“So, now, how would you describe your eating habits?” Doctor Zermati asked me a week ago.
– Hummmmm… I would say I’m more relaxed with food, some days I don’t even think of what I’m going to eat or of the therapy, I let my needs and wishes guide me. I even have the impression I can stop at the end of meal without reasoning just because I’ve had enough. Well, it’s not always the case, but it is nothing like it was before.
– Could we say it’s becoming natural?
– Yes, that’s it, basically, it’s becoming natural, I agreed. And, a few second later, always this nasty habit of opening my mouth too much, I added: “on the other hand, there is still one scenario in which I’m anxious, when I’m invited”. “Because of pre-dinner, I mean”.
– You’re afraid of drinking too much? (Worried face of a doctor who’s wondering if from slightly bulimic his patient became seriously alcoholic)
– Oh noooo, I reassured him immediately. Because of cashew nuts.
– Yeah, ‘cashew nut’, he said with a knowing look.
– No it’s very serious, I can’t stop. I think they put cocaine or something in it, it’s the only thing I can think of, I’m not myself in front of a bowl of cashew. And then, honestly, I don’t know what to do.
– At home, what do you do, then?
– At home? Simple, there aren’t any. I’m not crazy you know.
– Really? You love it but you don’t buy any? (Excessively astonished look of a therapist who wants to send a message). Then what do you serve for pre-dinner?
– Well… cherry tomatoes, possibly some cheese or raw carrots, or…
– And is it good? (Pointedly sceptical look of a therapist who wants me to say cherry tomatoes suck)
– Hum… yes, of course… (Girl who’s that close to crack)
– As good as cashew? (Therapist using the next gear, namely sarcasm)
– Of course no! (Patient falling feet first in the therapist’s trap)
– And people prefer cherry tomatoes to cashews? (Triumphing look of therapist who knows he just dealt the death blow)
– I doubt it but I don’t care, all I know is that at least I don’t fall in it head first. (And bang, get this Sigmund, unanswerable)
– Basically, you prefer serving everyone a pre-dinner that is less appreciated than what you could offer, only so that you don’t eat some, am I correct? And, if I may, do you eat what you put on the table anyway?
– Hum… yes, but it’s better than eating cashew or Pringles, isn’t it?
– …
Ok.
Zermati 1, Patient, 0.
This verbal fight thus ended up, you suppose so, with one of those exercise Zermati likes so much.
For four days, I’ll have to start my lunch with cashews, even – Doctor Z is magnanimous – a mix of these delicious little things and crisps, Pringles or Chipster. Basically same song as with chocolate. Except that now, if I’m hungry again after one hour, I must eat the same and nothing else. Besides, I must have a big enough quantity to have some left afterwards.
And the rest
I throw it away.
Every evening.
Why throwing away? Because according to doc, keeping eating when you are not hungry anymore is nothing more nothing less than considering your stomach as a bin. Or even as a recycling center. He isn’t in favour of wasting but he doesn’t see how throwing rests away is more of a waste than swallowing it when you’re unable to stick it anymore and it will thus do you no good.
In short, here I am, forced to eat cashew four days in a row. What a pain.
Let me point out that contrary to what you could think, the goal is not to put me off cashews for life. The objective is, I believe, to make me discover after what quantity of cashews I don’t enjoying it anymore.
Not sure, it’ll sort completely my issue with pre-dinner, which is also linked, I think, with the sort of anxiety I feel at the beginning of an evening with friends, I don’t know, fear that we don’t get along, that we get bored, that I don’t say things I should, etc etc etc. But never mind, I’ve decided to trust my therapist, thus inch’allah and cashew nuts here I come. Damn it.
