Feast or Famine?

So, I'm on a diet. It's an effort to finally get rid of the last few pounds of baby weight and get into some healthier habits. What can I say, I just have to come to terms with the fact that chocolate chip cookie dough is not what you'd call a nutritious and wholesome breakfast. Also, I have a little boy now, and he's watching me eat, and frankly the idea that I could be a role model for anyone is terrifying. SO! Diet!

Now, the diet plan I've chosen (and am doing with my wonderful husband) is Weight Watchers, and we chose it because A: we can do it online, which works best around our crazy schedules, and B: it's really very flexible about what we eat. Basically we can eat anything, so long as we hold ourselves accountable and record it properly. There's also a large number of recipes and articles and tools that can help us keep ourselves on track.

The other thing I've been doing is reading. I've already talked about the toddler book (though I suspect I'm not done with it,) but one of the other books I checked out is called A Homemade Life: Stories and Recipes from My Kitchen Table. So... I'm on a diet and I'm reading what is essentially a travelogue about food instead of places. And last night, somewhere between a first date and French-style lemon yogurt cake I realized something. It's the thing that makes dieting so hard for me. It's not the healthy food- actually I rather love most foods that are considered healthy. It's not the portion sizes since I've never really eaten a ton of food in a sitting. It's the attitude that food is only for stopping the feeling of being hungry. Sure, there are a lot of recipes for those who are slimming that are advertised as 'good tasting' or 'to satisfy your craving' for a particular foodstuff, but none of them say 'take your chocolate cheesecake and make it last for 40 minutes while you chat with a friend (or a romantic interest! Date night!) Or go ahead, have that plate of pasta with cream sauce, but have a rationally adult sized portion of it, and make your meal last for an hour! Longer!

See, there's the thing. In the U.S. food is not viewed as something to savor, an event to be enjoyed. It's viewed as something to do to accomplish a goal, to be plowed through as quickly as possible while doing something else. I need to do more work on finding healthy snacks to graze on during the day, sure. I also need to work on portion size (it's different for me now than it was 10 years ago! Heck, ONE year ago!) But I think more than anything, I need to remember how to savor a meal instead of trying to scarf it down while doing laundry, wrestling my son, and watching Mythbusters.

P.S. I'll review that book I mentioned later. It's pretty delicious.