It was never fun going to the doctor's office with my grandfather but there was always the joke I waited for -
Doc -”Mr. Smith have you ever smoked?
”Granddad - “Yes.”
Doc -”When did you quit Mr. Smith?”
Granddad - “When they raised cigarettes to 49 cents a pack!”
And the doctor would drop the pen and we would all laugh. No matter which doctor – it was always a funny/fun moment.
The truth was my grandfather had actually caught phenomena in his 40s or 50s, couldn't smoke because of coughing, and didn't go back once he was better. Now this was a man that smoked since he was a teenager and had just “quit” in 7 days time.
Why can't everything be that easy? LOL
I thought about him as I was on the Disney Cruise-ship serving myself pumpkin pie, ice cream strawberry cheesecake. It reminded me how addictive bad eating can be. But the difference between “eating” and “smoking” is that you “have” to eat. It means you constantly have to keep making the same good choices over and over and over again. You don't have to smoke. All you have to do is sustain the will power to keep from buying a pack of Kools with your diet Coke from the gas-station. But eating is a different beast – you have to eat every single day and you have to have self-control with every single meal. This means avoiding the bad stuff and not overeating the good stuff. Its tough!
I once read about a man that was so addicted to sex that he would have sex with cracked out hookers and pull to the side of the road to masturbate. We all have heard tales of dugs addicts stealing from family and selling their bodies for drugs and others have let alcohol abuse ruin their lives.
I don't have any answers here; just observations. I've smoked and drank regularly but I never considered myself “addicted.” The one thing about smoking is that it was something I would turn too when I got extremely angry or sad. I had to replace that with the gym. I was addicted to bad eating because it was convenient and I was in a mind-state where my health and diet were not priorities.
So bombarding myself with all the bad/sugary foods the cruise-ship had to offer reminded me of how easy it would be to undo all the progress I have made; how easy it is to eat “whatever you want.”
Maybe one day, 30 years from now, the Doctor will ask me; “Mr. Davison – when was the last time you ate McDonalds?”
And I can say; “When Big Mac meals were 6 bucks!”