What's the hurry?

why do I eat so fast?

A few of the supreme Lapband rules are--eat slowly, chew well and take small bites.
Given the Lapband scenario--this only stands to reason.
And, if you really think about it--those rules are probably good eating rules to live by--whether you have a band or not.
So, why is it that I still eat fast?
Sure, I don't race eat all of the time. However, because I consciously have to slow down my eating and remind myself not to eat fast, I consider my natural instinct is to eat fast.

My father was always a fast eater.
He explained that as a product of the depression era, you had to eat fast--for fear all the food would be gone before you had enough.
When my dad married my step mother--thus inheriting 10 additional children (did I ever tell you about that?)--my step siblings also ate very fast.
Their explanation was that with so many kids, you may not get your fair share so you had to eat quick!
Carmen tends to be a fast eater as well.
I attribute that to his non stop schedule, his impatient personality and his undiagnosed ADHD.
So, I wonder---did all of those fast eaters influence the way I eat or am I just a fast eater?
Or.....
Is it more than that?
---did I become obese because I ate fast--thus not even knowing what I ate?
Or, did I become obese because I ate so fast that my brain never registered when I had enough?
Or, do obese people just eat fast?

So, what made me think about this?
Here's my little story....
Even though I have had great success with my weight loss and my Lapband, I sometimes find myself falling into old habits.
Especially when my world goes mad....
Take for instance yesterday---I had a day full of meetings--most of them back-to-back, a shitload of projects that needed to be completed asap, emails and phone calls up the ying-yang and lots of people needing lots of things. Plus, I had paperwork and phone calls to finish up for my dad, errands to run for him during my lunch hour (which I never got around to!) and I was texting with Toni about her summer job search in between.
I was overwhelmed, overscheduled and just so over it all.
At one point during the day, I realized I needed to stop and eat something.
So, I ran up to the small little dining facility in my building, rambled off my order (one scoop of tuna salad) to the person behind the counter, quickly paid for it, ran down the steps to my office, flew into my seat to eat, finish up a project and hopefully start another. With one hand on my keyboard and the other hand shoveling what I thought was tuna salad in my mouth, I immersed myself in my work.
I soon realized I was eating ham salad.
Ham salad?
Shit, I hate ham salad....
When I looked down at my scoop of ham salad---I had eaten 3/4 of it!
It took me less than 5 minutes to eat 3/4 of a scoop of ham salad!
And, even worse---it took eating 3/4 of it to figure out I was not eating tuna.
I was eating ham.
They don't even taste anything alike!
Did I even realize I was eating?
I immediately fell into a panic.
I knew that if there was going to be a Lapband moment....it was going to be then.
I had just shoveled a good deal of food that I hated into my mouth in a very short period of time!
Even if I didn't have a Lapband, the mere thought of eating ham salad would make me puke.
Add that to the fast eating.
Bingo.
Not a good thing.
Nope.

Gotta work on the fast eating thing.
Unless I want to eat ham salad fast again.......