When I was in graduate school, a friend was conducting a research study that involved interviewing female students with and without eating disorders. This proved to be more difficult than she anticipated. Of the young women she'd recruited though a randomised process, all but one showed signs of disordered eating: She did not have a sufficient control group. So she dismissed her initial participant pool and tried again, only to get a similar result. Eventually this caused her to change the direction of the investigation: Her inability to recruit a group of university women with no history of eating disorders in itself became the theme of her research.
Looking back at this 10 years later, I don't think that she or I would have qualified for the control group of that study either. While neither anorexic nor bulimic, our eating was not what I would now consider normal. We were hyper-aware of our calorie intake.We knew our precise weights.We paid attention to the times of day we ate. After a meal, we would keep a mental note of the amount of exercise we'd have to do to compensate for it. The truth is, eating at that age for many of us was an inherently conflicted experience, the effect of food on our bodies ever-present in the backs of our minds. We were not fashion models and we were not athletes; we were university students. For most of us, it was not about our looks but about maintaining control in a competitive and stressful environment.
It was also a matter of having lostour natural appetite regulation mechanisms. We counted calories because we genuinely had no idea when we were truly hungry and when we were not. Our hunger and satiation signals were so out of whack with reality that we no longer trusted them.At age 12, feeling hungry simply meant I needed to eat something. But by age 22, this connection had become severed. There was nervous hunger, cravings for comfort food during all the endless studying, emotional eating. Lack of appropriate satiation signals could lead to overeating unless we were vigilant. And so we were, and it made us miserable.
How did this become the norm for so many women? Most likely it began with dieting during our teenage years and spiraled from there. We did not see it as abnormal, because we were neither puking up food nor outright starving ourselves. We were simply "eating healthy," watching our weight, making sure we maintained whatever clothing size we saw as being appropriate for our body types. But in truth we were suffering, and did not know how to put an end to it. In retrospect, I cannot believe how normalised this was in my generation of university women. Most of my female friends, acquaintances and colleagues had these issues and hid them with various degrees of success. Countless male friends have told me that they've never had a girlfriend who was not "weird" about food.
I cannot pinpoint exactly when things began to turn around for me. Possibly it was moving to a large city in my late 20s where I was suddenly doing lots of walking - not for exercise, but as a natural part of living and getting around. But riding a bike was what really accelerated the process of getting my appetite instincts back on track, so the connection is a strong one for me. Experiencing my body as a useful machine and not just as a bothersome appendage to my brain was what really did it. Through cycling I began to think of food as fuel. If I wanted to ride, I had to eat. And at age 30, for the first time in what must have been 15 years, I was once again able to eat when hungry and stop when full, just like I did when I was a child.
Since I began writing this blog, I have spoken with many, many women cyclists who describe similar experiences. Regaining trust in their hunger and satiation instincts for the first time since their pre-teens has been a gift more dear than they can express. And while cycling is not the only way to achieve this, it is certainly a great way, both fun and practical. Here's to all the women out there, cycling up an appetite.
The sixth photo in the sixth folder of the sixth folder of my "Image Files" folder was taken at my grandpa's house in December 1954 and my sister Terry was just learning to walk. Mom has always said "It was her first step" but who knows. A rather appropriate picture though, seeing as how today (January 31st) is her birthday. . .
Leaving
It amazes and delights me to see so many people on beautiful, functional and unique bicycles in the Boston area - from refurbished vintage finds to locally built custom frames. A mere two years ago this was far from a common sight, but today I might be stopped on the street and asked things like "Hey, are those Porteur bars?" by a complete stranger. People recognise me on occasion as well, as do I them - which is always funny. "You're Lovely Bicycle!" "And you're the girl who parks her ANT in Harvard Square!" After that we don't know what else to say, but we are both ridiculously happy. Yesterday I had another such encounter, and this time I had my camera out.
On my way home from Lexington I had taken a detour to photograph my mixte in a field at sunset, when out of the corner of my eye I saw the glow of a dynamo-powered headlight. As it moved toward me - gliding across the grass in the fading evening light - I could make out shellacked bartape and a rider clad in what was almost certainly a vintage wool jersey, astride a gigantic lugged steel bicycle.
Turns out it was JP Twins - whom I had never met before, but have known for some time as a reader of this blog. And that with him is an enormousRaleighMarathon (what is that, a 65cm frame?..), which he has transformed into an all-weather long distance commuter, Boston style. Behold:
A vintage frame with character.
Nitto Noodles, Cane Creek levers, shellacked cloth tape, brass bell. 
Single speed conversion.
Two chainring sizes, just in case.
Dynamo lighting with the wiring neatly zip-tied to the fork.
And of course, full fenders, rear rack and a set of panniers.
30 mile commute? No problem. This is how we roll in greater Boston. What about your town?
