Why Can't I Stop?

Even as I leap from bed, I ask questions. How many minutes of power yoga will burn enough calories to exchange for two slices of multigrain toast? How big is that avocado in the fridge? Should I eat a third of the avocado or a fourth?

The questions pervade like the feed of exercise videos on my iPad. At 5:15 AM, I open my practice. Level: 2-3, Intensity Level: 4, “Sweaty, Fun Flow,” and for sixty minutes I salute the sun, lunge into my legs, chaturanga-to-plank-to-chaturanga again, and vinyasa. Halfway through, we hop-switch between lunges, and when the instructor tells me to stop, I wipe my brow and growl because she thinks I can’t take more. I hold plank during the three-minute savasana at the end. The seconds tick and my low back throbs. In the shower, I lather my scalp and strands of hair cling to my soapy fingers. After I brush my cheeks with bronzer, and after I write my gratitude list, I send an email and read a chapter of that Daniel Pink book that my principal recommended.

All this before breakfast. Two habits—exercise and reading—checked off in the planner. But even as I’ve moved, as I’ve marched from the bookshelf to the office to the kitchen and back again, even as I’ve punctured the keyboard and strangled the neck of a pen, all this time I’ve been thinking of nothing but the toast. Should I top the avocado with chickpeas? Half a cup will cost 134 calories, but I’ll earn 7 grams of protein. I want something sweet. Can I afford a few berries on the side?

The bread is in the oven getting crusty. I lunge to take it out. While it cools, I slit the avocado, unscrew each half from the pit, scoop out my portion—one-quarter this time—and smash it into the toast. If I’m adding chickpeas, I have to cut corners somewhere. I opt for hot sauce instead of that “Everything but the Bagel” seasoning. Too many sesame seeds, not worth the calories. I am not due for a run today, so I decide to skip the strawberries, opting instead for a handful of greens.

I bring my plate to my pink-and-silver placemat from Pier 1, the kind I envisioned I’d eat off of when I was little, dreaming of my own apartment and solitude. I sit with near-perfect posture, inspect each bit of toast with patience. Ezekiel 4:9 is the only brand I buy; it’s 80 calories per slice free of preservatives. I chew each grain and revel in the wholesomeness of a bread so pure. I let each square of salt sit on the surface of my tongue. I savor a few leaves of baby kale and glow from their color. I caress the chickpeas to a creamy paste. I swallow each bite before I take another one, and in between I cleanse my palate with a sip of water.

Sometimes, I close my eyes and pretend that time can stand still, that I can stay here at the table for the entire day, lingering while the sun reflects off the white pine surface of my kitchen island, illuminating the circumference of my plate.

***

People say that I eat slowly. I’m deliberate, I’m thoughtful. And they’re right.

What people don’t realize is that I’m also vigilant. While I eat, I keep track of all that I’ve accomplished: this morning, I swapped out the savasana for a three-minute plank, I sent that email to that student with the overbearing mother, I read a chapter of my book, and I cleaned my hair from the shower drain. Since I’m so busy, I prefer to eat alone. If I have to talk to someone across the table, I’ll forget all that I’ve done earlier that day. If I go up for seconds or shovel forkfuls in my mouth, it’s like I didn’t do any of those things at all. And if I’m not careful, I’ll miss the signal that my tank is nearly full, like when you stand at the gas pump, watching the price increase and listening for the stream to change its pitch just before the trigger clicks—a moment even more delicious than the toast itself.

When this happens, I halt my hands, finger a corner of toast on the plate, rise from my stool, and toss the scraps in the trash. A fierce protest commences in the pit of my stomach. Armed with the power of my veto, I stand aside and let the conflict rage, basking in my endurance. I’m winning a battle against myself.

***

What do I do between meals?

I left teaching, so I’m living with my dad in the Adirondacks. He calls me his kitchen elf; every morning, he fries a few eggs, and an hour later his pan is clean in the drying rack next to his coffee cup, his plate and his fork, the crumbs from his white bread toast wiped from the counter. After I clean, I open my planner and think of more things to add to the to-do list. When the pen is in my hand, I fill the dome of possibilities for the day with a catalogue of checkboxes. In extreme gaps—last Saturday, I went seven hours between breakfast and lunch—I break the hours into quarters, which are broken up in boxes of ambitious feats. Each task of determination is a fiery planet in the galaxy, its motion sedately plotted, imbued with immense significance. In the emails, the projects, the hikes, and the seven-mile runs which overtake the senses, my mind inches to transcendence, wiping out environment, reality, fragmenting slowly until it soars beyond the limits to superhuman status. Look at all that I accomplish when I’m hungry.

I let my body beg my brain, and I let my brain prolong the request. At 2 PM, I jiggle the jar of oats and dwell on the banana slices, the blueberries, the walnuts. I salivate. At around 3 or 4 PM, after I’ve sometimes done a hike or a run or a second yoga practice, but always after I’ve reached the 10,000-step mark on my FitBit, only then will I sit down to the oatmeal, the maple syrup, the blueberries like celebratory confetti.

At 9 PM I microwave half a sweet potato, top it with a quarter cup of chickpeas, a mountain of greens, some salsa, and a sprinkle of vegan cheese. the tortilla chips have cracked to uncountable pieces, and I estimate a conservative portion; by nighttime, I grant myself a little crunch. At 9:20, I sit down to dinner and listen to my brother and his friends, gabbing around the bonfire outside.

Why eat dinner so late?

If I eat at six or seven, or at that eager hour of 5:30, come bedtime I’ll be empty, lying awake until eleven, just to doze until sometime around one in the morning, when I’ll gasp awake in a sweat, cortisol seeping through my veins and my stomach screaming, begging either for time to speed up or for me to march to the cupboards and grab a few pretzels. Instead, I’ll count the hours until my alarm goes off, recall the yoga class that I selected for the morning, the pants that I’ll wear, the matching sports bra. more than anything, I’ll look forward to my oatmeal. What kind of nuts will I add for crunch? Or, more savory, should I spoon a bit of almond butter in the middle of the bowl? What fruit will go on top tomorrow? There are cherries on the kitchen table, and their running deep red juices run me back to sleep again.

***

Aside from sleep issues, women with hypothalamic amenorrhea (HA) are prone to a small array of long-term consequences. I’m twenty-seven years old, and I have low bone density in my lumbar spine. I think of it every time I hold my three-minute plank, my low back screaming in protest. this morning, when I descended the three-hundred-fifty-calorie-burning mountain that I climb every day, my hips cracked the whole way. After every shower I have to massage my scalp with rosemary oil, apple cider vinegar, and thickening spray. My friends are getting pregnant, and I haven’t had a period in two years.

Two years of this, and I am getting tired, so I’ve tried letting go. At dinner a few weeks ago, I went back for a second bowl of quinoa, black beans, and tomatoes. I think I even had another handful of chips for scooping. For the last few weeks, I’ve made it a point to eat ice cream every night, and last week, for three nights in a row, I slept right through until morning. At a Hannaford the other week, I glanced at the birds-eye view of myself in the camera at the self-check-out, and my scalp was mostly covered in a fresh crop of hair. My NP says that once I heal, my spine can start to rebuild. My period hasn’t come, but my hormones tested normal. People say that my rib cage no longer protrudes my skin, and honestly, I love that extra jiggle around my butt. I really do.

But the latest research also indicates that women with HA may be at a higher risk for dementia. And unlike most of the consequences of HA—low bone density, hair loss, infertility—it’s unclear whether or not your increased chances of dementia are reversible. That’s what really scares me. Every time I rack up seven hours between breakfast and lunch, every time my hands shake as I unscrew a jar of tahini, every time I march about the house, wondering where I left my keys and how many miles I have to run if I want to eat a handful of pretzels on the side of half a spinach sandwich, every time I read the same paragraph eight times over, too busy with the next meal to comprehend its contents, every time I march up the mountain, alone again because if I bring anyone they won’t go fast enough and I won’t burn enough calories to earn a scoop of vegan ice cream or a glass of chardonnay later—that’s when I start to ask questions.

Why can’t I stop? Why deprive and destroy my irreplaceable body in the name of such compulsion? Why forego everything else for the sake of winning a battle against myself? Only when I’m asking these questions am I pulled from the trance and forced to a standoff. Why let the mind control the body, when such control could cost you your mind?

Right when I’m about to answer these questions, I remember all that I’m supposed to do this evening. My laundry isn’t folded yet and I haven’t been out for a walk since 2 PM. Shouldn’t I hang that floral top and fit the sheets to my mattress and march up the hill before I start to cook dinner? And what should I have for dinner? If I extend the walk and hike the mountain again, have I earned a bit of avocado and chickpeas on toast? We’re getting vegan donuts from my favorite bakery tomorrow. Can I have half a donut instead of a quarter, if I wake up early and do a yoga practice? Which one should I do? For fifteen minutes I scroll through the options on my iPad.

The questions are just as determined and disciplined as I am, feeding insatiably on my time and on my mind. That’s why I can’t stop.