To wonder how anyone can live on so much processed food?

[MummyMumMumMummy]

Let me start by saying I’m not by any means a health freak. I have periods where we’ll have frozen pizzas, frozen beige food and cans of beans for dinner.. but it makes me feel so so rough!

For example, in the last week we’ve eating frozen pizza, a McDonald’s, a night of cheese and biscuits, and we’ve had beans on toast, ready meals like lasagna or currys. This is just down to using what left in the house before doing a food shop and I feel awful. I feel slow, my anxiety is high, I have aches and pains and I just feel generally ‘bleurgh’

This happens every time I swap out out usual cook from scratch lots of veg type meals to these ready made quick and processed foods.

but my point is; does anyone else feel this way?

I have friends who quite consistently live on beige food and ‘hate’ veg. DH before we started dating would literally only eat beans on toast and frozen pizza. He still enjoys them from time to time but even he prefer home cooked meals with lots of veg now.

I’m not in any way judging anyone’s diet, I don’t care what you eat it doesn’t affect me. I just wonder whether other people feel such a strong physical sense of being healthier in mind and body (that sounds super green!) when they eat more organic, fresh foods?

Some misinformation here - as already mentioned here, tinned tomatoes are NOT ultraprocessed food or bad for you. They actually can be better for you, because canned tomato lycopene - a natural substance that is good for bones and protects against heart disease and some cancers - is more digestible than they lycopene in some fresh tomatoes. Tinned fruits and veg (in natual juice or water) are full of healthy things: https://www.rightathome.net/blog/are-canned-foods-healthy

Frozen fruits and veg are much fresher than those found in the shops and therefore are often MORE nutritious.

It's been said over and over again that a balanced 'Mediterranean-style' diet is one of the very best to follow for health:
https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/nutrition-and-healthy-eating/in-depth/mediterranean-diet/art-20047801

https://www.bhf.org.uk/informationsupport/heart-matters-magazine/nutrition/mediterranean-diet

Back to canned foods:

Baked beans do contain quite a lot of sugar and salt and are classed as 'ultra-processed' but they don't contain other harmful 'additives', as a previous poster suggested. They are also full of very healthy fibre. The occasional tin is not likely to do much harm.

Quick guide to 'good' processed foods and processed foods to avoid from the NHS here:
https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/eat-well/how-to-eat-a-balanced-diet/what-are-processed-foods/

Article here from British Heart Foundation discussing the whole processed/ultra-processed classification system in detail, and giving recommendations in a practical way:
https://www.bhf.org.uk/informationsupport/heart-matters-magazine/news/behind-the-headlines/ultra-processed-foods

I don't notice a difference. I eat a lot of veg, I'm a vegetarian and aim for a lot of protein. But if I have periods of eating lots of processed food I feel fine. I think it's because people think about how bad it is for them and them feel bad as a result.

Nope. I can't relate to what you've said at all. I feel no difference. Yesterday I made chilli and fajitas from scratch. Tomorrow we are having jacket potatoes. If I eat a frozen pizza with salad I feel no different.

What's wrong with beans on toast?

If I eat a lot of highly processed food it does leave me feeling a bit off kilter and sluggish. But it isn’t an all or nothing game. You can eat it sometimes, and freshly prepared food other times, and have a bit of a mix. There has to be a balance between convenience and optimal nutrition.

Anxiety?
Aches and pains?

No!

We normally cook everything from scratch I don't feel any different after eating processed foods. Maybe I feel guilt after takeout.

I take vitamins so maybe that's why. Only my vitamins D and iron is low. Those two things make me feel tired. But I can't enough of either from food. If I feel out of condition that's linked to my activity levels.

Sluggish? Yeah.
But no pains and aches, unless you mean unhappy stomach.
It has been a while I had biege food week.
I normally live on lots of veg, fruit and meat/fish with carbs (obvs just normal eating), no premade stuff except bread, so week without much veg/fruit mess with my digestive

I also didn't get any judging from OP's post. It's just a chat fgs

I see someone’s mentioned age. That could be a factor for me and I’m actually in denial, I’m just into my late 20’s and I have two children so aches and pains are probably just a product of life now!

but the sluggish rubbish feeling after eating lots of processed foods has been for as long as I can remember, more noticeable since I moved out of my parent home when I was 20.

again, I’m not judging. It makes no difference to me whether anyone else is eating pizza and chicken nuggets 7 days a week. Im
not above anyone else’s diet and I eat processed food like the majority of people. My post is about how these food make you/us feel. Not whether or not they should be consumed and on how regular a basis.

I’m an absolute sucker for cheese but I’m very much dairy intolerate so we don’t eat it often and I pay for it afterwards for several days! I’m not a huge sweet fan, I like chocolate and I’m love lime jelly! 😂 the only things I don’t really ever eat is bread, I’m not a bread person at all the only time I ever eat bread is if I make a focaccia and have it with roasted balsamic tomatoes.. which I’m now craving 🫶🫶

this has been a really interesting post and I’ve enjoyed reading everyone responses, it’s good to read how we’re all affected differently.

I absolutely notice the difference and I'm not sure why some of the people who don't notice the difference are getting so defensive about it.... Its okay that you don't notice a difference, we've all got different bodies??

I don't think it's judgemental either, I think it's another supporting point as to why as a society poverty is bad for health. In very simplistic terms, if you (via whatever circumstances led you there) are constantly eating processed food, and you are living under a constant low level of regular headaches, fatigue, small niggling stomach issues, sleep issues etc, then your body is having to deal with that stress constantly, which means other external stressors, illness or injury hit harder when they come. It's not a judgement, it's a call to arms for the processed food industry to be better regulated, people to have better working conditions and pay so they don't have to rely on quick easy options, us to fund social care properly so that we don't rely enormously on unpaid labour of (mostly female) family members who then have even less time in the day to think about planning, buying, preparing and eating healthy meals, us to figure out a proper bloody food education plan AND include food psychology in it so people understand emotional eating, binge eating and how to tackle it, how certain foods make you want more, how certain foods keep you full, etc etc. And don't anyone come to say I'm being patronising and people know this stuff, and they know how to cook they are just poor - yup, plenty of people in that category, but there are also people who can cook healthy and have the time and resources to do so but don't because of emotional or mental health factors.

I could eat crap until I hit perimenopause. Now I have to eat right else my anxiety sky-rockets. I can’t tolerate alcohol anymore either.

I’m very much dairy intolerate

Well with the list you put up this itself explains why you feel unwell....

No, it hasn't touched a nerved, it just came over as judgey to me.

She really isn’t.

We all feel really sluggish,tired and low if we eat too much processed food.
It's commented on by dd's and dh if we are out a lot or grab stuff on the run.
I'm lucky in that my lot all love healthy,home cooking and veg etc.
Definitely agree with you OP.

I don’t eat that much processed food but do eat some. I could eat beans on toast every day and feel fine though. I can eat a few processed meals a week and feel fine as long as I’m having plenty of good food too.

We had a couple of weeks with no kitchen and ate a couple of McDonald’s, chip shop a few time’s and other takeaways and I didn’t feel great. Tired, bloated and couldn’t be bothered to do much. As much as it tastes nice, we were actually all just wanting some proper meals after the fortnight was up, even the kids were sick of takeaway food.

I agree, I generally have high energy levels, but I really notice a difference if I eat lots of shit

And to think that in developed countries, access to cheap calories is almost always via processed foods. It's not a coincidence that diabetes, obesity, heart disease, mental health disorders such as anxiety and depression, are rife and linked in societies where time-poor people can most cheaply and quickly eat a diet of processed foods. There's lots and lots of research out there on this.

Since I have silent reflux, I cannot eat processed foods, sweets and various beverages.

So, my diet is now full of organic, naturally occurring foods.

Yes, I definitely feel much, much more energetic as my diet is high in protein with plenty of fibre, iron and carbs in there. Whole foods. Sleeping much better as well. I eat 5 meals a day - 3 main meals and two mini meals.

Everything from scratch, including making my own power bars using peanut butter, almonds and dates. Put it in freezer for a while then stick it in the fridge - job done.

Seafood is especially good for silent reflux. No cows milk as its an inflammatory so I've subbed it for goats milk.

There’s also this research that’s come out today!
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/nov/13/some-ultra-processed-foods-are-good-for-your-health-who-backed-study-finds

Food, even highly processed, is there to be enjoyed. It has no moral value. (Slightly off topic, sorry OP, but the UHP zealots really get on my wick.)

I did the Tim Spector Zoe programme and felt like crap! TMI but it upset my bowels for months as too many seeds/fibre.

I yearn to feel better when I eat better but I don't. I feel bloated and sluggish after too much beige but I feel the same after a bowl of porridge.

Regular not huge meals and a bit of fruit and veg that I like is what works best for me. Include some crap if I fancy it and don't make it a thing.

I feel different yeah, and I definitely crave fruit and veg when I've been eating beige for a while. It sits heavier in my stomach I find.

I'm not a health freak at all but I was at a festival in the summer and I just ate shite for five days straight - giant Yorkshire puds, chips, pies, pasties, pizza. Nary a green or grown thing in sight. I stopped at a Tesco on the way home, bought a punnet of necterines and ate all of them in the car in the car park like some sort of secret necterine addict.

I'm the same but I was very nearly the type of person that lived on processed foods. It's what I was fed as a child, I didn't learn to cook anything beyond toast and super noodles before I left home. It was only when I had DS that I was determined to learn how to cook from scratch and discovered I really enjoyed it.

Some people just don't know any better and have neither the knowledge nor the desire to change and it carries through generations. how many times do we hear "my child will only eat chicken nuggets so that's all I give them so they eat" which just causes an addiction, as is now becoming widely known about. And no I'm talking about children with genuine food aversions. It has only worsened over the years as these foods are cheap so they become the only food people can afford to buy.

Tbf to the "zealots" , the only positive it mentions is fibre in bread and cereals. That's really clutching straws imho...
But upf is fine as small part of healthier diet. Who doesn't eat any at all ever🤷 Very few people manage that unless they have homestead

If i have too much junk i feel lethargic and yuck and grave real food. I truly don't know how people survive on UPF but then if they haven't had a decent diet they won't realise how much better you feel on real food.