Valentine’s Day: Navigating High Expectations
I debated a lot of different titles for this post and I still love them all:
How not to turn Valentine’s Day into another life assignment and presentation of either 1. the worthiness of your relationship or 2. a grand display of “I’m single but I’m so totally ok!”
Navigating Valentine’s Day while healing your relationship with food and body
Breaking up with perfectionism on Valentine’s Day
Navigating Valentine’s Day when you’re an all or nothing kinda human
This is not another blog post about the “healthiest” desserts to choose on Valentine’s Day. Or Valentine’s Day and chocolates.
BTW, everywhere I look a business is trying to sell me chocolates, baked goods, or flowers, insisting that this is how I show love to others in my life.
Does “I love you” feel more impactful when it’s written on a heart-shaped Russel Stover box of chocolates?
Even if you think Valentine’s Day is a stupid, made-up holiday designed to line the pockets of conglomerates like Hallmark, Kay’s Jewelers, and whoever makes those heart-shaped Reese’s Cups, Valentine’s Day can bring up a lot of intensity. Many of my clients struggle with loneliness, grief, or avoidance. Especially the loneliness of being the only single friend in the group. On the other end of the spectrum, my humans can also experience a sort of pressure to overachieve and people please on V-day (and I was one of them).
I used to be one of those unpartnered humans who turned Valentine’s Day into another opportunity to achieve my imagined version of a perfect single gal’s holiday. I would:
gift cute personal cards to my close friends sharing how much they mean to me
bake heart-shaped cookies or some form of pink dessert dyed with beets or freeze-dried strawberries
plan/attend a Galentine’s night where we watched rom com’s or painted our nails with cucumbers over our eyes
This grand display made Valentine’s Day very busy for me and I now recognize it was a brilliant way for me to avoid the pain of loneliness and the deep yearning I felt for meaningful relationships in my life. I know this ritual of mine was not created in a vacuum. From an early age, we are socially primed to buy packs of valentines day cards and candies and give to every person in our class. Though that was the early 90’s so I don’t know if that is an acceptable holiday tradition anymore. Bottom line is, capitalism will always tell you what you “need” to do on holidays and will prescribe you expectations and solutions to those expectations.
You don’t have to do things the way they have always been done.
You don’t have to uphold the status quo.
Here are 10 beautiful Valentine’s Day reminders for my high achievers, my people pleasers, my perfectionists, and my anxious babes:
You do not need to do anything special on Valentine’s Day (if you don’t want to).
Most Valentine’s Day candy is just regular candy in a different wrapper (or with a different food dye).
Love can be expressed in a multitude of ways and those ways do not have to include buying gifts or food (if that doesn’t feel right for you).
It’s ok to make a self-care plan for Valentine’s Day if it is a hard holiday for you.
If Valentine’s Day foods trigger a binge for you, it may mean there is something to be explored there and it’s ok to want to do that work and also be scared shitless.
If you are going to a Valentine’s Day party where you plan to drink alcohol, consider how you will care for your body before and after the party. Restriction in preparation for eating anxiety-inducing foods or foods that are typically off-limits can make it so the alcohol hits your system harder and faster.
Feeling uncomfortable after eating new/different foods (looking at you four-course fondue dinner at The Melting Pot) and drinking alcohol does not mean that the food is bad or that your body is bad or that something is wrong and/or broken. It may just mean you are human.
Cultivating love in romantic relationships and platonic relationships takes time and effort. The same is true of cultivating love for yourself and your body.
What if we looked at Valentine’s Day like a science experiment at your 5th-grade science fair? Maybe you could test out a new hypothesis and try something different this year and see how it works out. Life is more trial and error than they ever really taught us growing up.
You are loved and you are love <3
You are worthy of love and care and support 365 days of the year. Whether you are pursuing ED recovery or just feel like things are off with food, I’m here for it. Hop on over to my Contact page or send me an e-mail.
xoxo & tqm
Rebecca