My journey with food, the kitchen and cooking has evolved over the years. I used to cook with love and entertain weekly with 5-20 guest at any time in my small apartments or homes. I can almost pinpoint the shifts in my life to the exact moments that cooking and food changed from love to a chore or an overthought process.

My 20’s was an awesome era with food for me. Me and my ex husband, before we had our kiddo and after, always planned our meals with great detail and excitement. We would plan a menu and a guest list. We looked forward to bartending and entertaining our friends and family. I would make loaves of fresh bread weekly for gourmet burger nights, homemade pizza dough where everyone brings their toppings, Italian nights where we did homemade Alfredo and red sauce. My most favorite nights of all were the “Taco Tetris” gatherings. I would make 5 pounds of meat and we would have Tetris tournaments, tacos and margaritas. If you know me, you know my love for Mexican food and margaritas. I believe this is where my love for tacos stemmed from! Then when my son started school all the lunch ladies were jealous of his packed lunch and napkin art for the day that I drew. They would tell me he ate better home cooked lunches than what they would have at home for dinner.

Then my 30’s hit. My marriage ended, I left my job of 12 years, I had a new partner and a big a lifestyle change. My new partner owned a gym where image was always at the forefront as I took on a new career/roll in the gym. Where food was once fun, it now became a question of will this affect my physical appearance to the athletes and how will it affect my performance in workouts as a representative of the gym. While trying to guide people in a healthy path of nutrition, overtime I began to forget the loving part of food. I became to busy at the gym to even be home to cook and completely lost touch with how to be spontaneous in the kitchen. Fast forward, gym owner and myself split and I go full force into my art career.

At these new crossroads of being a business owner myself, I was now into my mid 30’s…I was hustling to support myself and my kiddo, I was traveling for jobs and felt like I was killing it. When I did cook it was the same boring rotation of lifeless food to just have a home cooked meal and you can bet there was always a taco night. These taco nights lacked the love they once had. During this period my son was 12-14 and he was becoming my little chef. I was so busy and exhausted from work at the end of the day I had nothing left to be creative in the kitchen. I would buy him ingredients, help, hang out, chat and clean up after he would cook. The other option, we would get invited eat with our friends, which is the fun part of meals we always love.

I’m currently in my late 30s and starting to notice the changes with food over my past. For the first time in a while I want to start feeding the people I love again. I enjoyed showing people I cared for them, by filling their bellies with tasty food. My work hasn’t slowed down, but I have forced myself to. Where all of my creativity has been going into art and work, I am trying to use some of my creativity in the kitchen again. After all, cooking is an art! I have also opened myself and my heart to a new boyfriend. This amazing human is a great cook, he’s super creative in the kitchen and he also seems to share his love and affection with others by feeding them. That, or he’s just always hungry, so if he forces people to eat with him he doesn’t feel guilty eating every two hours… I just recently dropped him off at the airport where he is headed off to work for three months. Before he left I promised myself to start playing in the kitchen so I can get comfortable and return the love of meals to him when he gets home!

The last couple weeks I have been enjoying feeding my son, friends and family with my creations. Then I pack my son the leftovers from the dinners to take to school for lunch. I pair drinks, meals and desserts for my guest. I have even been bringing the meals to some of them and cooking in their homes.

I hope that sharing this story keeps me accountable and motivated to start eating and cooking with love again. I hope to change my relationship with food to one of happiness, health, creativity and wellness. I hope that maybe someone else can benefit from reflecting on their relationship with food even if their struggles differ from mine. I hope that if my relationship with food has affected my son, that I can undo or help repair any negative feelings or habits he may now have towards food.