Yours Is Not Mine

When I joined Food Addicts in Recovery Anonymous (FA) in April 1998, I was married and childless, both by choice. I loved my husband, but couldn’t imagine wanting to bring a child into this horrible world with war, poverty, etc. After a couple years of abstinence, my view of the world had changed, as had my desire to have a child. As I’ve heard from others, parenting is simultaneously challenging and rewarding. It also provides a lot of humor.

When my son was five ,he would declare that he had to go to the bathroom at the very moment I got all our hot plates to the dinner table. It happened every single night. Every single night, despite the fact that he’d just been in there to wash his hands. Like with so many other phases we’d seen him go through, we just rolled with it.

However, one night, just after making his declaration and heading to the bathroom, he stopped in his tracks, turned, and said, “Dad, don't eat my food!” It could’ve been because my husband was sitting closest to him or, more obviously, because my husband did actually take his food from time to time.

We got a good laugh out of it and the story has been retold over the years. I am just so grateful that, because he knew, even at that age, that I weigh and measure my food and only eat food I’ve weighed and measured, “Mom, don ’ t eat my food, ” wouldn’t have made one bit of sense for him.