I called Aunt Bessie to check on her persistent cough the other day. I think it is due to allergies, but she doesn’t believe in such things. Allergies exist only in one’s head, which includes allergies to cats and food. My poor brother-in-law is weak because he can’t be around cats. I suppose those puffy eyes and inability to breathe is really just some character flaw rather than a medical condition. We talked for a minute and then she mentioned the letter I sent her:
That’s how it begins. First it starts with some healthy food that I can have, and then she will bring the cookies and cakes too and if you take one then you have to take it all and then the cycle degenerates into the same habits of old. Doesn’t Steppenwolf have a song about this?
Break over? Isn’t that the problem with weight loss? We work hard, lose a bit of weight, then we get tired, give in and gain back the weight plus a few more pounds to boot? She’s not talking about my losing weight. She’s talking, deep down inside, about her compulsive desire to feed me. If she just waits me out she will be able to feed me again, just like the old days, and then she can have the life she wants – not the life that is healthy for me. She’s prepared to sabotage me later on the down the road and just letting me know about it. It’s always been this way with her.
No one understands that except my family. Everyone in our family gets Aunt Bessie. We know how she works and are used to it. She doesn’t show those sides to people outside the family. To the rest of the world she presents as the finest, most caring little old lady with lots of spunk. That cute spunk to the rest of the world is translated to control and domination to the immediate family. My parents, sister, other aunt, several cousins and her siblings see it, but no one else does. The domination is something one has to experience to truly understand.
I don’t know what’s harder: resisting my eating addiction or resisting the relentless pursuit to ensure my health failure by my Aunt Bessie. She is bound and determined to watch me fall flat on my fat and wallow in my own utter inability to control my hunger.
That’s how it feels anyway, but the truth is it really has less to do with my failure and more to do with her desire to wield control over me. She is more concerned with her feelings than my health. It is all about control. The only rules to be made are those that she imposes on others. She doesn’t take kindly to anyone else setting rules, even if those rules do not affect her directly.
In some very dysfunctional way, she enjoys seeing others struggle and fail. It gives her a sense of peace knowing that she is in utter control of her life while we are not in control of ours, giving her fodder to discuss our shortcomings when and with whom she chooses. Usually that discussion is held until there is a audience around, with you standing aside and taking the lashing by her cat-of-nine-tails.
My making a rule about only eating healthy food and ridding my own home of junk food is perceived as an affront to her. We need sugar. My daughter needs sugar. She will miss out on needed vitamins and minerals. Forget about the fact that cookies and gravy contain no essential minerals and nutrients. We need them, by golly, and I am depriving my daughter of these things. She will become malnourished if she doesn’t get cakes and chicken fried steaks.
But Aunt Bessie is determined. She has made known that it will be okay for me to break over soon and she expects me to return to my old ways. And who will be there during my weak times, when I am ready to give up and succumb to my urges to gorge, but my old pusher, Aunt Bessie, with a basket full of biscuits and gravy, and a cobbler or two. Then she will have her old eating buddy back and all will be right with the world.
“I got your letter,” she said to me in a pleasant voice.
“Oh yeah?” I responded. I said nothing more about it, giving her the chance to talk only if she chose.
“I went to the store today,” she responded. And here it comes my friends. Hatches are securely battoned down. “I bought some chicken thighs like you had the other day.”
Says I: “uh huh.”
“I won’t bring them to you.”
My God, the letter worked? I am actually making progress? She gets it; she really gets it? I was so hopeful until she made her real intensions known. She found a loophole in my rule and is just letting me know who is the real boss.
“I won’t bring them down there. You can come here to get them. I know you like them; they are the same kind you cooked the other day.”
That’s how it begins. First it starts with some healthy food that I can have, and then she will bring the cookies and cakes too and if you take one then you have to take it all and then the cycle degenerates into the same habits of old. Doesn’t Steppenwolf have a song about this?
“Yeah, well, I uh, well … Aunt Bessie we’ve decided to not accept any food or groceries from anyone. That just makes it easier. It’s too hard otherwise.” I thought that was a good response to her – proper, kind and still keeping my ground.
“I know it’s hard,” she says. “I guess that’s what you have to do … for now.” I didn’t fall for it this time. “Soon you will get in the habit and lose a little bit of weight and then you can break over.”
Break over? Isn’t that the problem with weight loss? We work hard, lose a bit of weight, then we get tired, give in and gain back the weight plus a few more pounds to boot? She’s not talking about my losing weight. She’s talking, deep down inside, about her compulsive desire to feed me. If she just waits me out she will be able to feed me again, just like the old days, and then she can have the life she wants – not the life that is healthy for me. She’s prepared to sabotage me later on the down the road and just letting me know about it. It’s always been this way with her.
No one understands that except my family. Everyone in our family gets Aunt Bessie. We know how she works and are used to it. She doesn’t show those sides to people outside the family. To the rest of the world she presents as the finest, most caring little old lady with lots of spunk. That cute spunk to the rest of the world is translated to control and domination to the immediate family. My parents, sister, other aunt, several cousins and her siblings see it, but no one else does. The domination is something one has to experience to truly understand.
I don’t know what’s harder: resisting my eating addiction or resisting the relentless pursuit to ensure my health failure by my Aunt Bessie. She is bound and determined to watch me fall flat on my fat and wallow in my own utter inability to control my hunger.
That’s how it feels anyway, but the truth is it really has less to do with my failure and more to do with her desire to wield control over me. She is more concerned with her feelings than my health. It is all about control. The only rules to be made are those that she imposes on others. She doesn’t take kindly to anyone else setting rules, even if those rules do not affect her directly.
In some very dysfunctional way, she enjoys seeing others struggle and fail. It gives her a sense of peace knowing that she is in utter control of her life while we are not in control of ours, giving her fodder to discuss our shortcomings when and with whom she chooses. Usually that discussion is held until there is a audience around, with you standing aside and taking the lashing by her cat-of-nine-tails.
My making a rule about only eating healthy food and ridding my own home of junk food is perceived as an affront to her. We need sugar. My daughter needs sugar. She will miss out on needed vitamins and minerals. Forget about the fact that cookies and gravy contain no essential minerals and nutrients. We need them, by golly, and I am depriving my daughter of these things. She will become malnourished if she doesn’t get cakes and chicken fried steaks.
But Aunt Bessie is determined. She has made known that it will be okay for me to break over soon and she expects me to return to my old ways. And who will be there during my weak times, when I am ready to give up and succumb to my urges to gorge, but my old pusher, Aunt Bessie, with a basket full of biscuits and gravy, and a cobbler or two. Then she will have her old eating buddy back and all will be right with the world.
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