Now there’s an enticing title, no? Sounds like something from a 1950s teacher training manual. Well, it isn’t.
First things first. I went to my group last night and I’m almost 4lbs down, which sounds good on the surface but I’ve had a very uppy-downy few weeks. I suppose I should be heartened that, despite all of the recent celebrating and general craziness, I’m exactly the same weight as I was before it all began. So I’ve managed to maintain my weight through a very tempestuous time and that is A Good Thing. Although I can’t help but wonder how well I would have done had I been abstaining …
Not to put too fine a point on it, I really don’t feel that our group is functioning very well at the moment. I’ve been thinking about why that is and it raises some interesting questions about personal and collective responsibility (in the group and in our real ‘food’ life). We are a very varied group of people, mostly returners to the programme, and at differing stages. Some of the group are in Management (that means they’re eating normal food, for you non-LL-ers) and have been on the programme for some considerable time. Personally, I would keep the two distinct types of dieters separate, but it’s not my call to make. Here’s where some of the responsibility questions start to creep in: should they respect the fact that most of the group are abstaining and avoid discussions about what they are/aren’t eating, or should we be mindful of the fact that we have to get used to engaging with the world of food, whether we’re consuming diet packs or real meals?
Our counsellor is very relaxed about the structure of the session, too. It’s very chatty and informal, and people come and go at various times. On one level that’s great, because it’s so easygoing, but on another I distinctly feel that we’re all on the programme with no sense of consequence whatsoever. I remember clearly that a big part of my success last time was due to the fact that I felt a sense of commitment to my counsellor and, more importantly, my group. If I was tempted to ‘cheat’, one of my first thoughts would be dread at the prospect of letting them down and having to own up to that. It sounds a bit melodramatic, but you get my drift. This time I don’t have that feeling, and I’ve been struggling to stay on track, to be honest. Again this raises questions about responsibility: should we be looking to our counsellor to dictate the agenda and, effectively, keep us in line, or should we be taking the responsibility ourselves, irrespective of how relaxed the group sessions might be?
And it hasn’t escaped my notice that I’m back on the programme because, clearly, I wasn’t taking responsibility for my own actions, so maybe this desire for discipline says more about me than about my group. I find that odd, though, because I genuinely HATE being told what to do and normally respond very badly to it.
During one of the numerous interruptions to the session last night, some of us were talking about the issues I’ve outlined. One of the women asked what I meant by group discipline and I said ‘perhaps we should all commit to arriving on time’. As the words came out of my mouth I realised that she herself had only just arrived so, understandably, she thought of this as a personal attack. It wasn’t. That got me thinking that there are clearly times when the counsellor should take the lead: she should lay out the ground rules for how the session is run, otherwise it’s just one group participant apparently throwing their weight around (no pun intended). Not very helpful in building group loyalty.
I suppose the group is working on one level because it’s got me thinking about the fact that, as an adult, you clearly have to take charge and control your own destiny. And I know, from being very overweight not many years ago, that one of the strong feelings I had was an abject loss of control. I’d almost go to the ‘I’m big and that’s just how it is’ point, which is terrible. So I’m going to persevere with the group and see what happens, in the short term at least.
