Urges, Cravings, And Impulses

Hey, I survived The Dentist! My teeth are finally squared away and good to go for another six months. So by Dentist’s orders I’m supposed to be eating soup, or oatmeal, or j-ello or some other food that resembles more of a liquid state than a solid. Of course I want none of the above and I’m starving; I’m actually in the mood for Panda’s orange chicken and fried rice. I think my appetite has the maturity level of a five year old. You tell it, “No you can’t have that” and I instantly crave whatever food is off limits. Actually, for some reason I’ve been having cravings for not so healthy foods for the past couple of days. I’ll be sitting at my desk working and then all of a sudden I’ll think about pancakes with butter and maple syrup. What the hell is that? Does that happen to everybody? Where a picture of food pops into your head and you almost can smell and taste it? It’s been happening a lot lately and I can’t even blame TOM for these cravings. Arrgh! I hate when I get like this; I never know what to do. Should I ignore the cravings or is that going to set me up for a binge? Should I eat a small amount to satisfy the craving or will one bite turn into a week of crap eating? I notice that the cravings are centered around comfort food: mashed potatoes and gravy, chicken fried steak, Burger King croissan’wiches. If it’s battered, deep fried, filled with sugar or made of white flour then I’ve been fantasizing about it. And it’s not just the food itself but it’s also the urge to just eat anything I want without thinking about its nutritional value. I feel like just eating until I’m stuffed and not thinking about how many calories I put away. I don’t know, I’ve been under a lot of stress lately and that’s probably where it’s all stemming from. Ok, I’m going to go ahead and post this now. Funny, it never fails that as soon as I’m done writing I already begin to feel better! I’m just hoping that the urge to eat like hell goes away soon. At the rate I’ve been thinking about crappy food I’ll probably end up breaking down and finding myself at an IHOP at 3 am, face down in a stack of golden flapjacks.