Eating is a Learned Behavior

One of the interesting things I discovered recently is that eating is not instinctive - it is a learned behavior.

I was visiting the home of a friend, an occupational therapist who works with autistic children, when someone pointed out a book on her table. It was entitled Just Take a Bite: Easy Effective Answers to Food Aversions and Eating Challenges!

That's from a course I recently took, my friend explained, and she proceeded to tell us about children who refuse to eat, after experiencing some traumatic event, like choking while eating. Sometimes a medical problem had made eating unpleasant - some children, for example, repeatedly experience a burning sensation in their throats when they eat. Associating eating with unpleasantness, such children become fearful of eating - or eat only a limited selection of foods. If eating has not been a pleasant experience for them, they have to be taught (by pleasant food experiences) that eating is nothing to fear... (The old adage - When they're hungry they'll eat - does not work with children who associated eating with pain.)

Her explanation made me reflect on several of my own eating behaviors - such as my "need" to "reward" myself with rich, chocolaty food whenever I feel sad or tired. Do I associate chocolate treats with a positive adrenalin rush? Or does the taste simply make me feel better? I don't know, but I notice that - whenever I take my mother to a stressful medical appointment - I always crave a chocolate reward. (I mentioned this in a previous blog...)

But I also wondered about another eating experience I had last fall... I was visiting an aunt and uncle, both retired, staying at their home for about five days. My aunt, a wonderful cook, prepared most of the food. As usual I monitored my early morning blood sugar levels daily... What amazed me was that my early morning blood sugar readings were significantly better when I was staying at their home!

I returned home excited! Perhaps I had found the diet that works for me! I began to replicate what I had eaten at my aunt's house - rye bread with home-made jam for breakfast, coffee, orange juice. (As a type 2 diabetic, I don't often eat bread and jam - or drink juice - as they are high in carbs.) I prepared some of the same meals as I had eaten at my aunt's. But - here at my home - my blood sugar readings rose to unhealthy levels again!

Why? I pondered... Was there anything I had not accounted for...?

At my aunt's home, we would eat together, sitting around the table, chatting, during each meal. Perhaps it was not so much what I ate - but how I ate (i.e., in a relaxed, unhurried way, talking with my relatives) that made the difference.

Years of quickly preparing meals for my family, then repeatedly getting up during a meal to bring this and that to the table have made me into a person who eats quickly. I rarely relax and chat at mealtime. And, since Terry and I find ourselves hungry at different times, we don't eat all our m meals together.

Perhaps I have to relearn eating too: eating more slowly - making mealtime a pleasant, social experience - a relaxing time... in order to be healthy again.