My New Coping Skills To Handle Stress

With Joe spending almost a week in the hospital, I found out that I developed a couple of coping skills to handle my stress:

1. Biting my fingernails - this was done in stages and over the course of several days. By the time Joe came home from the hospital, I had no long fingernails at all. Corey always said he could tell when I was happy and contented - when I had long fingernails.

2. Eating! It appears that when my regular routine was disrupted, so was my way of being aware of what and how I was eating. It was though I had to eat my way through the fast food industry in Wyoming. One night I knew I just had to have some chicken strips and a Beef n' Cheddar so I stopped by Arby's. When I arrived at Arby's, I discovered they no longer had chicken strips which threw my whole plan of action out the restaurant door. I stood there for about 10 minutes, not able to make up my mind what I was going to do (remember I'd been up for almost 34 hrs) and I just left purchasing nothing.

I then headed to Dairy Queen where I knew they had a chicken strip basket, which I did buy after requesting and waiting for freshly fried french fries. Walking out the door, I spotted the Long John Silver's across the street and suddenly thought how great some fish would taste too. So, I drove across the street there and purchased a 2 pc. fish dinner. When I got home, I only all the meat, some of the fries and my coleslaw.

The next night was a trip to the Subway where I purchased two foot longs because I couldn't decide which one I wanted.

There was a trip to the Burger King just because I hadn't been to a Burger King in months.

The only reason I didn't hit the Taco Bell was because I had had some enchiladas at the hospital buffet earlier in the week.

I rationalized my eating habits by the fact that I hadn't eaten anything all day some of those days. I will be so glad when all returns to normal this coming week so that I can begin to control my eating habits again. All I know is that eating this way was my way to cope with Joe's latest hospital stay.