I have been experiencing a weird thing lately. I don't seem to know where "normal" is. My reference points seem to have shifted. Have you ever had this experience?
For example, chocolate and sweets. I have long provided snacks for my lab group. I used to go out and buy these myself, but then I got tired of doing that and started giving money to a grad student to go shopping instead. I've noticed that these tend to be very healthy food choices. Healthier than I would have picked out. In fact, I had to specifically start asking for them to buy some chocolate. While I admire the healthy eating habits of my students, I have to wonder if there is something off about my eating. I look healthy, I'm about the same BMI as the students in my lab. And yet, I do love love love girl scout cookies, for example. And I ate 5 at one sitting yesterday afternoon. Is that outrageous? Is that extremely far out of the range of normal?
Coffee. How much coffee do people drink? I like a big cup of coffee every morning, but then over the holidays everyone who came over to my house gave me such a hard time about how big the coffee mugs that go with my every-day dinnerware are. And then I like to have a cup of tea in the afternoon, or maybe a little cup of coffee. But then I keep running into people who act like coffee is the drink of the devil.
And then there is wine. I like to have a glass of wine when I get home. I shifted to drinking a 4 oz glass of port after dinner, but that usually ends of being two 4 oz glasses over about two hours in the evening. I don't do this every night, as my husband does not drink much at all and so I feel like a total alcoholic. My mother in law thinks that anyone who has even a sip of alcohol is an alcoholic. What is a normal drinking habit that isn't unhealthy? I thought that my habits were ok, and that a glass of wine most evenings was maybe even good for you. But then I went to a dinner the other night and everyone either ordered 1/2 glass or no glass.
Exercise. Same kind of thing going on.
What's the deal here?
Now please refrain from lecturing me on how I shouldn't care what other people think, or that I should do what my doctor recommends, or that I should do what feels healthy for me. Yes, I know that.
What I'm finding strange is that I'm going through one of those times when I realize what a cultural animal I am, we all are. It feels strange to think that I don't fit into my cultural surroundings. I hadn't quite realized how important it is to feel like you are doing what everyone else is doing until I started feeling like I'm not, and that I don't know what is "normal" anymore... does that make sense?
Really, InB, you should limit your alcohol intake to 1 glass of wine per day (for women! men can have 2 glasses!), exercise for 30 minutes 3 times a week (or is it 4 times per week now?) and eat a diet consisting of 40% grains, 10% protein, 20% dairy, 30% vegetables, and 1% chocolate (or have vegetables and starches now swapped places on the food pyramid in the wake of childhood obesity?). And don't forget to brush after every meal! Ha ha ha!!
ReplyDeleteSeriously, I know what you mean, though. The other day I told someone that I went home and got drunk after a bad day, and they looked at me like I was some sort of homeless psychopath. *Is* that weird, to want to get a good buzz on, when you are a 36 year old mother??? Whoopsie.
If it's wrong I don't want to be right!
DeleteOh I know of what you speak. I have not exercised in god-knows-how-long and have a piece of chocolate cake on my desk. Which I will eat once I finish my salad.
ReplyDeleteI was on the ragged edge of losing it a few weeks ago and marvelled at how every other working mom seems to be able to keep it together. Then I called a college friend (and mom of two) and she regaled me with stories of her screwups and I felt much better.
All this as a way to say, you are pretty close to the mean here on your eating/ drinking/ etc. At least in my world view. (but maybe i'm not that lucid: I drink a fair amount of wine every night, too.) And I would guess that none of your seed-eating grad students are the mom of a 2 year old, too.
Yeah, sometimes I fear I eat worse than just about everybody. I love me some chocolate. And red meat. I will eat and drink anything. I have noticed that having a selective diet (not for reasons of allergy) is apparently a sign of enlightenment. There are people who don't eat fried foods, or don't eat sweets, or don't eat red meat, or don't drink alcohol, and they always seem to be very proud of their choices. Eating and drinking everything seems to make me some sort of unsophisticated glutton and alcoholic. I think this is a US thing, really, where it seems that restriction/control is considered a virtue in general. Food and drink are right there with sex as carnal and therefore something that's supposed to be reigned in.
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