A Gazillion Lies About Food

Still on the subject of telling lies. Thinking about some of the lies I've told about food... to people I don't know, to store clerks, to close friends, to family, to myself. Just for fun, here are a couple of them...

Lie told to a very close woman friend about 2 years ago

On my way to her house to have a pot-luck lunch with a couple of my quilting friends, I stopped at the grocery store to buy a roasted chicken. Cookies there calling me loudly. Like home-made and only $1.00 for three of the lovelies with macadamia nuts and white chocolate. So I bought a dozen. Got in my car with cookies and chicken, opened cookie bag, chowed one down. Ate another while driving. Was almost to friend's house, but wanted to eat a couple more (this was becoming an uncontrollable binge). Parked my car by the side of the road, ducked my head down, and ate cookies, one after another.

Meanwhile, my friend, driving from a work errand in town, passed my car and recognized it. With 6 remaining cookies, I arrived a few minutes later at her house. "What were you doing parked by the side of the road?" she asked. "Wasn't me." I replied. "Looked like your car," she said. "Nope, guess there are a lot of blue Honda Civics, huh." Flat out lie.

Since starting OA, I told her about that lie and apologized. Feel better about it now.

One of many lies I've told my husband about me and food

Because of having a family that has suffered greatly from alcohol abuse, my husband understands about addiction. When we met 14 years ago, long before OA, I knew I was addicted to chocolate. At times I would go abstinent on chocolate and when I met him was one of those times. We shared that we were both abstinent on alcohol and for me, also chocolate. This was a good bond for us.

A couple years later, I slipped on the chocolate. I thought I could have it just one time, at one special occasion, which of course set me off rolling down the slope of more and more chocolate, more and more binging. But I didn't tell my husband. First lie... lie of omission.

In order to maintain that lie, I had to sneak my chocolate. I had to tell many lies to hide my daily chocolate fixes. One time we were waiting for the ferry and I HAD to have a fix. Standing at the vendor, paying for a bag of M & Ms, my husband walked in, surprising me and catching me in the act. "I'm buying these for you! And they were supposed to be a surprise," I said, covering for my irritated attitude at being caught.

It's a fact...

I have a history of telling a lot of lies concerning my behavior around food, little lies and big whoppers. It makes me feel creepy when I do it; and it makes me feel creepy now to admit it, to write about it, to remember some of them.

I prefer to think of myself as a fundamentally honest person. Honesty is something our parents and teachers encouraged. Honesty is something I admire in others.

So, what's under the lies? What do they have in common? Mostly, I think, I lie to conceal behaviors for which I feel shame. I have a great deal of shame around not being normal about food, about not being able to control what and how much I eat, and around my weight, about my size and shape and at times obesity.

Shame is under the lies. What is under shame? Is it fear? I think so. Fear of not being loveable, fear of death, fear of loneliness, fear of being wrong, fear of ultimate failure as a human being.

Today, I accept the fear. It is real and it is part of me. I accept.

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Gratitude: shooting stars just starting to bloom, quilting friends, OA