this week about the genetics of satiety — what makes people feel full and that they’ve had enough food. It isn’t about willpower, writes the reporter. After writing about one particular gene that was studied, one doctor said, “This proves that MC4R is an important, if not the most important, controller of weight.”
It’s not that I think genes are unimportant. It’s not that I believe that some people have a harder time with weight challenges than others. But studies like this (and they are only studies and we have no idea how many other variables like lifestyle, exercise, relationships or what in fact the people studied were eating) keep placing the onus of responsibility on something beyond our awareness.
We get to think, Oh, it’s because I have the MC4R gene that I’m like this. It’s the gene’s fault. And regardless of the genes you have, at some point, it always and still comes down to attention and awareness and what you choose. Where you place your attention, if you feel like a victim. Most people zoom through and past meals. Past pleasure. Past noticing when they’ve had enough. It’s not about their genes, it’s about being on the internet while eating, talking, walking. It’s about missing our lives. It’s about not choosing to show up exactly where we are.
So when I serve myself a portion of food and sit down to eat it without any distractions, I find that if I just sit there in one spot after eating and do nothing, that I slowly begin to notice my stomach feeling full,
However, my inner voice tells me to wash my dishes NOW and to do my homework or clean the house or check the weather forecast or the news as it may inform my thesis….then I walk out on myself and I have left my stomach, left my human being into a human doing… and then I enter the inner discourse of the peer review panel….judging my mistakes…..then I get hungry trying to satisfy my peers’ voices or correct my errors…..
And my hunger demands the forbidden bread -it is hard to crave broccoli at midnight… “Mom, you don’t have any vegetables!! You should be eating vegetables!”
Should, is a derivative of shit just like methadone is a derivative of heroine.
I ate all my broccoli, I will buy more after I am finished the 2 bags of apples in the fridge. Apples, red delicious apples and green granny smith apples. Mix red apples with green apples and oatmeal and brown sugar and margarine and red river seed cereal… comfort food, I need comfort.
When people ask me for feedback on their writing, I try to give them a heart sandwich:
A positive slice
Meaty suggestions
Another positive slice