Inevitable Impulses

I'm pretty sure it started around 11am this morning. I had finished some mildly frustrating e-mail exchanges regarding complicated schedules...I started feeling hungry.

My 3-5PM appointment was the final session of a Time & Project management course. I opened the appointment, only to find that none of my attendees had accepted. Breathing deeply, reminding myself that these four employees were my customers, I walked around the office to make sure that the 4 students in my class were in fact, planning to attend. I felt hungrier.

I received the following unenthusiastic responses to my question: "Are you coming to our last class this afternoon?"
"What time?"
"Do I have a choice?"
"This is the LAST class, right?"

Prisoners. The lot of them. Oh, Joy.

And now I got back to my desk famished, wanting to cry, and wanting to eateateateateat, get out of the office and eat badly.

So I sat down at my desk and ate some lovely fruit salad. I barely noticed the rich, sweet fruit, because I was upset.

I tried to calm myself. I took deep breaths. I reminded myself that the food In The Gap was not supportive. I explained that while a walk or getting out of the office would probably make me feel better, eating would only SEEM to make me feel better. The fruit didn't feel good - too much acid on an empty stomach.

I decided to leave the office and call my husband...who was busy. Busy having a nice lunch, wherever he wanted, with buddies of his from former companies. And not able to talk to me; Help me overcome the sadness which translated into cravings for food "out."

So I went to the bank...to The Gap. I genuinely wanted to problem-solve a food situation that I did not have to prepare for myself. My lunch needed to be hot, novel and primarily vegetable-based (lower calorie). food options scrolled through my head:

Bagel sandwich (but the last one I had wasn't very good - not worth it)
Sushi (but that looks like it will take too long)
Starbucks (I almost fed my impulse with a green tea latte and a slice of lowfat mocha cake...but what kind of lunch is *that*?)

Finally I was going to leave, when the taqueria jalapeno menu caught my eye: Zucchini burrito. Rice, black beans, grilled zucchini and corn in a wheat tortilla. Mmmmmmmm. Pretty good compromise. Certainly better than many other choices. Now I could feel good about myself for making a good choice, even if I had to feel guilty and depressed about wanting to (and giving in to) eating out to begin with.

Back at the office, I sat at my desk, reviewing slides for my "doomed" class in a few hours. I ate half of the tortilla, a little more than half of the insides, and the small baggie of tortilla chips that came with it.

I started to feel full (What? ME? Full?!). I decided to wrap the other half of the burrito up and save it for later. I finished my "baby" diet coke and decided I needed water.

I know that this whole episode of boring details was a huge way to avoid how sad I felt about my class being "rejected." And me by association. The inevitable impulse to eat to find calm and relaxation and emotional balance is terribly, terribily obvious...But what was the alternative? Until I made the emotional pain (associated strongly with the hunger) go away, I was cognitively frantic - unable to focus on why I feel so rejected and unappreciated by my reluctant co-workers.

Is my impulse to eat what I "shouldn't" - foods that are un-supportive by virtue of their higher calories) - truly inevitable? Is there, in fact, a solid cognitive strategy for dealing with emotional eating?

I suppose the search continues. I hope I find out.

[It occurs to me to try bringing PowerGel to the office for occasions when this occurs. If I can recognize the emotional eating right away, as I did in this case, maybe the "frosting" association will help me get through it with fewer calories.]