I've Always Been Hungry

January 19, 2016 1:13 PM

Growing up poor, there were times when I only ate what I could manage to steal. As a well-fed adult, I still can’t turn down a good meal…or a bad one. This moving memoir piece is by Zen monk and author Barry Graham, who also blogs at No Mean Preacher.
posted by katie (22 comments total)

A Zen Buddhist monk writes about hunger & hot dogs, and refrains from a make me one with everything joke? Truly, this is restraint.
posted by zamboni at 1:27 PM on January 19, 2016 [20 favorites]

All the feelings.
posted by bilabial at 1:27 PM on January 19, 2016

That's an awesome piece, nice find.
posted by Keith Talent at 1:33 PM on January 19, 2016

Oh my lord, this. When I first became homeless and before I learned that anyone can show up at a soup kitchen and will be fed no questions asked and no need for proof from the government that you qualify for free food, I spent three months eating a single pack of ramen noodles a day. That's about 400 calories a day.

I was hungry all the damn time. I did not steal any food during that time because I was trying to maintain some connection to my middle class "civilized" upbringing. But it was getting bad.

Once I found out that I could eat at the soup kitchens I ate everything (as much as was allowed). It probably took six months of finally having enough meals and feeling secure about it before I could keep myself from eating everything. Instead I ate nearly everything.

I would make myself sick and I could not stop. It's this horrible survival mode thing your brain is screaming that it's not sure if I'll ever find anything to eat ever again so eat all of it now dammit! even though the rest of your brain is saying no, it's ok, there are five more meals available tomorrow between the local shelter and various soup kitchens -- I don't have to eat everything everything.

After about a year I was finally able to stop before eating nearly everything. And I'm now back to that essential skill of only needing (psychologically) one meal a day (a very useful skill when you're homeless).

Similar to what the author relates at the end of the post, I get angry when I hear that people fast (for any reason) as fasting is something only people can do when they know they have plenty of food to eat. And throwing out leftovers? I will walk 10 miles in the rain to take that 4 week old chicken off your hands (if it doesn't smell too bad) just so it isn't wasted. What the hell are you thinking?

I cannot imagine what it would be like to spend your entire youth always hungry like this author did. Besides what I'm going through now as homeless I've had other times in my adult life where food became a serious issue (it's how I developed my one meal a day skill (by the way, make it supper)) and I started to get like that but it wasn't till this most recent "adventure" that I got this bad. And for this author it was even worse.

Our brains are crazy pieces of shit when it comes to food and survival.
posted by bfootdav at 1:49 PM on January 19, 2016 [25 favorites]

This was a great essay, but Barry Graham is a "Zen monk" in name only, with a long history of fraudulent claims.
posted by infinitywaltz at 2:15 PM on January 19, 2016 [10 favorites]

I worked in a group home years ago, with emotionally disturbed children. we had a boy who'd been homeless for a while. unlike the rest of the boys he had impeccable table manners, he was quiet and neat and it took us a while to realize how much he was eating. he was a big husky boy and it was our responsibility to feed him healthily. but how do you limit the food access to a child who has gone through that? how do you convey the message that there will be more food in a few hours, every day? why would he trust that? he would sneak out of bed in the middle of the night to steal food and stash it in his bedroom.

I have gone through periods of poverty/food insecurity as an adult, but never as a child. I wonder if a wound like that can ever truly heal.
posted by supermedusa at 2:17 PM on January 19, 2016 [5 favorites]

Seconding infinitywaltz. He's a great writer but let's just say he is not exactly a nonfiction author.
posted by masquesoporfavor at 2:18 PM on January 19, 2016 [2 favorites]

I've heard of people who care for elderly Holocaust survivors accommodating food hoarding or hiding behavior. If a hidden scrap of bread crust was once your only hope to survive, I can see how that would change you deeply.
posted by thelonius at 2:20 PM on January 19, 2016 [4 favorites]

Oh, and it case it wasn't clear, I'm not saying that fasting is wrong or that throwing out leftovers is a mark of pure evil. It's only that once your brain hits survival mode there's a part of it that does think that way ("What? There are two French fries left on your plate! Fool! EAT EVERYTHING!!"). I think this part lies dormant in most people for most of their lives but once it comes out it's very difficult to get it to shut up again. I mean it's very difficult to turn it off (which is the point of my previous comment and the essay linked to here).
posted by bfootdav at 2:23 PM on January 19, 2016 [6 favorites]

It's a traumatic reprogramming of the reward and motivation mechanism that I suspect isn't far off from an "abandonment fear" but is more along the lines of fearing death itself. Total sympathy here, and of allowing children to unnecessarily starve is a form of abuse, it's no less abusive not to ensure that their parents can also eat while taking care of their young. Successful rich folks always encourage having an attitude of "abundance mindset" but that sort of thing only comes natural to someone who's never wanted for basic necessities and is inured to the guilt that comes with knowing your actions or inaction in achieving success often come with consequences that directly affect others' ability to eat. Sheesh
posted by aydeejones at 2:40 PM on January 19, 2016 [7 favorites]

He lists NO teachers.
posted by bird internet at 3:40 PM on January 19, 2016 [1 favorite]

" I also love to cook, and I am also lean, and to look at me you would assume that I am also moderate in my eating habits."

No, I wouldn't. Though you might decline such assumptions were you to educate yourself about eating habits and dispositions for weight gain. But something more will be required to cease conjectures using the 2nd person. There's much about this essay that's rhetorical judo.

I have lived, as well, between the chemistries of hunger and appetite.
I'm Buddha. I'll see you on the road.
posted by lazycomputerkids at 5:07 PM on January 19, 2016 [3 favorites]

Also, that plate of chicken that "was handed to him"? I wonder if the woman nominally a parent bought and prepared it and then he said something snarky about it. The origin of that food is totally erased from his story, and he definitely didn't buy or prepare it.
posted by 3491again at 5:21 PM on January 19, 2016

I have gone through periods of poverty/food insecurity as an adult, but never as a child. I wonder if a wound like that can ever truly heal.

Anecdata, but a friend's late father, who came to the US from China as a 20s-something in the 60s, told me once in passing that he was more or less always hungry until he moved to the United States. When I knew him as a late middle aged and then elderly person, he appeared to have a pretty healthy relationship to food.
posted by ryanshepard at 6:53 PM on January 19, 2016

This was a great essay, but Barry Graham is a "Zen monk" in name only, with a long history of fraudulent claims.

So, a prime candidate for appearing on Oprah, if she were still doing her show.
posted by tobascodagama at 7:27 PM on January 19, 2016 [2 favorites]

A good friend of mine, a very tall man with a pronounced hump, was always hungry as a growing teenager. Despite living in an affluent suburb, his father restricted his mother's housekeeping money so there was very little food in the house for the three teenage brothers. The father's job involved many long lunches at fine city restaurants and beers after work at the local pub. His mother had to find a secret part-time job to afford more than white rice, noodles and cheap sausage mince for her boys. My friend grew up thinking he didn't deserve adequate healthy food. He also lost many friends because despite having a pool and lots of teenage toys, there would never be enough food in the house to feed teenage friends visiting after school. Imposed unnecessary hunger was a form of child abuse and it still affects him to this day.
posted by Thella at 9:20 PM on January 19, 2016 [5 favorites]

A hungry ghost.
posted by squeak at 9:41 PM on January 19, 2016 [2 favorites]

I'm not saying that fasting is wrong or that throwing out leftovers is a mark of pure evil.

Others have a right to go to hell their own way, but they aren't doing that in my house.
posted by ridgerunner at 3:32 AM on January 20, 2016

One of the things that brings back years of the "you can eat" "you cannot eat" cycle for me is oatmeal.

Although I spent most of my youth eating oodles of noodles and $1 frozen dinners, there's something about oatmeal. The appearance. The scent. The taste. Two meals a day for I don't know how long; I've forced myself not to remember. I thought I'd be OK and tried something similar a few months ago. I couldn't control it. Tears came to my eyes and I started gagging uncontrollably.
posted by Ms. Moonlight at 5:05 AM on January 20, 2016 [1 favorite]

"I've eaten a river of liver and an ocean of fish!"
posted by valkane at 5:26 AM on January 20, 2016

Ms. Moonlight, your story reminded me that my grandfather used to talk about how, when he was a very poor kid in Ireland, he had to eat plain oatmeal for two meals a day. When he came to America, he said he would never let oatmeal pass his lips ever again. In fact, he was VERY particular about food, and though he was never truly wealthy in America, he could afford to eat like a king (at least, compared to his youth). He loved to cook and grill and share bounteous meals. It wasn't about overeating for him, but the idea that he could have eggs and bacon for breakfast whenever he wanted, and a good roast on Sundays, and so on, and oatmeal never once. . . that alone made leaving his family and poverty behind worth it.
posted by katie at 7:48 AM on January 20, 2016 [1 favorite]

Never will understand the 'always leave food on the plate to toss away' thing; whether it be a 'this helps me to cut calories' (?what?), or 'I don't want to look hungry/like I don't have much money'.

Bizarre.
posted by buzzman at 10:05 AM on January 20, 2016