Dad's Birthday Lunch.

Today was my Dad's birthday lunch for his 86th birthday. My Mum is a great cook, and I usually come back from her house feeling like an overstuffed cushion! I really didn't want to feel like that, so I'll tell you how it all went.

I had a very small bowl of cereal at about 8.30 am which I didn't finish, as I had had enough.

So I was very hungry by the time I got over to Mum and Dad's at 1.30 having picked up my daughter and gone to the garden centre for some flowers.

We gave Dad his presents, said hello to everyone, and had some wine (I was driving, so only one glass for me!). Mum had put out a starter of smoked salmon, prawns and gravadlax for everyone to help themselves. This was good, as I could help myself to just a little bit, as I was starving by now!

Then came the main course, roast pork, potatoes, yorkshire pudding, vegetables, gravy. Again all the dishes were on the table, so I could just take what I wanted. I also made sure that I ate slowly, put my fork and knife down, and had a drink between mouthfuls. I was very concious of how full I was getting, and stopped when I had had enough. Mum had done lots of puddings, but I just had a little bit of profiterole, which I really enjoyed.

After that, chocolates and a birthday cake were produced, neither of which I was tempted to eat as by now I was as full as was comfortable.

I asked Mum if I could take a peice of cake home, and am sitting here at nine o'clock in the evening still feeling comfortably full!

Quite a succesful day, in all, and a good 'trial run', for Christmas!

Normal?!

I think I might be normal at last. Well a normal eater at least. (!) I'm not obsessing about food, I'm not binging, eating in the car, panicking, or obsessing.

I have gone through the stages of eating chocolate, cheese, cakes, ice cream, etc, and now tend to eat a fairly healthy selection of foods in normal portion sizes.

I don't wait for my husband to go out, or to bed, and then do wild snacking, and I don't raid the charity food box in the staffroom for chocolate coated brazils, and make myself sick on them in the car on the way home.

And I'm not worried about food at Christmas either!

Is this what being a normal eater is like?