First Date Eating

I was watching something on TV today where women confessed that they ate much less on a first date than they did normally so they did not appear to be pig like.  One woman went on to say that it she ate differently in public in general than she did at home alone.  She knew that standing over the kitchen sink eating spoonfuls of peanut butter from the jar would horrify anyone who saw her doing it.

I got to thinking about how concerned people are about having his or her eating habits judged.  We don’t want people to see how we eat when we do it badly, unless you are a competitive eater, like those people who eat thirty hot dogs in five minutes.  But for many of us, appearing to have a smaller appetite or making healthier choices, at least when we are in public, seems to be important.

If you were able to go out to lunch with a girl friend and be satisfied with a green salad with grilled chicken would you make that your choice if you were alone?  As long as you don’t go home and eat six Oreos after lunch because you are starving you know that the salad lunch was really all your body needed.  No body needs, Oreos, they are a want item.

So the challenge is to try and eat all your meals and snacks as if you are on a first date.  Let’s not say a blind date because if you discover in the first five minutes you hate the guy then who cares what and how much you eat.  Think of the date as someone you really like, then what would you eat, and do it.

It has been twenty-two years since I have been on a first date, but I still remember what it felt like.  If I did not want to do anything horrifying then, I think I would still not like to scare my husband now because I happen to like him even more now than I did then.

If you have a problem with eating from the jar over the sink take a video with your phone of yourself doing it and play it back.  I am sure you can cure yourself of that habit if you saw what it looked like.  I’ll experiment with the first date line of thinking when I’m out and report back if it helps me eat less, but more importantly I will try it at home when I am alone.  Being conscious of what and how much I’m eating is all I’m striving for.