Yesterday was not a fasting day, but I still didn’t expect to gain weight. I did. I only ate once but apparently consumed too many calories because I gained a pound. Dinner was my usual vegetarian salad, but I stopped by the grocery store after work because I decided I needed cheese. This was an unexpected diversion; I only made the choice to stop right as I was about to pass the grocery store. I also felt like I needed something sweet. My work day had once again been a frustrating one, so I perused the candy aisle for some small bit of comfort chocolate. I didn’t find anything small enough, though, so I settled for a jar of honey-sweetened peanut butter after reading the ingredients and seeing that two tablespoons contained only nine grams of carbohydrates and three grams of sugar (I do eat peanut butter directly from the jar).

I think the cheese was the culprit. As much as I hate to admit it, I’ve developed a taste for American cheese, which isn’t even “real” cheese according to some people. Anyway, I had some cheese right when I got home, added some to the salad, and had some after eating the salad. I ended up eating far too much of it and as a result consumed probably an extra 1,000 calories (not to mention a lot of saturated fat). It’s surprisingly easy to eat almost an entire block of American cheese because it’s soft, whereas eating the same size block of cheddar cheese would be more difficult because it’s a harder cheese. There’s more work in eating cheddar cheese versus American cheese, I guess.

I also probably had more than two tablespoons of peanut butter. And I probably had too many cashews between eating them in the salad and eating some right out of the bag. Anyway, the calories consumed at the end of the day were just too many. Yes, I’m probably full of water and fiber from the salad, but that doesn’t explain a pound of weight gained.

It’s becoming clear that many of my impulsive “bad” choices are a response to my psychological state after work. The unplanned visits to P. Terry’s, the impulsive stops at the grocery store, the ongoing craving for carbohydrates and sugar, etc., are all tied to stress, and my job is by far the biggest stressor (and source of misery) in my life right now. I either need to figure out how to get a handle on my job-related anxiety, or I need to find another job.