It’s Always a Special Occasion

Sigh.  I just love sweets.  I just love them so, so much.  I always tell my husband that I want to open an ice cream parlor/crêperie, but methinks you can’t make money if you eat all of the product.  Sigh.

When there’s sugar around I can’t think about anything else until I’ve had some.  This extremely powerful “desire” (let’s not label it) goes back a long way.  I blame the problem on my parents, of course.  This is how the memory goes: When I was little, my parents took me to a candy store where I was allowed to fill a bag with whatever candy I wanted.  I couldn’t believe my luck.  Best parents ever!  I ate a few pieces and then my parents took the bag away and hid it somewhere.  Worst parents ever!  I looked for that bag of candy for years.  No exaggeration.  It was the early 80s and the cabinets in our kitchen had sliding wooden panels, each with a small circle into which you would insert a finger to slide the panel open.  I scaled that wall of cabinets like a Mount Everest climber, inserting my toes and fingers into the slots for support.  The elusive bag of sugar was never recovered.  As you can see, I’ve totally gotten over it.

From time to time, I get serious about reducing my sugar intake.  I even went so far as to convince myself that sugar is poison (I think it might be), but then I told one of my children that sugar is poison and she wondered why I would let her eat poison.  #parentfail.  So I had to eat sugar again, just to prove that it wasn’t actually poisonous.  Yes, that’s what I told myself.

I know (logically) that the only way to cut down on sugar is to cut it out completely, cold turkey, goodbye.  However, such a drastic move would be very difficult for me because there are so many special occasions on which I feel that it’s ok (maybe even necessary) to have sugar.  Below is a partial list of special occasions.  Let me know if you can spot the problem.

1. It’s Passover and I can’t eat bread.  Therefore, since I’m going to lose weight, I can eat as much sugar as I want.

2. It’s been a bad day.  Everything sucks.  I deserve something sweet to make me feel better.

3.  It’s been a great day.  I have so many friends.  And I’m so thin and beautiful.  I tried on clothes and I fit into a smaller size than I thought I would have.  I have the most successful Blog on the entire Internet.  Hell, I OWN the Internet!  I deserve something sweet to celebrate.

4. I picked up a box of cookies to bring to a friend’s house and all but two of the cookies had sprinkles.  I had to eat those two sprinkleless cookies because they were feeling left out.  Crazy???  Crazy considerate! 

5. It’s Sunday.  Sunday is the worst day of the week because the weekend is drawing to a close.  There’s wasn’t enough time to get everything done that needed to be done before the start of the week.  Monday will be here momentarily and we’ll be back to the grind.  I deserve some sugar to make me feel better.

6.  It’s Monday.  There’s way too much to do.  I’m stressed.  I deserve some sugar.

7.  It’s Tuesday.  Forget about Sunday!  Tuesday is actually the worst day of the week.  Tuesday doesn’t bring anything to the table.  At least Monday goes by quickly because there’s so much to do.  Tuesday stinks.  I deserve something sweet for putting up with Tuesday.

8.  It’s Wednesday!   The week is more than halfway over.  Time to celebrate with a little sugar!

9.  It’s Thursday.  Thursday is awesome because when I was in Middle School I had double English on Thursdays and English was my favorite class.  Thursday deserves to be celebrated.  Sugar time!

10.  TGIF!  Sugar.

11.  Saturday.  Ah, Saturday.  The weekend has just begun, we’re spending time with family and friends.  Life is good.  Let’s celebrate with a sweet treat.

12. It’s my birthday!  We’re having cake.  Lots and lots of cake.

13. It’s my daughter’s birthday!  My son’s birthday!  My husband’s birthday!  That random guy on the street–I’m sure it’s his birthday too!

14. I just did a cleanse.  Nothing but liquid for two days.  It sucked.  But, my pants are looser and I got a lot of veggies in, so guess what I deserve???

15. There’s a bake sale at school and the money is going to be donated to a great cause.

16. It’s my son’s school’s benefit and the benefit chairs spent hours setting up the dessert tables.  It would be rude to walk right by them.

17. I just sat through the longest, most boring, most painful, most deserving-of- an-eye-roll meeting, and I managed not to roll my eyes (externally) more than 10 times.  I deserve a reward.

18. I’m at an outdoor birthday party in October in the rain and the hosts didn’t have the forethought to provide hot drinks.  I deserve to give someone a smack but, since that’s not socially acceptable, I’ll have two pieces of birthday cake instead.  I’ll show them!

And so it goes.

What are you trying to cut down on?  What are your excuses for not giving it up?  What are your suggestions for cutting something “bad” out of your life?