The rhythm of food

'Dr Abbritt...commented on my weight loss and said I must be the envy of all my friends'

Food.

The diary notes include the listing of every meal Mom had during her 6 weeks of cancer treatments at the Hillbrow Hospital, even to the detail of the mixed frozen vegetables she had with lunch.
Her quick pencil notes towards the end of her treatment still provide details of her daily food rhythm.

Throughout my teenage years growing up in Vanderbijlpark I watched my mother diet.
And put me on diets too.
 PET (Proper Eating Training),  Mayo Clinic Diet, Grapefruit Diet, these are just some of the diets that stick with me from this time. Marmite on soft white bread would became Provita and cheese.

I have a vivid recall of a conversation with Mom in her bathroom. She is in the bath, calls me across, asks me to prod my lower abdomen and to compare what I find to what she finds.
She is thin, has lost her weight, having dieted after her last pregnancy and is noticing a lump. This lump was a tumour the size of a tennis ball and the start of her 20 year story with cancer.

The relationship with food is the cantus firmus in my life as well as for my sisters.
The dark and the light.
A constant battle between the appreciation of good food; the love of fresh produce; the joy of cooking and sitting down to eat with family and friends; the delight in the discovery of food as I travel the world; versus the reigning in of our addictive selves where food is not about pleasure nor nourishment but rather about disappointment and heartache.