To All The Foods I’ve Loved Before.

In the 2018 teen romance film, To All the Boys I Loved Before, high school junior Lara Jean Covey, writes letters to boys she loves locking them away in her closet, never to send. Until her younger sister finds them and decides to mail each one to the boy it addressed.  You can imagine the events that follow (if you haven’t seen it yet, I do recommend it!).  

When I watched this with a good friend of mine I told her, man, this makes me think of a lot of things like my relationship with food.  Our relationship with food, especially the food we obsess and pine for, is one we often try to lock up – never to be truly seen for what it is.  But what if we unlocked it?  What if we mailed the letter?  What if we got it all out in the open?  What would our life feel like then?

This is me, mailing my letter to all the foods I’ve loved before.

Dear Foods I’ve Loved Before,

For a long while, I classified you as bad, attaching some morality to you instead of focusing on the bigger questions and bigger truths.  

• You are inanimate.  
• You do not have thoughts or feelings.
• You do not have bodily sensations.
• You can’t even choose me.

And yet, you with the help of your friend who I like to refer to as “the matchmaker and fixer”, Marketing, we found each other and I loved you.  Oh cereal, you were my first.  Count Chocula, Cinnamon Toast Crunch, and Lucky Charms, we met when I was young, impressionable by your bright packaging and toys inside – I knew you had to be for me.  We met, and the rest was history.  I loved the sparkly, toasted wafers, the chocolate for breakfast, and the marshmallows.  I became addicted to the immediate highs I received from you – the jolt of energy as I got every last bite of you.  I literally ate you up!  After grad school when I moved away to another country I helplessly scanned the bright packaging in a language I did not understand until one day, I found someone just like you.  It was chocolate, crunch granola, so much more sophisticated.  I was living in Europe after all.  My fix was met and I returned nearly every day to sweep you off the shelf.  

Next, I’ll never forget when Marketing introduced me to “fat-free and low fat”.  Marketing pointed a finger at Fat and told me he was no good for me.  Marketing was always so in-the-know, so I believed him.  I did my best to not let Fat sit at my table, and whenever our paths crossed at a party or any place I couldn’t control  I immediately turned the other way.  Skim milk, fat-free yogurt, fat-free protein shakes, Diet Coke, low-fat instant microwaveable meals, low-fat mac-n-cheese – you all shared this great quality!  I became prideful having you in my hand, for all to see, I was with you.  You were my trend that helped me look good, and I was sure you were helping me feel good.  Without fat-free and low-fat I’m not sure what would’ve been left in my college diet. 

Oh, wait, of course I know what was left …Candy.  Oh, candy, Bottlecaps (strawberry and rootbeer I’m looking at you), Runts (banana, oh banana), and peanut butter M&Ms you guys were always in for a good time.  Do you remember when we would pull all-nighters and you were what got me through?  There’d be me, my books, and candy.  I could never have just one of you, as hard as I would try.  I had to have all of you.

Our 25-Year Relationship.

But over the course of our 25-year relationship, my high after seeing you was always short-lived.  My satisfaction and pleasure were quickly replaced with a gurgling in my belly.  My body was still hungry.  My body was craving nourishment, although I refused to recognize it like that at the time.

Angered I would tell myself “I just ate.  I’m not eating again right now.  I shouldn’t be hungry already.”

I placed the blame and shame on me, over and over again for years.

I went back for more of you, looking forward to the moment we’d meet again, and sometimes if I’m being honest I even dreamt of you.  I should’ve known the relationship was not built on solid ground because at times I would hide you.  I would hide the fact our paths ever crossed and only meet you when I was sure no one would know.  It’s a sad and shameful feeling hiding.  But, I’ll be the first to admit that the hiding within our relationship is on me.  It is on me for having believed so much of what diet culture prescribes, and so when I failed to meet “the standards”, I hid in shame.  In fact, you probably would’ve loved our relationship being more out in the open.  But I just couldn’t do it – at least not with some of you.

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