Addiction Recovery Story #22, Tiger Lily: Taming Jungle Hunger at Night

I’m turning the tables and asking you, readers, for some help. Do you stop eating after dinner — manage to hang on until breakfast the next day? I would love your feedback. This is #22 in my series of flower-titled stories about toppling sugar and overeating addiction.

My good Dad got up in the middle of the night to eat, at least after Mom died, when I was old enough to notice.

When we started father/daughter/granddaughter visits to Cape Cod with baby Figgy — in the family ranch house, beginning with a short trip near the end of my maternity leave in November 1995— I heard him open the freezer door and eat ice cream in the deep, still night. I heard the metal spoon.

The kitchen is a short walk down the hall. You can’t be a secret eater unless the other house occupants snooze very soundly. Dad didn’t try to keep secrets, anyway.

I’ve been dealing with night eating lately, too. I eat well and healthfully (and within safe fences, as planned) all day, get ready for bed, go to bed…and then toss and turn. I often head for the kitchen at midnight or after. My mind tricks me into thinking that only a snack will soothe me, like a baby with a bottle.

Sometimes the snack is small, sometimes not. Last night, it was two slices of buttered country toast with a dab of Bonne Maman Peach Preserves (bottom of the jar) and some dried figs. I sit alone in the breakfast nook while the neighborhood sleeps. I…