Lawd!
My cravings have come back. As soon as I walked into Starbucks this evening, I heard voices. And those voices weren’t the ones in my head telling me that it was going to be ok, that the day would be ending soon and I wouldn’t have to stress no longer, not for seven hours at least, about not craving artificial sugar.
No, these voices sounded like they were coming from somewhere near the cash register. They sounded like that plant in Little Shop of Horrors, but instead of “Feed Me” it was clearly telling me, “Come git me.” I looked around and saw the bag of sea salt kettle chips. It winced a little when I acknowledged that I heard it with a mean glare. And that’s when I heard the other voices.
The oversized chocolate chip cookies sitting pretty in their brown wrappers took it a step further. They called my name! They exclaimed, “Zor, you know you want me,” as seductive as a pussy cat in heat.
I ignored them all though. I had just eaten an apple cinnamon rice cake in the car before I went in so my taste for sweets was already satisfied. But after purchasing my vanilla tea, I turned my back to get some milk when I heard the kettle chips crying. That’s it. I had had enough. I immediately turned around and ask it to “Shet up!”
It was at that moment that I asked my friend if she could hear the voices too. She said she could not.
So, it is day 13 of the year and I am still hearing voices from potato chips and chocolate wrappers. They had gone away for a good while, it seemed, but now they’re back. I think what set it off was that I was unprepared at work earlier this week. I wanted a midday dessert after my lunch and I didn’t have any fruit or other homemade desserts in my bag to back me up. I was unprepared! So I went to the snack shop at work and bought a strawberry nutri-grain bar. Sounds healthy but it’s got like 50 ingredients (bad sign!) like high fructose corn syrup, and a litany of others that I can’t pronounce.
I think that one nutrigrain bar reminded my taste buds of what artificial sugar tastes like. Every since that day I have been phening for sugary things. And I’ve bought one of those 90 calorie granola bars from Quaker Oats everyday this week. They are a bit more nutritious, but only by a bit.
This addiction to sugar is like that of an alcoholic’s, I see. You have one taste and you are in danger of relapsing. And now begins the work to get the sugar out of my memory again.
I wonder if there is a place where sugar addicts can go for support each week. I need a sponsor!
