it is the shining chocolate chip in my crown of shame and weakness. I’m only a little bit joking.
This is not, I realize, particularly earth-shattering or uncommon. Many people struggle with eating too many sweets. I’m just joining the club, getting in line, jumping on the wagon.
The thing that disturbs me most is the feeling that I am not in control of myself. “This is the last cookie,” I might think to myself. Five minutes later, I’m eating another cookie… and then another. When I exit the train at certain subway stations I’m immediately fighting to not reach into my purse for change to buy a Twix, a Milky Way, or that delicious cookie and cream bar—what’s it called? Symphony?
I once bought a can of icing, for no real reason, and started eating it on the sidewalk, as soon as I left the bodega. I have squeezed tablespoon after tablespoon of chocolate syrup onto a spoon, slurping it like medicine, and unable to stop. On Shabbos, at shul, I have eaten pastries that had a bite out of them already, left forlorn on a table.
I have tried rules and tricks of all kinds. Sweets once a week. One sweet a day. Sweets when Yakov, my husband, says it’s okay. No sweets at all. Moderation above all things. Nothing sticks.
At work, a couple of colleagues and I are participating in an 18-day “sugar-free challenge”, which ends November 11th. I know that this is just another trick, and that after November 11th, I’ll have to figure out how to balance my deep, dark need for sweets with my brain and my body—which want me to quit, to be healthy, to own myself and my cravings.
Or maybe I’ll just get a huge ice cream sundae to celebrate, and call it a day.
I haven’t had processed sugar for 6 months because my body can’t tolerate it, and other irritants, right now. I sit at my desk, trying to work, recreating the sensation of eating cake, the taste of ben and jerry’s flavors, the feeling of a spoon cutting through chocolate mousse. In the past six months I’ve smelled bags and containers of: M&M’s, Nutella, cookies, and pretty much anything I could lay my hands on. Tonight I broke down and ate a cookie, because as long as I didn’t actually swallow it, I could at least chew and enjoy the flavor. It’s not the same, but it was amazing. I’ve searched endlessly for sugar and dairy free chocolate and have gotten creative making my own. I’ve made brownies, pies, chocolate sauce and chocolate milk with rice milk and sugarfree cocoa powder + agave, but none of it is quite the same.
My conclusion: it’s been out of my system for a long time, but my taste buds still crave it. And that’s OK. So have a cookie. And then have another for me.
Thanks for the perspective–at least I am physically able to eat sweets. I will definitely have a cookie for you.
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