My New Year Resolution? I'm Breaking Up with Deliveroo
Or, if you're thinking about going on a new year diet, read this first
According to my Deliveroo app, my earliest order with them was placed in September 2020. It was for a harissa chicken salad with vermicelli rice, artichokes, baked cauliflower and broccoli, roasted carrots and baby spinach, with a lemon tahini dressing. It cost £14.48 and was the sort of thing that I am more than capable of whipping up for myself in the same time it probably took to be delivered.
While this might be the earliest order on the current Deliveroo app, I know for a fact that this is not the first order I placed with them because I can remember the aquamarine bags coming to the door of the flat I lived in before this one back in 2016. Then it was novel and exciting. That I could afford this treat was proof to myself that I was making a success of freelancing. I can also remember the summer of 2018 when I developed plant fasciitis in both feet and standing was so painful that even five minutes in front of a microwave had me in tears, so nearly every meal was delivered. Then it wasn’t novel and exciting, it was just another sign that my body was failing me.
According to the app I order Deliveroo on average 2.6 times a week. If you do that to the same flat for five years you begin to know the delivery drivers. You put names to faces, you know who will hand you your food with a wave and “enjoy!”, and who will leave it on the doorstep as they run to their next stop. You automatically know where to scroll to for food that will provide comfort, a pick-me-up, excitement, familiarity, bland-fullness or just a relief from the eternal question, “what should I have for dinner tonight?” I know exactly how to get what I need from that little app.
And that’s why I’ve decided it’s time to break-up with Deliveroo. Because I’ve stopped ordering food and instead I’m ordering my mood.
[I didn’t mean for that to rhyme but it does and now I can’t find any other way to put it so you’re stuck with a takeaway rhyme. Sorry.]
My therapist likes to tell me that my love language is taking responsibility. From a small child I’ve always felt like I should have the answers to my own problems. If you can solve all your own crises then there’s never any need to bother anyone else with them. This awareness that nobody was coming to save me, has given me a lot in my life. It’s helped my shape and grow a good career. It’s bought me my own property. It’s forced me to be a quick learner, always looking for new ways I could be self-sufficient. When one school teacher offered a series of “life skills” classes, I was the first to sign up. I didn’t want to get caught out later in life not knowing how to change a plug (a skill I still have and which I have used precisely twice. I’ve been glad of it both times.)
What nobody ever told me about responsibility though, was that you could over do it. That if you’re going to take responsibility on, you must balance this by also allowing yourself to be taken care of. And if you try to behave as though this is optional, as though you can take care of yourself and no-one else is required, you’ll slowly find those responsible clay feet you’ve created start to crack and chaos creeps in.
Of course we all know the feeling of being overwhelmed and dropping balls because we’re trying to juggle too much. Some of us will know the feeling of being burnt out, not even dropping the balls because we can’t find the energy to put them in the air in the first place. Being over-responsible for yourself and for others for too long, can leave you feeling both of these things but it also leaves you with a gap where you should be allowing others to care for you but you’re not. And because nature abhors a vacuum we try to fill this gap with something, anything else.
Maybe you end the day by sinking gratefully onto your sofa with a glass of wine. Perhaps you run until the sound of your breathing blocks out the sound of your head repeating the undone items on your to-do list. I know people who shop, people who smoke, people who take drugs and dance into the night with the sort of abandon that can only be achieved when you know you’ve put all your problems off until tomorrow. I know people who turn all their attention onto their children so they never have to think about themselves. And I know people who spend years in psychoanalysis only thinking about themselves but never asking anyone to care for them.
I order a Deliveroo.
There’s nothing wrong with any of these things by themselves, some of them are actively good for us. But when we use them as a substitute for more deeper relationships with other people, I feel we’re doing ourselves a disservice. For myself, right now, I want to try and find a different way. I don’t want to be someone who keeps denying that she has needs, who refuses to let anyone else shoulder the responsibility and is afraid of being taken care of. I want to be able to call a friend and say, “I’ve had a shitty day, can I rant for a second?” Or, hopefully, “I’ve had a great day, can you celebrate with me?” I want to balance responsibility with being taken care of by someone other than a twenty-something with a moped.
So this year I’m breaking-up with Deliveroo, I’ll let you know how it goes.
Do you recognise the behaviour of looking to be taken care of in ways that don’t need other people? Tell me about it in the comments.
Each month, I offer to take care of one of you. Sort of. I offer a space where you can ask me for advice and I’ll try and help if I can. The first of these newsletters is going out next week to paid members, so sign up here.
Also, if you want to clear the cobwebs of 2022 and call in all the care (and anything else you might want) in 2023, then I’ll be holding a New Year Zoom gathering for paying members on Wednesday 18th January at 7pm. Membership starts from £6.99 a month and I’d love it if you could join us. And if you’re already subscribed, keep an eye on your inbox in the coming days for more information!