Hungry

A funny thing happened on the way home from the hospital..well, that's not exactly true, but it's a decent opening line.

When the way that you eat is severely impacted, oh, say, major oral surgery just as a for instance, it can also result in changing other behaviours as well.

I noticed this after coming home from the hospital (once the feeding tube was removed) when I was trying to figure out which foods I could eat and how. I began (pretty quickly) to have this fear that there wasn't going to be anything that I could eat. The only food around was going to require chewing of a variety that I could not do. So once I found some of those foods, oatmeal, for instance, I began making it constantly so as to never run out. 

"What? Only one unopened container of ice cream in the freezer? Quick, gotta get to the store!" 

This, of course, played into my Depression Baby upbringing about conserving and my Eagle Scout father's indoctrination about "Be Prepared." Running low? Then put it on the list and buy some more so that we don't run out. I think it applies to a lot of things but it really manifests itself most, I feel, around food and items of general shopping and living.

So, in addition to the other benefits of having a full set of teeth, I'm looking forward to being able to venture out or travel without the "fear of running out of soft food," though I doubt that that is an actual phobia, ou know, with a real name.