I'm a recordbreaker. If I detailed here the worst of my nights, it's possible some of you, even the ones who think of yourself as severely ill, wouldn't believe it. I've always been the sort of person who doesn't do things halfway, and eating has been no different.

I've been struggling especially hard ever the last nine months, and it got substantially worse when my cat died last October. On the surface it seems obvious - I'm unhappy, I'm grieving, so I eat, right?

Well, not really.

My daughter (8) has been a mess, off and on, since Tinker died. And I'm Mom, so when she cries about his death, my automatic emotional response is to slam a door shut on my own sadness and "deal with it later," if at all. So I can Be There For Her. You don't have to be a parent to know that drill. Frankly, it's a hell of a lot easier to do that than to live with the grief. Because if you feel grief, you are, by default, acknowledging a loss. And I've been fighting that for quite some time. I wish I could adequately express how much a part of my life that miserable *kitten* of a cat was, and had been, for years, and I wish I'd realized it sooner. Maybe that's part of it.

Couple of weeks ago my husband suggested strongly that it was time to start looking for a new cat. So we started looking, and that day I began to understand how very special my relationship had been with that damned cat. I couldn't expect to walk into a shelter and find another creature, another connection, like that one. I know, I know, it's a cat. So what? He was also one of my very best friends, had been for more than ten years, and had more personality in his ragged left ear than a lot of people I know.

At some point that day, or that week, I can't remember, I saw that I hadn't come anywhere close to acknowledging that Tinker was gone and was not coming back. I still try to avoid it in my head, try to wiggle out of the truth of it. Usually that's when cookies start to look good.

But something really odd has been happening lately. Lately, I've been going down the cookie aisle and through the bakery and instead of craving, I feel anger, and sadness, and betrayal. Because not one donut ever stopped my big boy from suffering, and from dying. No chocolate chip cookie is ever, EVER, going to bring him back.

And oh God, that hurts. I've been telling myself that now for almost two weeks and it still hurts. But that's okay. You know why?

Because it's supposed to.

Life isn't always fair, and it's sure as hell not always kind. It's almost never easy. But let's be honest, folks. No amount of fried chicken, french fries, donuts, soda, booze, cigarettes, or other distraction, is going to change that.

And for me, that's what food has been; one big distraction from truths I have not wanted to acknowledge.

Don't get me wrong. I have a wonderful, blessed life. But it's not fair to anyone for me to see what I want to see, and not all of it. When I eat, I not only distract myself by the physical act of eating to illness, but there's also the emotional and physical aftermath of it, and I know you all know what I mean.

"I feel so guilty. I'm so ashamed. I hate myself."

Does it ever change anything? Does any sort of food ever change anything? Will it bring back your loved ones, or rewind time so that you have a trauma-free childhood, or a good marriage, or make life fair and just?

No. It won't. And it won't even make you feel better about it. It just keeps you from looking at it for a little while.

Lately I've been looking. Nope, not fun. But try it sometime. Just try it. See what happens. It doesn't necessarily mean you're miserable 24-7. It just means you're looking.