How Was Your Yesterday, Sweet?

I’m going to say it started off after the gym - only because it’s a good marker. I felt ravenous, so I allowed myself to have a sandwich. No big deal. Later in the afternoon, I allowed myself another sandwich. Still, no big deal. Brown bread, a little protein, pickle -  all safe stuff. Sensible adult food.

Then came the school run. I picked up the kids and bought them both a treat — they could choose between a small bag of jelly babies or some sour candy. I asked my daughter for one sweet, which I placed in my mouth and sucked gently, savouring the sweetness. Normally, I’d chew it quickly and move on to another, but this one I lingered on, watching how it slowly dissolved. It was the only sweetness I was allowing myself for the day, and I was determined to appreciate it.

My son had chosen sour sweets. I asked for one of those too. That one disintegrated faster -  sweet, sharp, tangy. I could feel the little strips with my tongue. Fascinating. Hardly any calories in that, I reasoned, so I had another one. Just to check if it tasted the same. Then another from my daughter, for comparison. A small tasting panel, if you will.

I hadn’t been drinking lately, so I decided to have a small liqueur while cooking -  purely for the taste, of course. The Bolognese sauce tasted a bit bitter, so I added a spoon of sugar. Then another liqueur. Just to even things out.

After dinner, I was cranky. Irritable. I snapped at my daughter on a call, lecturing her about not working hard enough -  when in truth, I’d played hooky that afternoon. I wasn’t angry with her. I was angry with me.

Because I wanted something.

When the kids were still faffing about before bed, I raided their sweet cupboard. Jelly Babies. Sour strips. And — in a final act of sugar surrender — two small packets of white Oreos. I told myself I was just tidying up the kitchen, but the truth is, I was shovelling sweets into my mouth like I was making up for lost time.

The switch had flipped. The fuck it switch.

And in that moment, I realised: this is probably what an eating disorder looks like. Not the dramatic kind you read about in psychology textbooks, but the quiet, ordinary, middle-of-the-night kind - when your control slips through your fingers, and you watch yourself break your own rules in slow motion.

I woke up this morning heavy -  not just with sugar, but with shame. My first thought was, I really screwed the diet yesterday. Followed by, You’re disgusting. Then: I’ll start again today.

But maybe that’s the point. Maybe the problem isn’t the sweets. It’s the shame.

We talk so much about control -  fasting, willpower, “good” food versus “bad” food,  that we forget how much energy it takes to keep ourselves contained. Sometimes, what breaks the diet isn’t hunger, but loneliness. Or boredom. Or feeling helpless or the need to feel alive again, even for a moment.

The sugar rush wasn’t the reward - it was the release.

So today, I’m trying something different. Instead of restarting the cycle of guilt and discipline, I’m writing about it. Just noticing. For today, no grand declarations. No detoxes. Just curiosity. What was I really hungry for yesterday?

Because maybe self-awareness isn’t about fixing every slip. Maybe it’s about forgiving the one holding the sweets.

How was your yesterday, sweet?