In my experience, most addicts go back to their addictions once they go back to their old environments. I have a cousin who’s (apparently) a really nice guy in prison, but each time he gets out and hooks up with his old buddies he goes back to the drugs and before long he’s robbing and stealing from people to pay for his habit, usually in record time. And it’s not just him; anyone who’s seen the show Intervention knows that at least half of the addicts on that show who go through treatment and get clean and sober relapse within weeks of their release. I’m sure they don’t want to (the addicts on that particular show are presented as being pretty miserable), but the problem is that they return to the old environments that facilitated their addictions in the first place. When a former crack user goes back to his old crack-infested neighborhood and starts hanging out with his old crack-using friends, who can possibly be surprised when the person relapses?

I got to thinking about this Saturday, at Mason’s birthday party. I did so good all week, eating my little frozen entrees and walking around the neighborhood. But once you get back in those olf familiar settings, you find old habits soon reemerge. Before long I was eating ice cream and multiple pieces of cookie-cake. The leftover ice cream went home with us and we ate cup after cup of it Saturday night. We gave away the left over cookie cake, but not before I had several more pieces. On one single day I pretty much negated any weight loss I’d achieved last week.

I have done a really good job this year of controlling food situations for the most part.What I need to do now is figure out a way to control those situations where I don’t have control. So far this year I’ve figured out that eating patterns must first be recognized before they can be addressed. I recognize this one as a problem; now I’ve got to do something about it.

No real weight loss this week.