Seven Donuts

The day after I penned an article about how a tiny bit of something sweet doesn’t hurt, I had a doctor’s appointment in the far south of town. Far enough south so that it took me right by the exit where, a few years back, our first Krispy Kreme opened up. The lines were so long and out of control that several cops had to help manage the traffic.

For uber-healthy Colorado that was a shock.

Not long after that another opened up not far from my house.

I was in deep sh*t.

There are only a few things that can sabotage me and that’s KK donuts. Especially the hot ones, which you can inhale by the dozen before you realize that you just pounded down about 2300 calories. Or so. It depends.

When I was battling an eating disorder, KK was my drug of choice. I knew the location of every store that made their own, every supermarket that carried them. I knew what day of the week they were the best, and what times of day you could get hot ones.

Nobody loved KK like I did. They owe me a bronze statue at their South Carolina headquarters. At the worst of my eating disorder I would buy fifteen dozen donuts every single night. Yep. You read that right. I spent my entire retirement and vastly more chewing up and spitting out KK donuts. Weird? Gross? Damned right it was. But that’s why they all it a disorder. I had an aunt, my namesake, who used to walk around her Reno home and spit into cups. I wish I could say I can’t relate but I can. I realize that people do weirder things, but lemme tell ya, healing myself from that particular monkey on my back took four decades and a mouthful of teeth. The ones I have now are gorgeous, thanks to the VA, but dammit, I’d rather have a set that doesn’t sit in a cup all night. This is what we do to ourselves for the sake of our addictions.

The BF is a sugar monster. He has a thing for KK donuts. For a while we could get them at the local gas station. For years, I could walk by the glass-enclosed display, not even look. After a hard-won eighty + pound weight loss, they no longer existed for me. That’s how stoic I was.

Until the BF moved in.

A week later I was recovering from very nasty surgery. In constant pain.

One day he came in and place a small green and white bag next to my operable hand.

Chocolate covered creme-filled. Oy. I was a goner. First time I’d had one in perhaps 8 years.

I’d forgotten.

I really really wish he hadn’t done that.

Since then the neighborhood gas station has stopped carrying them (thank you God).

However there I was, driving by the store that makes them. I haven’t been in that part of town for years. I swear to you the store waved at me as I drove by.

Gah.

Just…gah.

I could feel the sugary fish hooks settle deeply into my cheek.

I had to get a Cat scan, and in the process I got iodine injected into my veins. Didn’t feel good at all. In fact, by the time I left the facility I felt lightheaded and lousy.

What a perfect setup for dropping by the donut store.

I haven’t driven into a KK parking lot in many years. For good reason. My 34.5" hips, some twenty inches smaller than their widest point some thirty years ago, can attest. Yet walking into that Temple of Temptation I felt right at home.

Welcome back, it said. We missed you. Please help yourself. Enjoy.

I picked out half a dozen glazed raspberry-filled for the BF, who has just as serious an addiction to donuts as I ever did, but never paid the price. Then somehow, in that same way that relapsed alcoholics tip an entire vodka bottle into their gullets, I ordered four chocolate-covered glazed, and two cream-filled chocolate covered. Just to top things off royally, a dusted cinnamon twist.

And ate every single last one of them on the drive home.

Now to be honest with you I have never in my life ever eaten that many donuts at one time. Even at my worst, that would have been unthinkable.

By the time I drove into my driveway I was busily dusting off the proof of my indiscretion from my workout shirt, and wiping the glaze off my face.

That, however, didn’t change the way my guts felt.

WTF?????????

Anyone who has ever retrained their bodies to give up sugar, which I did years ago, can attest to what happens when you insult your poor belly and body with this kind of wholesale toxic blast.

I made it downstairs to the BF’s bedroom where he was busy coding on his computer and laid the box of KKs on his bed. The bulldog raised herself from her stupor and waddled over to inspect. His eyes lit up the way a kid’s does on Christmas morning. Two seconds later he had half a glazed raspberry filled jammed into his mouth. Happy boy.

Can’t say the same for my body. I barely made it upstairs before collapsing on the couch.

OW.

Several of my Medium.com community friends have pointed out the importance of listening to your body (as opposed, say, to tending to your tongue, which doesn’t possess a lick of common sense, and doesn’t give a flying shit about what happens to the rest of you after you gorm seven donuts). I had to listen to my body for the rest of the damned day. And the next.

Even my dead sainted mother couldn’t berate, scold or verbally wallop me the way my innards did. I hurt all over. Headache, stomach ache. The next day I suffered serious gut problems as my body worked overtime to get rid of all that poison.

A calorie is not a calorie (if you doubt this, please read Gary Taubes Good Calories, Bad Calories) which is how so many people have such a tough time with food. You can’t assume that the 200+ calories you take in from slamming a Snickers bar is just as good for the body as the 200+ calories you get from a nice, big spinach salad. Yet many of us still labor under the misunderstanding that the type of calories doesn’t matter. It matters a GREAT deal. You can’t feed yourself toxins and expect the body to like you, perform well, and deliver a high level of health. You and I are what we eat.

Seven donuts.

Geez Louise.

However, this much I know. A single day out of a life committing crimes of nature against your poor beleaguered body isn’t justification for beating yourself to death, and returning to the scene to do it again as a form of self-flagellation.

Here’s how the thinking goes: Okay, I just torpedoed my diet. I am SO bad. I feel SOOOO guilty. I hurt all over. My guts are in an uproar. I’m hopeless. Let’s go do this again.

This is what I used to do. Those of us who have ever been on a diet can relate. Hair of the dog, as it were. I have no clue what mope came up with that prescription for fixing what ails us but frankly, they should be drawn and quartered.

Actually, here’s a better idea. Whoever came up with the recipe for KK donuts should be drawn and quartered. For that matter, Godiva’s chocolate, gooey cheese pizza…..let me count the ways.

In the largest scheme of things, downing seven donuts won’t kill me, although I sure felt like I was dying at the time. Doing that every day most certainly will. I have no intention of ever repeating that piece of monumental stupidity (although it sure as hell tasted awesome). However, it was a perfectly wonderful lesson in just how toxic sugar really is, as well as how susceptible I am, as are we all, to life’s biggest temptations. Whatever we do consistently is what we look like and feel like.

I really do NOT want to look and feel like KK donuts. Fat, soft, wide, dripping glaze and oozing sickly white cream. Unfortunately I did used to look like a Krispy Kreme donut.

Nope.

When my body finally came out of its sugar coma I headed out for a three mile run. Man that felt good. Celebrated with pineapple slices. Man that tasted good. It took several days for my liver to do its job.

Downright nasty.

It will be early December before I have to head south for the next doctor’s appointment. My Christmas present to me is just keep on driving. If the BF wants his Krispy Kremes he can by god head south himself.

I can’t speak for anyone else, but there is one very hard lesson I’ve learned. Like any other addict (and in this case, KK has my number), the best thing is to steer clear. There is no way I can walk into a KK shop and just get ’em for the BF. I may like the guy a lot but even he’s not worth three days of hell. Of course living him feels like that at times, but I needn’t add insult to injury with a mouthful of sugar.

Seven donuts. Oy. I’m not even going to re-read and edit this article because I have to look at the photos. Even better, I am off in half an hour to hike 3600 steps. It is nowhere near as fun as slamming seven donuts, but I like the aftermath a heck of a lot better.