Food Avoidance
This isn’t about eating disorders, which is a very serious subject that I have no experience with. This is about avoiding eating certain food because it brings up negative associations or bad memories.
This past Saturday I ordered a hamburger in a restaurant. Doesn’t sound like a big deal. But it was for me. It has been decades since I did that but on Saturday, I knew I was ready and made the choice happily and eagerly. I’ve eaten plenty of hamburgers in my life. The usual fast food, grab it in a hurry, too tired to cook, too lazy to come up with a menu and on many occasions, upon leaving the rink after a child’s hockey game when there had been no time for a meal beforehand, just a bagel with cheese and hope there’s enough energy to get the kid through the game. But to sit at a table in a restaurant, look through a menu and say “oh I’ll have the hamburger please" that was just a no go zone for me.
When my parents separated and ultimately divorced when I was 15, it became the “routine” that every weekend belonged to my father. Correction, it wasn’t every weekend. It was every Saturday for a one hour lunch. The most he seemed able to spare. And it was the only contact we had - one hour on Saturday. Not court mandated - his choice. He would come to pick us up, my sister and me, and drive a very short distance to a local restaurant. Nothing fancy mind you, just the local little diner. The first time we enjoyed this momentous occasion, my sister and I were both apprehensive and a little nervous. Life had been contentious prior to the separation, and I had been somewhat of a catalyst for that. Another story, another time perhaps. Our father was a strict man and there was never any room for flexibility or that bit of freedom. When we looked over that menu, he immediately decided he’d have a hamburger. The next words were “how about the two of you, does that sound good?” and we both nodded our heads and said “sure, that would be great.” Our usual reflex response to his decisions. And the die was cast. Because every Saturday at noon after that it was hamburgers and fries with a coke for lunch. A squeaked out “well maybe I’ll have …” was cut short with, “but you love the hamburgers here” which were flat, tasteless, greasy and difficult to choke down. No one enjoyed that. But it was easier to just say “right” and cede the ground I’d tried to cover.
Those lunches lasted for just over 2 years when I had finally had enough and stopped not just the inane lunches where we were expected to describe our entire week in 30 minutes each but I ended the relationship with my father for a multitude of reasons.
From that point forward, the thought of ordering a hamburger never entered my head. Looking at that section on a menu would make me avert my eyes to another section and choose anything but. The image of that greasy spoon, the stilted conversation, the uncomfortable atmosphere has lived at the back of my mind for far too long.
I’ve changed in many ways over the last year. I’ve done the work of forgiving and purging old memories and old hurts. I’m no longer that young teenager forced to be in places I’d rather not be, forced to stand up for myself - and my sister - who never felt able to use her voice. So, this past Saturday I made the conscious decision to have a hamburger. I took the fries instead of a salad - I do eat fries but will usually choose a different side. But no Coke. Sorry that product has not passed my lips since I was 17. It was my father’s beverage of choice for his rye and general consumption.
And that hamburger? I relished every delicious bite. It was the taste of rebellion and freedom and me, taking back my life, making my own decision, not one made for me.