Spare Me!

Today we bowl! Our group of  10 that included both recreation directors, Talia and Carly, all piled into the van with the non-existent shocks and headed out to Queens. The alley was small and more crowded than I would have expected for 11 am on a Tuesday but we got 2 lanes and settled right in. Amongst the sorting out of shoes and registering of names we all found ourselves in a horseshoe around the facilities only snack machine. A seemingly strange place for a bunch of eating-disordered patients to convene, but yet there we were ogling the goodies. We were actually owning up to our true likes and dislikes while letting the caged sweets run away with our imaginations to new horizons. A passer-by would have thought that none of us had ever seen a contraption such as this before.

Back at the lanes we divided into two teams of five and begin the mass shop-swap. Each in turn, with constant support and cheerleading with each roll of the ball, we played for about 20 minutes before breaking for lunch. We took plastic seats around a few of the small tables that littered the main floor area and let loose a torrent of white paper bag meals. We unpack like kids in a school cafeteria to inspect the loot.

General consensus amongst the group was that the 900 calorie lunch guideline had definitely failed to be met. Each of us had about 2 ounces of turkey on wheat bread with no cheese or condiments. Other than that there was 4 ounces of juice, a small apple, and a bag of sunchips. Mostly we just shrugged, ate, and went back to bowling after disposing of the remains. It was common knowledge that if any of us wanted more we could drop some money at the alley’s little cafe. Some opted for snacks, some for drinks, but it wasn’t until Elise came back with a cup of coffee that we all knew what we wanted.

The single cup was worth the $1.75 price on such a damp and chilly day right up until Talia and Carly realized that artificial sweeteners were in use. By the time they got over to the counter most of us had dressed our drinks and returned to the lanes. only myself and Molly remained at the prep station. That was when we remembered what we were in reality – essentially a bunch of psych patients on a field trip from the hospital. Its a little disheartening to be having a great time out with friends just to later be reminded that we are actually being baby-sat.

With all the ‘tsk’ of an elder to an out-of-line child Carly informed me that sweeteners were not permitted. I tried to explain that we were not only off the unit and spending our own money but that others had already done it without getting scolded. She told me that, while she hadn’t gotten to them in time, Molly and I were not allowed to follow in their footsteps. When I am treated like a child, instead of the adult that I am, first instinct is to act like one and rebel. I promptly told her that if that were the case then I just didn’t want coffee and dropped the entire cup in the garbage.

I understand how this looks and, in the past, a situation like this would have let in a cloud of grumpiness that would likely last the remainder of the day. This time it didn’t though. I didn’t realize the difference until we were headed back to headquarters in the old rickety van. Thats the point of all this though – The amazement at my subconscious dropping of a grudge. After the incident we went back to enjoying the game and generally having a good time. It may take baby steps but its just more proof of how things are changing.

 

The sweetness (part II)

Flaw number 1 in my coffee sweetener test was that, ever since the caffeine detox I have been trying to keep the intake down to one small cup in the morning. Number 2 was that, not only had I already had the early cup but Fridays, because of Coffee Klatch, I wind up having a little bit more than usual. So, I didn’t really want coffee to begin with when they came to get me for the study at 4 pm. 3 was that they didn’t specify what cup size they would be presenting me with and I was surprised at the large drink placed in front of me when I had expected the smaller size I normally get. Coffee, for me at the small size, is complete with 3 Equals, so thats what I worked to earn even though I didn’t want the coffee to begin with.

Had i known the coffee would be a bigger size the outcome would have definitely been different since that size I will usually put 7 or 8 Equals in. I don’t know if it would have been different in that I wouldn’t have worked for any Equals because, to get 7, was a lot of button pushing for something I didn’t care for at the moment anyways. Or maybe the outcome would have been different in the way that I would have stuck it out and worked for all 7 knowing thats what I would normally put in a cup that size.

I told the lab techs about these contributing factors and sort of felt like I maybe hadn’t provided them with a good enough result template. I guess, though, that there is really no correct or incorrect way to provide our information. I suppose thats the reason behind it being an ongoing study. Well, I did what I could. Hopefully they’ll get some of those result-altering kinks worked out in the future. Who knows. I did my part, it way definitely interesting to say the least, and now thats that.

The sweetness

I sat, feeling goofy in my disposable plastic apron, ready for the scheduled research study to commence. The table in front of me in the small lab room had been laid out systematically with 10 clear plastic cups filled with a set amount of cherry Koolaid and accesorized with large red straws. The cups themselves were marked 0-10 in black Sharpie and in front of each was a line of Equal packets corresponding to the cup’s number. With a set of rating sheets in front of me, a call buzzer to my right, a rinse cup, spit bucket, and short stack of napkins to my left, I was primed and ready to take the sweetener test.

The object of this little exercise was to start with a sip of the “o” marked unsweetened Koolaid, roll it in my mouth to taste and rate its sweetness, how much i liked it, and weather or not I wanted more on the corresponding sheet. Then spit, rinse, and repeat with the next cup after first adding the required number of Equal packets. The rule was to do this until i got up to the cup I didn’t like due to too much sweetener and then do one beyond it.

Alone in the small stark room through this I took my time and tried to rate each one as accurately as I could. Having gotten to 10 and still not finding the drink to be more than moderately sweet I wiped my mouth and rang the call button for the lab tech. That was the first part of the study.

Next, after the table had been swept clean of anything having to do with the Koolaid testing, a small laptop was brought in and placed in front of me. This part was titled “work for Equal”. It involved sitting, staring at a screen with an Equal packet pictured on the left and an empty column on the right. With the promise of actually receiving a cup of coffee containing the number of Equal packets you were willing to work for, the button pushing began.

Basically I was asked to just sit and continuously press a key on the computer repeatedly until an Equal packet appeared in the column on the right. Each time a packet appeared it would take almost double the amount of key taps to earn the next packet. If you really wanted all 10 available packets for your coffee it would take up to 40 minutes of continuous button pushing to earn them. All of this was to observe and track just how much a person with an eating disorder relied on artificial sweetener for taste. How long we were willing to sit and do this tedious work just to have that one last packet of Equal. The study, though, was still in its very early pilot phases and was hindered for what I could see as accurate results by some definite flaws.

(to be continued…)