I think about food. A lot.
Well, to be fair I am a Bengali human person. As the stereotype goes, we love to eat, think about what we eat and talk about what we eat. Food is a big part of our identity. At least I can say it is definitely part of mine. I am a foodie through and through. (My dream is to be able to travel as much as possible and experience local cuisines all over the world. I believe food says a lot about who we are.)
However, I had always had a love-hate relationship with food. That is, I love food but it doesn’t seem to love me back. There are so many things that I cannot eat without breaking into hives or falling sick. Why food why? Why do you not love me as I love thee?
And, of course, we have to talk about food and my weight. As a kid, I was extremely underweight. So, of course, everyone assumed I didn’t eat enough. Now, I am overweight so obviously I must be stuffing my face with ‘junk food’ all the time. That’s how it works, didn’t you know?
I will not lie, these weird assumptions and being told to either gain or lose weight affected me a lot. As if my identity relied on that one thing: Am I thin or fat? (I am happy to report I do not care about any of it anymore. My priority is to be healthy, fit and happy. Unless you are directly involved in enriching my life, your opinion matters to me, as much as the foods I am allergic to do; I will look at you, see you but instantly ignore you.)
I think the biggest culprits are our relatives. No matter if they are seeing me after a decade or for the first time since I was born, the first thing they would say “Ebaba ki mota hoe gachis? Ektu kom kha ar gym kor.” (“Oh my, look how fat you have gotten? Eat a little less and go to the gym.”)
Umm…how do these aunts and uncles always seem to know how much I am eating or if I go to the gym or not without actually being in my life? Wow, they must have the sixth sense that M. Night Shyamalan was talking about and something I do not possess. They see fat people and know exactly what they eat and how much activity they get.
I can actually talk about this for days, even months. But, the point is that these unwarranted comments affected me and I developed weird eating habits. I like many others, villanised food. I thought thinking about food means I have an addiction to food. For a while, I truly believed that I had an eating disorder. I even got professional help for it just to be told, “there is absolutely nothing wrong with you, don’t cut out the foods, cut out the toxic people from your life.”
Being a good patient, I followed my doctor’s orders and did as was I told. I am happy to report I am currently missing a few relatives and old friends from my life but I gained a true love and appreciation for food and all its beauty.
I will be honest, I am not a person who can go on ‘diets’. I cannot do ‘calorie deficit’ and all the jazzy things out there. I need to feel satisfied with what I am having.
The one thing I can do is follow easy and simple rules. If I am told not to do something, I can easily do that. It has taken me years but now I understand which foods make me happy and are also healthy for me. I cannot just eat to sustain, I need to love what I am eating. But, I also do not want to eat and make myself sick either
I like to think about what I eat, I like to meal prep and I love to cook. (It pays off that I am a decent cook, well I like my own food and for now that all that matters.) I love to learn about the ingredients I am using and I like to be aware of the foods I am putting in my body.
I have noticed I love to plan out what I will eat in a day before the day starts. I do not always follow them perfectly but it helps me to make sure I am getting enough nutrients and also get to eat what I want to.
Maybe to some, it seems restrictive and to others it is discipline. I just know it helps me to enjoy my food.
P.S. I have so many more things I want to talk about, on the topic of food, maybe I will do so in the coming days. As I said I do think about food a lot and the impact it has on me, my health and even the world, because of course what we eat does affect everything around us as well. But, maybe that’s a topic for another day.