Finding It: And Finally Satisfying My Hunger for Life by Valerie Bertinelli Read Free Book Online Page A

episodes, I only see my pain. I want to grab that version of me and tell her it’s going to get better.
    While flying home after one trip, I watched a movie starring Kate Winslet, one of my favorite actresses. Though she kept her clothes on in this particular movie, she frequently got naked onscreen and seemed comfortable showing her body. Clothed or not, she conveys enviable self-confidence. I applaud the way she has spoken out about the importance of looking real, as opposed to emaciated, so that her daughters and others of their generation don’t grow up thinking you have to look thin to be beautiful.
    Women of my age need that, too. As I had discovered at age 48, feeling healthy and normal has as much to do with being honest with myself as it does with eating right and exercising. When I thought about wanting to walk around the house naked, what I really meant was that I wanted to feel the comfortable confidence that I saw in Kate Winslet’s eyes, whether I was dressed or buck naked. To get there would require more than adhering to a diet over the long haul. I would have to be forthright with my emotions, my relationships, and my dealings with other people. I would have to recognize when I felt less than I was, figure out why, and push myself to be better.
    Could I do it? It didn’t seem like it when I got home after this one trip. I was grateful to be back smelling the familiar smells, sleeping in my own bed, and hearing my cat Dexter purr at night. I fell asleep next to Tom as if he were the missing piece I needed to complete the puzzle. But the next morning we began setting up for a party we were having that weekend, and we got into a fight. It was a first-class blowout that ended up with both of us walking off in separate directions.
    Suddenly, I didn’t feel very evolved. If anyone were looking for proof that losing weight didn’t make me a know-it-all, though I had sounded like one a few days before giving interviews and signing books, here was proof. Wolfie looked up from his video game as I stormed through the living room.
    “What’s going on?” he asked, but then before I could answer he added, “Are you guys okay?”
    “We’re having a discussion,” I said.
    “Yeah,” he said with raised eyebrows. “It sounded like you were fighting about how to set up the chairs.”
    He was right, but I felt like showing my appreciation for his intelligence with a wave of my middle finger. I didn’t.
    “Are the chairs that big of a deal?” he asked.
    “Don’t start,” I said.
    With that, I harrumphed off in another direction. Two things then happened that resolved the strain that permeated our household. First, Tom walked into the kitchen just after I grabbed a large bag of cheddar cheese rice cakes from the pantry. He caught me struggling to break it open. It was one of those bags that resist the most strenuous efforts at breaking the seal, and once he saw what I was doing, I was too embarrassed to rip the bag with my teeth. I would have preferred taking a bite out of Tom instead.
    “Oh, really,” he said. “That’s how you’re going to handle this?”
    “I’m an emotional eater,” I said. “Right now, I’m very emotional—and I’m trying really hard to eat.”
    “But?”
    “I can’t open the friggin’ bag,” I said.
    With both gallantry and sensitivity, Tom took the rice cakes from my hands and put them back in the pantry. Then we had one of our best and most honest talks ever. And later that night, I gotinto bed feeling much more relaxed and at peace, as well as grateful that I had not eaten my way through my anger. Tom slid in a bit later. It took a minute before he noticed the surprise I had for him. He looked under the covers to make sure, then turned to me and said, “Hey, you’re naked.”

Notes to Myself

If the life I want is in my hands, what happens when I wash them? Does the life I want go away or get cleaner?
Think of the feeling you have after a great workout. Now compare