Supposedly a Buddhist story:

Two monks are traveling together along the road. They come to a river crossing, where a woman is struggling to get across. She asks them for help. These monks are not supposed to touch women, but one of the monks picks her up and carries her on his back across the river. There he puts her down, and the monks go on their way.

The other monk is silent as they walk on for over an hour. Finally he says, "You know, you broke your vow back there. It was inappropriate for you to carry that woman." The monk who did the carrying stops and looks at him. Then he says, "My friend, I carried that woman and put her down over an hour ago, but clearly you are still carrying her. You must be very tired."

So... even though it might not be a matter of guilt, one wonders why that piece of apple pie has taken on a "life of its own."

I like the story, but think the meaning doesn't apply. In the story, there are two monks. Monk one takes the action, moves on. Monk two is still carrying it an hour later - it wasn't his action he was commenting on, he is judging someone else for theirs.

Saef isn't casting judgement on another, she is commenting on her own actions. And in a rather matter of fact fashion, not with what seems like excessive guilt. More resignation? Or just a fact of it.

I think we all have that judgmental monk inside us, chastising us when we "do wrong." The story uses two monks because it's hard to make the point without setting up a dichotomy between two views.

saef, I don't know whether you feel guilty about the pie or not. I hope not! But, it does seem to be clearly in your mind when you are mentioning your weight increase post-vacation. As Shannon says, perhaps it's just resignation.

When I met that piece of apple pie again (and I am rather sorry that I never met it in the flesh, so to speak, as I think we could have got on rather nicely), I believed that saef was using it to remind us of her recent time away which involved challenging travel and challenging relatives. She told us about the apple pie incident in detail but I seem to remember the trip involved other difficulties too. So I saw the apple pie as a metaphor.

Talking of challenging travel and relatives, I am having a difficult time coming down after my recent journey to my aunt's funeral. I built in good support things for me, I ate properly, I slept well. I'm fairly certain it's not the funeral bit. What I'm homing in on is that certain members of my family really wind me up. I had similar feelings after the previous funeral and so I thought I'd taken precautions this time. Obviously not enough. I think I should be a bit more Zen when I'm in the vicinity of certain people. At the moment I'm pacing about, grumbling and swearing. Clearly, I'd rather not be doing this.

I'm confident I'll be back to this soon enough but it's horrible in the meantime.

JayEll:I hope so, too. I don't mean to make you sad. I'm just putting out there what my experience is. There are people out there who read these things and relate to them, and find my experience closer to theirs. This is for me, and for them, too, as we figure out how to live after losing more than 100 pounds.

And no, I don't feel guilty about having eaten the slice of pie. It wasn't a binge. Binges bring out more guilt in me. It was offered; I could have passed on it with thanks and a compliment regarding how nice it looked. I often say "no" to food that family offers. But I see the slice of pie as a concrete example of my trying to eat more normally, to loosen up my restrictions. There are other instances of late when I've done this, but they're less vivid, and I haven't shared them here in a story. To me, it's just one moment in several months of continuous behaviors that tell me that for me, eating "normally" leads to weight gain.

Anyway, I don't know if I understand what "normal" is anymore. Maybe I've never eaten normally. I ate myself up over 250 pounds; was that normal? There is no past Edenic state for me, no memory of eating "normally" that I could return to, which would tell me what my weight "ought" to be.

My normal is not everyone's normal. My usual routine, which has come to feel normal, is stressful, and when I am stressed out by traveling, by relatives or by work, I either restrict -- or I eat more -- but I'm less conscious of doing so because, on some level, I'm fixating on the thing that's bothering me rather than the act of eating or not eating.

So now I'm reacting to stress by eating, rather than NOT eating, and I don't like that. That was partly what made me fat before.

I don't want life to consist of hard workouts that keep me muscled but never quite burn off binge calories. I hate to think I am going in that direction.

Birchie - regarding members of your family winding you up... My family does the same to me. We are very dissimilar personally and politically, and holidays often stress me as much as anything else. If you do master the Zen around yours, please share the technique with me.

Good point on the two monks inside each of us, Jay. I read it very literally and didn't think of that, but I definitely have the judging one talking inside my head often.

I also read the tone of resignation in some of your comments Saef from my own experiences, I suppose. I have also tried to be 'normal' and had it backfire. Like you, I'm not sure I know what normal is anymore. I'm trying to make my normal less stressful.

I'm currently considering developing a kind of zone of peace around myself which people are unable to get into. Within the zone of peace I'll be taking my time and being relaxed, and the nitwits will just have to wait. I used to have a ring of fire which worked really well but now I'm all grown up and mature it's not the best choice going. Luckily, there are only a few of these nitwits and I hardly ever see them but I do need to have a better plan in case life changes a bit and they become more involved.

Do you think Obamacare will come up as a topic of conversation, Shannon? It seems such a fraught subject with lots of scope for trouble-making.

Yes, yes I do. Or something about the economy being destroyed by the liberals forcing banks to make bad home loans, or Obama being a socialist, or immigration reform, or whatever else. Though right now probably the ACA or the immigration issue more than anything else. I've avoided family events sometimes rather than have the conversations. As I've grown and really come to understand my views I've become more confident and will take on a conversation, but sometimes people want to attack rather than discuss. Even people I'm related to and should be able to trust. Politics often brings out the worst of us.

I love your zone of peace, though the firewall image is nice too.

Politics and religion (IMO).

I'll discuss both with my FIL because he has opinions similar to my own but there are a few times when I just have to back away. With other people, those who don't see things the same as I do, I just stay mute and smile and eventually walk away.

I've been attempting normalcy in eating since we came back from our vacation. I suppose I'm winning as I haven't gained anything. Certain days I actually see a loss, but it doesn't stay away for long. But yeah, I'm not dieting or doing anything close to it. I eat healthy and I don't turn anything down, however desserts are still few and far between but that's because they aren't necessary to me.

Re staying away from nitwits I have just invited my cousins and their spouses to dinner at my new home - first time ever as we finally have enough space to entertain people for dinner.

My one cousin's wife several weeks ago suggested that DH and I do Christmas for 16+ people at our house. I politely said no, not this year but next.

So guess which cousin has not RSVP'd to the dinner invite? SIGH.

I suppose I should be dismayed but I'm not. He and his wife were the ones who liked my dad and their views of most things in the world are far, far away from mine and DH's. So if they boycott coming to my house to them.

Birchie It would defiinitely be a ring of fire for these two relations of mine - in Shannon's words - BAH!

Dagmar

Hot topic this: "regarding members of your family winding you up."

I'm headed off next June to visit with some cousins. One devotes all his energy trying to wind up his Boston cousin, me, with Fox News sound bites. It's not even an attempt at a discussion, it's like having a conversation with Ann Coulter in attack mode. The most interesting part to me is that he has no idea what I think; he's pegged me as a blue-state-liberal to be taken down. Since I've never risen to his bait, I can't figure out what's in it for him. Eventually other cousins tell him to shut up and life goes on.

My family grits their teeth and is polite (otherwise knows as too "chicken" to speak up) whenever someone says anything inflammatory. We put up with my dad's racism, mysoginy, homophobia, etc. for many, many years. We all started cringing whenever he spoke up but none of us answered back or stood up to him.

Dagmar

I'll google this person when I feel a bit stronger.

I remember once saying to a friend, 'Don't look for sense where there is none.' I think I'll start to take my own advice. But two things (three people) niggle me. One is 'emotional intelligence' - how can you promote this as an excellent business thingy and yet show little yourself? The second is why bother being very managing and noisy when you are actually a new member of the extended family? This gets in the way of other quieter conversations which would be nice to have. (And, by the way, it's pointless trying to bond with me about children.)

Space and quietness are powerful weapons. Bill's use of passive resistance is quite laudable but it gives me a headache sometimes. Sometimes I feel I have to try to take control of the situation otherwise I will end up where I don't want to be.

The good news is that I'm not eating too much.

The SO will be back soon with his own version of family PTSD. The DB has told me not to swear so I'm doing it under my breath. Walking wounded, I tell you. I prescribe a routine of clean eating, regular gymn visits and time in the open air for myself this week.

Yesterday I went to my Grandmother's 90th b-day party. I knew I would encounter this B!tch of a cousin who made all these snarky comments on Facebook - on other people's pages but where she knew I would see it - about me and the party I hosted for the whole family this summer.

As is my instinct I tried to think of all these passive-aggressive ways I could get "revenge" during the 2 hour drive down there.

But by the time I got there, I just didn't want the whole drama of it. So instead I just was very casual and nice to her. This obviously threw her completely off and you could tell she was extremely embarrassed.

Now she's posting all kinds of supportive and wonderful and supportive things about me on Facebook today. LOL

FAMILIES!

Birchie - don't Google Ann. Just don't. I swear, she makes my head want to explode. Literally. My eyelids twitch and the crown of my head pounds with my heartbeat. I worry it will pop right off. I'm going to add your 'don't look for sense where there is none' to the firewall I'm building for the holidays.

Bill - i love the passive resistance as well, it is a tactic I've used many times over the years. Sadly, for women here in GA that often seems like domination by those around you rather than simply trying not to engage. I've engaged more than anything else of late. And of course your cousin knows all about you, you live in Boston! Fox News tells him what to expect from you, regardless of what you actually say.

Dagmar - I'm not surprised that one of your cousins suggested you host Christmas. It is always communicated as a great time to show off the new house, all about celebrating you. Um, no. It is about you doing the work. I'm too far from the family center to ever have to host - I'm 2hours north of where I grew up, my parents and brother are there, the rest of my dad's extended family are now two hours south. They will never want to come to my house, and most often expect us to go four hours and in a different time zone to them. I think I'm luckier that way. LOL

Jen - first, 90! Happy birthday, grandmother! And congratulations on taking the high road. I really do try ty o do the same thing most of the time, contrary to my above statements. I'll have to do it at my aunts in a few weeks.

Family PTSD. Snicker

DH and I tend to give a pass to those over about 70 here in GA. Those folks lived in a different time from us and have totally different experiences to pull from. My brother did ask my grandfather to stop using racial terms in casual conversation a few years ago, though he never used them in the more offensive ways they still bothered us.

There's no place like home for the holidays.