What's eating you? Rather, what are you eating?

Dr Abe V Rotor

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Eating with gusto (Vigan empanada)

In either case, you have a problem. A problem that's bothering you for sometime now. You may have adjusted to it somehow, but you still find difficulty counting sheep to get some sleep, or waking up without the Monday Blues. Time passes slowly in wasted hours and gloom. Even so you think the best healer is time and silence - which indeed may ease, but not erase, your pain and suffering. And prevent you from slipping into untoward consequences.

You lose weight, your eyes are sunken, and happy moods are getting few. You decline invitations, keep distance even from friends.

You lose appetite. Recipes you liked before are no longer appealing. You eat light and miss meals specially after taking a can or two of beer. And don't take one shot too many of that liquor. And stop smoking. You are anemic and suffer from ulcer symptoms. Don't let things get worse while early.

Take a break, a vacation if possible. Go back to your hobbies, your "favorite things." Evaluate your plans and priorities in life. Open up to your family and friends, go to your family doctor and get professional advice. Remember you are not alone with your case. There are millions like you - many even worse - all over the world. Learn from those who found their way out successfully.

Have you read "Hope for the flowers," by Paulas, "A Search for Meaning," by Victor Frankl? Or some classics like "Les Miserables," by Victor Hugo? Go watch good movies and TV programs. Turn on you favorite music. Why don't you write your thoughts and ideas?

Sooner ot later you will get away from what is eating you up.

There are people of your condition who take the other road. They indulge in food to the point that they become food addicts. They gain weight tremendously, many end up obese.

Analogous to the popular adage of knowing who you are by your friends, what you eat, and reveal what you feel at the moment.

For example, when you are angry you crave for meat, hard and crunchy foods. It's like releasing your anger with your teeth. Grrr.. Depression follows and you have sweet tooth. Just anything sweet. Truly, you need calories to perk your mood, and sugar readily goes into your bloodstream.

But in times of loneliness, which may include frustration in love life, you crave for anything that is filling like pasta and pansit. Bottomless iced tea, rice unlimited, anyone?

Your mood sways, this time you are stressed and you reach for anything salty. You can't eat without toyo, patis and a lot spices. Hot chili, please! Ah, tuyo and suka, for breakfast. Dinuguan for dinner. Green mango and bagoong alamang.

People who can't overcome their problems go for food as last resort. Or are they trapped to food addiction? Just being anxious and you look for ice cream, candies and cakes. Why? Isn't anxiety a prelude to discovery? When the brain is stimulated is there need of elevated calories supply?

Maybe, but there is no answer to the claim that a jealous person will crave for anything and everything. Food and others as well, I suppose.

What's really the problem with these two scenarios: What's eating you? and What are you eating that makes you obese? Pogo, a comic character says, "The problem is us."

The Man Who Ate Everything Ma Ceres P Doyo, (Sunday Inquirer Magazine May 29, 2011),