The Rituals..

Little rituals and habits that have taken over my life.

Every person who suffers from a personal Anna, has their own daily rituals that takes over their life from day to day. They start as just little things, like the way some people read the paper in the morning, "we" also have our own things we do the same, day in, day out.. After all, our whole life and therefore the whole world revolves around food..

I never really seen how and when they started to take over my life, because it happened so slowly.. It becomes "you".
I have an endless list of things I would do everyday..

Whenever I start my day, I would have one pot of yogurt (120 ml), with a sprinkle of pumpkin and sunflower seeds, and 6 almonds, cut into 2, which means I can savor the taste of the almonds 12 times! This I would have to put in the same bowl, every time, because if I put in a different bowl (bigger for instance) it looks less and that would mean that I would want more when I've finished the bowl, and that's a definite no-no..
I would sit, with 1 liter of green tea (this cleanses the body, another obsession of mine) and read my book. But I'm only allowed to take a mouthful after I have read 2 pages. All the while, drinking my yummy tea. It would usually take me an hour to finish it, if there are distractions, it could take anything up to 2 hours, which is pretty ridiculous and then I just get sick of it, and throw it away. I prefer to be totally alone as well, nobody around, just me and my book and my yogurt.

Lunch, I don't eat. I stopped that when I stopped working (beginning of June). I convinced myself that I don't need 3 meals a day, if I'm not doing anything "productive". When I did work, I ate a tiny bit of muesli and yogurt in the morning (this would only take me 15 minutes), I would do 20 minutes of yoga, walk 20 minutes to work, have 2 slices of brown bread at 1 o clock. I'd usually work until 5 or 6, walk home 20 minutes, after thinking all day about what I was going to have for dinner.. and dreaming about food but despising everyone around me because my colleagues just seemed to eat their way through the day. My dinners then would usually be some toast, or maybe a roll, or a bit of noodles or rice (that was if I could stomach it) but my favorite meal, which really isn't a meal, would be a bowl of muesli with some yogurt and nuts, maybe some fruit as well.. If I was allowed to, i'd live on this.. but I'm not allowed. Much to my disgust..

On the days that I wasn't working, I wouldn't let myself eat 3 times.. no way.. I would try and sleep until 11 o clock, this way I would be able to have breakfast/lunch in one. I still don't eat lunch. But my extras and supplements are starting to make up for it at the moment (really not too chuffed about that).

Another thing, is spices. My dinner has to be smothered in spices and herbs.. Sometimes it's just insane. For example.. If I were to have some toast for dinner.. I would have 2 slices and cut them up into 8 little pieces (this is another "ritual".. the more little pieces there are, the longer it takes to eat and again savor every bite). On every piece I would put a different taste. On one I'd have a piece of cheese with spices, the other some garlic spices, the other some Indian spices, the other chili spices, the other some ham with Italian spices. This with a pint of green tea.. Gorgeous. I would be thinking about it all day long, dreaming about it, and counting down the hours.. when was the last time I ate and how many hours have I got to go..? It wouldn't take me an hour, this is only my breakfast ritual. I have forced myself to keep up the "speed" when it comes to my dinner.. just for it not to get totally out of whack.

I would also try to have 16 hours without food. This would be tricky at times. My dinner, finished at around 6.. so then breakfast, starts at around 10 the following morning. I was able to do this, up until Monday.. since the "3 supplements" have made their entrance, I have had to reschedule the whole day.. but that's a story for another time..

Looking at the time is also something that I would constantly be focused on. How long have I been sitting? If I'm sitting, can I keep my brain active instead? What can I do to make the time go faster, so I can eat again? If I would have energy at night, and I'm sitting on the sofa, watching telly, I would secretly do belly crunches, while dreaming about what I want to have for dinner tomorrow. I would tense them up to 750 times.. sometimes, when I've too much energy, I would do 1500 crunches. I would sit there, and count in my head. First I would count to 50, that's 1 finger.. until all 5 fingers are accounted for, then I know I've done 250 crunches, and that I would want to do at least 2 to 4 times over. Then I know that I haven't lost count of the amount of belly crunches I have done (because anybody I'm watching telly with, doesn't have a clue that I'm doing it, so they can distract me, but I will never loose count!).
This I don't do every night..only sometimes.

Sitting around the house so much, if I'm doing some cleaning or just "pottering about", I would leave certain things upstairs or lying around, just so I have to walk up the stairs that extra time.. to be busier just those few more minutes.. 2 minutes walking up and down the stairs is far better than 2 minutes sitting on my behind.

And then there's the food recipes. I love cookbooks.. I love reading the ingredients, I love watching food programs.. Love the look of food in magazines, on the adds, on billboards, in the supermarket.. everywhere.. Even watching a movie, I would nearly want to press pause, just to see what they are eating.

Enjoying cooking and feeding other people. Glorious. I was never someone who could cook or who was interested in it, or was good at it.. not at all. But now, I would happily prepare a 3 course meal and sit and watch everyone enjoy it.
It's apparently because the brain isn't getting enough of all this, that it's all it's focused on, to get me to eat and remind me that I need food.

It's so weird, these rituals, and when they start to get disrupted.. it's scary.. It's like the weighing scales, that's gone and it's scary. Once the rituals start to break down, it's scary. And it's happening at the moment.. Because of these supplements.

It freaks me out to think of my day not starting with an hour of reading with my pot of yogurt.. I don't want to have to think about that now.. But I feel that they will have to slowly be broken down.. stepping away from each ritual, one step at a time..