Habit

[jducoeur]

Fascinating: my habit of having a glass of water on my desk, and sipping at it constantly, is stronger than I think.

I'm going in for an endoscopy late this afternoon. (Reflux issues -- they want to make sure nothing's seriously wrong.) This means no food all day, and nothing by mouth after 1pm. The food isn't so hard (although sitting through a lunch meeting with everyone else eating was a little painful). But the cognitive dissonance of not letting myself have a glass of water next to me is almost painful. Only an hour into it, and I already feel parched, and every instinct is insisting that I should be running for the fountain. Almost entirely psychosomatic, but still a very strong effect.

Nice to know that I've trained myself well (it was based on a recommendation for helping to avoid the kidney stones that run in my family), but disconcerting when I have to break that training...

Comments

[43duckies.livejournal.com]

:-) I completely sympathize. I was praying that I would get a morning surgery, so I wouldn't have to spend the whole day parched and hungry.

Do you find your hand reaching automatically for the cup of water that's not there, even though you *know* it's not there?

[jducoeur]

Actually, it was even worse: the glass *was* there, but empty, and I continually had to fight the driving desire to get up and fill it...

[eclectic-1.livejournal.com]

I feel your pain. I really miss not having water to sip if I forget to get some.

It is nice to have to urge to do something healthy rather than something like munching on popcorn.