Day Five

The headache is well. I don’t mean it’s gone. I mean it’s doing just fine. It’s host is still suffering, however. Pain is not enjoyable when it never goes away. Still, it’s weaker than it has been, and at this rate may be gone by next Monday.

Today I have experienced my first real craving. After my after work nap (which I have been taking this week instead of my after work trip to the gym) I awoke not hungry but still wanting something to eat. I lay in the bed thinking of all the things I have in the apartment, and nothing appealed to me. Chips and salsa? Nah. Add cheese and sour cream? Too heavy. Frozen vegetarian shepherd’s pie? As if. Tandoori nan and humus? Not as such. Salad? Nay. Apple? My stomach actually gave a little jump, as if I had stumbled onto the right track. I know my body is just screaming for a Mountain Dew, which is way outside of the boundaries of my little headaching experiment, so went with the closest thing I had - a small glass of cranberry juice. Amazingly enough, it took the edge off my longing.

These withdrawal symptoms, or whatever you call them, have gotten me to thinking about the nature of addiction. We label some things addictive and others not, as if every item firmly belongs in one camp or the other. Like most things, it’s more of a sliding scale than a matter of absolutes. Jonesing for a Mountain Dew isn’t the same as heroin withdrawal, but the body craves the things we take away from it, healthy or not. So, next experiment – thirty days of shooting smack.

Final note – to those of you who think you can resist my sugar-free, tumor-driven, mental superpowers, I say: resist this.