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Day 52: Should I Plan to Fall Off the Wagon?
Some experts in the field of addiction don’t recommend quitting cold turkey, which is what I did when I gave up candy and desserts on Feb. 28, 2010. They recommend tapering off slowly instead.
Still others say it’s OK to relapse now and then – meaning don’t feel all is lost, you can start again.
I even know someone who calls relapsing “field research,” meaning you find out how bad you feel when you go back to your favorite substance – thereby ensuring theoretically that you go back on the wagon.
Since I am reporting about going off sweets, I began thinking today – what if I planned to fall off the wagon on a set date, at the exact halfway point of my Year Without Candy?
What if I ate some of my favorite treats on that day, which would be Saturday, Aug. 28, 2010. Then the next day I would go right back to my candy and dessert-free regime and write about how my mind and body felt after being filled up with sugar again.
There’s an upside and downside to this.
Upside: I can eat stuff I love for one day! Legally, without lying on this blog. And of course, all in the name of research.
Downside: It won’t truly be A Year Without Candy. It’ll be a Year Minus a Day Without Candy. Plus the way I work is often all or nothing, black and white. I often get momentum and motivation from extreme situations. Also, what if I couldn’t get back on the wagon?
Mitigating factor: Who the hell cares? Most of us will be dead within 50 or 60 years. Could all our little goals, plans, petty complaints, laughable aspirations, earnest analysis, faithful blogging – be any more inconsequential? I think not.
I have a few months to consider whether to deliberately fall off the wagon – and what candies and desserts I will eat that day. I am not a binger – and sweets get sweet fast – so I must be judicious in my planning.
The Relapse Menu so far:
Breakfast: One or two freshly-baked Nestle’s Toll House cookies. NO NUTS! Why do people wreck the purity of this perfect food with walnuts and their ilk?
Lunch: Two fudge selections – to be mailed to me in time for Aug. 28 from Swiss Maid Fudge in Wisconsin. I hereby choose the peanut butter and chocolate fudge and the creme de menthe and chocolate fudge (also known as Irish fudge.)
High tea: Half the quantity of a box of Haviland thin chocolate peppermints from Rite-Aid in New York City. Cost of the box? $.99. Will also need to have them shipped to me if I am not in New York.
Dinner: A bowl of Haagen Dazs vanilla ice cream with a dollop of Nutella (there’s even a page for this killer combo on Facebook!)
Midnight snack: Gail’s buttered popcorn with embedded chocolate and butterscotch chips. (Photo currently unavailable.)
There you have it. I feel plumper and sated already.
Ready for a sugar-crash nap – if I could only see the shore.
Ta,
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