Dear First name / friend
I want to say I have a complicated relationship with food, but it's difficult to write that without considering whether, in fact, we all do. I challenge you not to have a somewhat accordion-like relationship with food in a world in which processed foods are ubiquitous and obesity has become a global epidemic.
How do we retain some sense of normality around our food habits when advice about healthy eating is not only constantly forced down our throats, but also confusing and conflicting? Even as a medical doctor, I often find it difficult to advise about the best foods for, say, high cholesterol and generally give some variation of: cholesterol is mostly genetic; eat as little processed food as possible; adopt a predominantly wholefoods plant-based (WFPB) diet, with some Mediterranean touches thrown in (unsalted nuts, seeds, extra virgin olive oil). Dr Chatterjee's advice of choosing foods with fewer than five ingredients and my supervisor's go-to of “only eat what your grandma would recognise as food” are also two pretty good mantras to live by.
This train of thought has been set off a book I bought this week called Hungry Heart: A Story of Food and Love by Clare Finney. I bought it precisely because I was looking for some way to rekindle my relationship with food and I happened to walk past it in a shop window (CookBookBake, if you're a Hove local).
It upsets me that a book can be published when it contains significant and repeated grammatical errors, typos and generally plays fast and loose with any understanding of hyphens v. colons v. semicolons (although I'll admit sometimes the latter does get me sometimes; I'm not perfect). That said, there are many beautiful turns of phrase that Finney uses and although sometimes the debate between food and love gets a little confused (this is turning into an unexpected book review…) for the most part this is a comforting, honest and clearly thought-provoking read: “I have found food is inextricable from - even equivalent to - love, to the point where knowing where food ends and love starts feels impossible”.
I don't have a straightforward relationship with food, and I wonder whether you don't either. Food is wrapped up in memory and relationships and is, therefore, deeply emotive, complex and rooted in childhood. How can anyone then claim to have a perfect relationship with it? Then you add in a dash of social media, a sprinkling of consumerism and a splash of health journalism and you've got yourself quite the confused dish.
For me, my difficulties with food are not borne of a desire to be slim (although in this age of social media, can we ever exclude that completely?) but of many complicated strands of emotion. To give you an example, I stopped eating bacon and sausages after my dad died in 2012. I had not long watched a Michael Moseley documentary about how two rashers of bacon is the equivalent to losing 30 minutes of your life. In my 18 year-old brain, I seemingly conflated the two events and suddenly found myself with this new rule of food exclusion which gave me some temporary feeling of control.
When I first became pescetarian, I used to describe the decision as 50% environmental and 50% health. After my yoga teaching training, this was split into thirds with ethical reasoning. Interestingly, health wins over ethics when it comes to eating fish. Why? Probably because at the back of my mind is this fear I have that with my family history of early cardiac death, eating well is surely paramount? If my dad hadn't enjoyed his Lurpak (daily) and Sugar Puffs (only at weekends) would he still be here? Of course, that seems wildly reductionist to say, and I'm strikingly aware of the voice of my inner child - or at least that grieving 18 year-old - but you can start to get a sense of how complicated our food choices can become. Living alone and a lack of pre-planning only adds to this.
Our relationship with food is complex; there is more to this than we could possibly begin to uncover in one book, let alone one newsletter. Parenting, culture, religion, faith, trauma - these things all play their part.
Mindful moment: What is your relationship like with food? Do you understand how everything from childhood to social media influence the decisions you make every day? How does grief, loss and trauma come into it? Where is fear? Guilt? And have you set a place at the table for joy, friendship, love and comfort? Do you eat differently when you're sad, alone, relaxed or in a group setting? Ultimately, I'm learning that the food we choose to eat is a reflection of our psychological wellbeing. How do I show myself love if I choose not to eat? How do I show myself care if I eat foods I know aren't nourishing or which make me feel unhappy? I'm starting to see that our diet is a mirror to our inner psyche and a fundamental expression of how we give and receive love. How do you show yourself love and care through food? Do you?
