Well, this week I tried again to eat trail mix, and found I still could not just leave it alone after a few bites. The trail mix I bought was 50 calories per tablespoon, so I couldn't eat very much of it without going overboard. But having it sitting there in my cubicle, I just kept going back to it until I found and ate all the chocolate candy pieces and the almonds and the cranberries--the stuff I liked. I did finally throw the peanuts and raisins away. But I'm sure my "experiment" amounted to 300 or more extra calories consumed.
But it wasn't just the calories; it was the loss of control and the unhappy realization that I can't just lightly snack on anything that has chocolate candy in it. I also had a piece of Indian New Year coffee cake that one of my coworkers brought in. It was good, and I didn't feel out of control eating it, but it was extra. Plus, this week I didn't exercise every day as I usually do, so it's no wonder I gained almost a pound.
Apparently, I'm still at the lowest coping level with chocolate candy: Level VII - Avoiding or eliminating the stimulus. Will it ever change? I don't know, but I guess I need to stop testing myself until I'm really ready to take on the challenge, using Shirley Simon's zeroing-in technique.
Shirley's technique with cherry pie (her nemesis) was to very gradually ascend through the coping levels, from highest to lowest:
I. Face to face without any help
II. Face to face under safe conditions
III. Competing response: keep your hands busy
IV. Competing response: keep your mouth busy
V. Competing response: eat the right food
VI. Making the stimulus hard to get
VII. Avoiding or eliminating the stimulus
She started out at level VII and then gradually took on cherry pie at the various levels: bringing it into the house but not eating it, and showing that she could be around the pie by doing other things such as eating fruit or drinking coffee. When she finally reached level I, she could eat a small piece of pie and not eat any more of it, in private with no help from hubby.
Do I want to have that kind of control over chocolate candy? It would mean having only one piece of chocolate a week, for instance. Right now I'm thinking, what's the point? But that says to me that chocolate is not food, it's a drug, since the only way to consume it is to overconsume it to obtain whatever effect it provides. Can one obtain that effect from just one piece of chocolate? That's a good question. But a better one is: Why risk it?
It's like the question of drinking coffee with caffeine or not, or even drinking coffee at all. There are benefits to caffeine; it stimulates the brain and possibly the metabolism. Coffee tastes good, even if it's decaffeinated. But the consequences for me are an increase in heart flutters and a painful bladder. I don't know if the benefits outweigh the harms.
If I ask the same question about chocolate, what do I answer? Benefits: good feeling, taste bud pleasure. Harms: eat too much and gain weight, put too much fat into body, hurt bladder. If I could eat just a little chocolate, would I get the same amount of benefit? I don't think so. I suspect that the benefit comes from eating a lot of chocolate. As it turns out, people have done studies on that question (mostly funded by candy companies). Here's one website's review of the chocolate research: Chocolate's Potential Health Benefits.
I found the word "potential" in the title to be important because when I look at the research as a whole, the results are inconclusive, and there still lingers the question of how much chocolate is enough. If the amount that produces benefits will also produce obesity and fat-related illnesses, is it worth it? And if the benefit-producing amount is small, can a chocolate-addicted person stop at that amount?
I think I'll just stick with other healthy foods for now and leave chocolate alone. Maybe someday I'll take it on and get to coping level one. In the meantime . . .
I'm hoping to have a less challenging week coming up. Wish me luck.
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