Well, I had a rough afternoon and was wanting to cry, scream, hit someone and bury myself in a tub of vanilla ice cream. And pasta, and butter, and well, everything bland and fatty and soothing.

Instead I walked around my neighborhood for 20 minutes when I got home to give myself a few minutes to calm down and then drank a glass of water. Then had a yogurt and when I realized I was both hungry and munchy I peeled & sliced a large English cucumber (one of those 2-feet suckers) and ate the whole thing.

I now feel much better. Better because I took some time to calm down, better because I didn’t sabatoge my efforts of the past few weeks, and better because turning towards healthy solutions was at least as stress-relieving as the ice cream would have been.

I didn’t do so great at dinner - at least not at first. We had a fresh baguette (French bread), my nemesis, plus our awesome butter from a small independent producer… I had a small piece, then a second was starting and a memory from Dr Hope came back and I realized I was okay diet-wise as long as this WAS dinner (not in addition to it). That realization relaxed me and slowed me down. I ate the rest of my bread and butter savoring every bite and knowing calorie wise I was fine. Added a small amount of Greek salad and a yogurt to round out the meal (well, sort of rounded out) and called it good. No guilt for eating “bad foods”, no over-eating from eating bread and butter and then a dinner too.

…but I’m still going to throw away the ice cream that’s deep in the freezer — knowing it is there is weighing on me.