Food thread! how has trauma played into food behaviors?

[littleoc]

Thats what keeps me motivated to eat healthy, to always look young and good.

Do you think you're doing that for yourself?

I hope everyone here at least gets enough calories and enough nutrients :)

 

[Rani G2]

Do you think you're doing that for yourself?

Its an ego thing too. I would say yes.

Thanks for asking :-)

 

[FauxLiz]

I have a weird relationship with food. My brother (abuser) was diabetic so we were not allowed any sweets, desserts, sugar cereals or anything with sugar like soda or kool-aid. So ever since I left home I have always had some sort of sweet in the house.

Also, I yo-yo back and forth on my weight. I struggle because I have a hate-hate relationship with my body. I put on weight to discourage men from noticing me. Then I hate myself and lose weight meet men panic and gain the weight back.

I am also a big comfort food person. I have meals that I make like today when I am feeling exceptionally vulnerable and then overeat.

 

[littleoc]

I am also a big comfort food person. I have meals that I make like today when I am feeling exceptionally vulnerable and then overeat.

I'm sorry to hear that you're feeling vulnerable today. Just curious, but what kind of food are you making?

 

[KwanYingirl]

@littleoc as a child we ate a lot of empty food like white bread and potatoes and soda.

As for eating metal it is not as rare as you might think. I was an X-ray tech for many years and I’ve seen many, many coins and paper clips in the GI tract of children. It has a name, I think it is called Pica, but I might have that mixed up with something. I also forget but I think it’s a nutrient deficiency.

 

[FauxLiz]

@littleoc I made a pot roast last night. Something about the smell of all the ingredients cooking together makes me calm. I always make enough for leftovers for several days and generally don’t eat anything else until it is all gone. Other times I will bake pies cakes or homemade bread because no matter what my family said I knew they were good as I would enter cooking competitions and win top prize.

 

[One step at a time]

I love cooking. Last night, a rich, homemade bone broth. But my relationship with food definitely shifts around. It is independent of my relationship with my body. It is important for me to be fit, but I don't change how I eat in order to lose or gain weight.

When I was small, my access to food varied. I had a health problem that restricted what I ate, and three of the (non-abusive) caregivers I lived with at different times had, themselves, lived through decades of food scarcity and so had tough relationships with food. Some of those attitudes rubbed off on me.
I hoarded food, especially sweets, in my room.

When I was older, I began to restrict. I still go through phases like this, occasionally. Other times, the food-scarcity mindset sets in, and I will eat anything and everything in front of me, if it is free.

I'm finding balance. I try to eat when I feel hungry, and stop when I feel full. Like most things... sounds simple, feels complicated.
Most days, I eat yogurt or eggs for breakfast, fruit and leftovers or a sandwich for lunch, and veggies and/or beans/rice/potatoes/pasta for dinner, with a little cheese/meat some of the time. Lots of small farms, here, which helps with the ethics around animal products.
I drink a lot of tea. I always carry a snack with me.

 

[Julia426]

I wouldn't really call it trauma-induced, but due to a lack of food being available to me when I'm hungry, I feel I've developed an unhealthy attachment to food. I'm a high school student athlete with a job. I'm away from home 13 hours a day. All my spare money goes to entry fees for my sport and sport equipment. There is often no slack money left for lunch or dinner, so sometimes my only meal is breakfast.

When I'm home and have access to food before it's all eaten, I tend to go overboard and eat as much as I can. When I attend events with free food, it's always on my mind. I force myself not to take too much out of courtesy, then keep regretting it because I'll be hungry in the future. When I see people throwing out perfectly good food, part of me freaks out.

Oddly, like @littleoc , I tend to obsess over whether or not I have enough water. When I was younger, I never had a water bottle, nor did my parents buy bottled water. I would go entire school days and sports practices without water because I didn't have anything to carry it in and my school only had one functional water fountain on the other side of school. These days, if I forget my water bottle or do not have water on me or available to me, I feel uncomfortable.

 

[littleoc]

When I was younger, I never had a water bottle, nor did my parents buy bottled water. I would go entire school days and sports practices without water because I didn't have anything to carry it in and my school only had one functional water fountain on the other side of school. These days, if I forget my water bottle or do not have water on me or available to me, I feel uncomfortable.

Wow, that's shockingly familiar to me.

Despite yours not being trauma induced, I can sense a need to take full care of yourself instead of your parents helping. I hope you are having big breakfasts. Or at least enough vitamins.

 

[Deleted member 8714]

I wait too long to eat. I love to cook and bake and I still do I wait. I love to create new recipes for cooking and baking. So no excuse. I've done this since I started my healing journey in 1988. It's gotten worse over the years, the deeper I get into what happened to me. I used to have zero appetite in the morning as a teenager due to PTSD.

Right now I have an excuse because my kitchen is being remodeled all too slowly for my tastes. No pun intended. Will it be different when the kitchen is finished? Maybe. Maybe not.

 

[Changing4Best]

I was an undereater throughout all my childhood, teen years and most of my adulthood. Then some pdoc in a Hospital prescribed Zyprexa to me for my Bipolar and I gained 60 pounds in 4 months! It took me 6 years to lose most of it, never could lose all of it.

These days I do hoard food, yes, and I overeat still, so I am overweight.

There is CSA in my past, which contributed to my not wanting to eat. So, yes, trauma contributed to this.

 

[Whirlwind]

My trauma definitely had an effect on my relationship with food but not all were bad. As a young person I had some unfortunate compulsions (intense food rules, touching etc etc ugh) but thankfully it stayed in the past.

To this day every time I go grocery shopping I get a bit excited, at all of the colors and different vegetables etc. Despite a budget I could likely buy whatever I want and that is amazing to me.

I feel very respectful towards food, I waste as little as I can and meal time today is such a nice thing, colors and options, it will always feel like a little holiday to me. I don't struggle with my weight and I was lucky enough to come to peace with my body after everything...I had an epiphany of sorts and I'm still grateful.

But this second brain of ours is smart......had I understood to listen to it would have saved me from a great trauma. I have learned what I sometimes cannot process emotionally my stomach will alert me with a deep sense of unease or nausea.