Girl Against Food

On food issues, relationships, and - shit, I think my prefrontal cortex just developed.

Song of the week: Anemone by The Brian Jonestown Massacre

“I won’t let you down. Yes I will. Yes I will. Yes I will.”

I’m on the overground home, hurtling across London with hundreds of strangers in a lit up metal box against the dark sky. It’s my favourite time of day when the sun’s finally gone but left behind it’s imprint. Flushed faces and shiny foreheads, people’s eyes glistening during their conversations; either from their last beer or from falling in love. Hair stuck to their skin and curling at their necks, linen shirts damp, and bodies too close together, humming all the way home. Two men standing close to me laugh together about their evening, in their hands, a greasy takeaway lingers. He takes a bite. The red oil dripping over his fingers into the styrofoam. The sauce pooling at the corner of his mouth. Its overwhelming smell wafts under my nose. I feel fucking sick.

Eating and I have a problem, I’m not sure when it started. It’s one of my most tumultuous relationships, and like most of them, we fell in love fast. When I was a kid, my Mum worked weekends so my Dad and I used to spend our weekends reading newspapers with our breakfast. He’d read The Sunday Times and I’d flick through the supplementary magazines. I remember one time, we found a recipe for raspberry chocolate brownies. We took the clipping with us to Sainsbury’s and picked out the ingredients together, then we walked home slowly, before methodically baking it. It felt like the longest time in the world to wait for them to be done and then even longer in the mandatory cooling period. I’d watch them on the counter at eye level willing them to be ready faster. We’d then eat them together at the kitchen table next to each other, to me, food was always better when shared.

Food became the backbone of most relationships in my twenties, to cook together was to create together, an idea that is synonymous with love. When my first boyfriend and I broke up, I stopped eating altogether, I’m not sure why. Punishment maybe. After my friends and family became increasingly worried, it then became something I did out of necessity. I’d eat healthily to prove something. Chicken. Salmon. Rice. Broccoli. Chicken. Steak. Salmon. Asparagus. Yoghurt. Broccoli. Salad. Chicken. Salmon. Mince. Rice. Over and over and over until it all turned to flavourless concrete solidifying in the back of my throat. Disgusting mush. I’d choke it back everyday, cooking out of duty to keep myself alive. I’d only ever make more elaborate meals for the benefit of others; dates to impress or friends to keep full. I’m a real person, watch me eat.

“I’d been used to cooking for two and eating side by side with someone as we caught up on our day. Suddenly being single and living alone, meals suddenly felt pointless. To go to the shop, buy all of the ingredients, come home, cook it all up, eat it, and then clean it - how tiring is all of that for just me? So, I’d resort to easy meals like pasta with a store-bought sauce and sometimes skip dinner altogether to just have toast. Teri Hatcher’s ‘Burnt Toast’ talks about how often mothers fall into this habit of giving their children the good toast and rather than making more for themselves, they eat the burnt bits themselves. Somewhere along the way, I’d forgotten that I was a whole person on my own.” - Excerpt from my essay ‘How to be single’.

In my most recent relationship, it was the first time I had to look food in the eye in a while. He was a good cook, the kind that made me want to be better. I got pretty close to burying my problem under his plates of carbonara and bowls of ramen. In the beginning, I’d struggle to stomach it all, not knowing how to eat a whole plate. Then right before the unexpected end, it had started to feel natural again to eat rich foods, and be in love, and experience the world instead of watching it.

Now, suddenly, I’m single again on the overground, hurtling across London with hundreds of strangers and the idea of eating is making me sick again.

The good news however, is everytime the sun comes up, it means you can start again. So, today, I woke up and despite wanting to live off a toaster potato waffle, I put on some real clothes and I went to the shop. I walked there slowly, no need to rush. It’s a weekend and no one is waiting for me. No one else’s hunger but my own, I can eat whatever I want. I try to flex my fingers with this freedom as I get used to the idea of it being peace not prison.

The early summer heat beating down, I wanted to have a can of coke and a cigarette on my front steps, a genuine self-care routine your favourite influencers are hiding from you. Looking back at me from the fridge, I saw a bottle with the name Anthony slung across it and it felt like a sign, so today, I decided to make the most of my fresh start and make myself some good food.

Bourdain’s favourite sandwich

• a roll

• mortadella

• provolone cheese

• dijon mustard

• mayonnaise

£10.16 later, a bottle of coke and enough ingredients to live off the sandwich for about a week, I walked home to get to work. The only task I had to do was to focus just on this sandwich, no distractions. I scrunched the mortadella and fried it all twisted next to my roll toasting on the pan, then I put a slice of the cheese on top of the meat and watched it melt. I slathered on the mustard and mayo to my bread and constructed it together. Next, my only task was to eat the whole thing. No matter how long it took. And to my surprise, for the first time in a while, I ate the whole thing.

I got really good at surviving on my own, and becoming ‘healthy’, but I wasn’t really living. I want to be the type of person that loves food again, I want to be the type of person that wakes up early to have the ritual of enjoying it just for them, I want to eat a proper lunch and then make dinner with all of my friends. I want to have an appetite. I want to be hungry and then satiated then hungry again, and I want to find that beautiful.

-Shit, I think my prefrontal cortex just developed.