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?

I definitely feel better when I eat well, and I believe diet is linked to mental well-being, however I don’t buy into “organic” and I don’t feel terrible if I don’t eat well. After a few days I just feel like I could do with some nutrients.

I feel awful when I eat too much processed junk. I think I am slightly allergic to all the e-numbers, aspertam and/or sugars. In America on holiday my face blew up and think it was because of sugar or substitute sugars in everything. I am by no means a health freak but yesterday I read an article about low sugar substitutes, diet cokes etc. Ugh. You might as well inject yourself with poison. I had no idea.

I grew up in the 70's. My mother wasn't a good cook and still isn't. Everything was probably processed. She isn't adventurous with food now and she wasn't back then. I guess supermarkets had less choice back then. We always had potato and veg with some sort of processed type meat. Sausage, minced beef, bacon. Mostly likely had a chicken roast dinner every sunday. She was a SAHM and later worked part time. She had time to cook from scratch but no motivation.

I'm the opposite. Work full time. Have no time to cook from scratch except at weekends. Tend to mix it up on weekdays. For example pizza with loads of salad. Spag Bol with veg. Chicken curry and rice with veg. Chicken stir fry, noodles and veg.

I feel fine, am a healthy weight. Its the stuff like brown bread, brown rice, some veg, some fruits that make me feel rubbish. Just plays havoc with my bowels lol. Causing gas and painful bloating and constipation. I'm in my 40's.

My DH and DD don’t know what vegetables and fruit are. They seem fine

I always feel gross after a takeaway and have a weird poo (sorry tmi) and feel quite dehydrated because excessive salt.

I don’t feel any different with UPF vs fresh food. I kind of wish I did though because it would be a massive incentive to cook from scratch!

Since I've turned 40 if I eat crappy food I feel tired and rubbish and could fall asleep after eating. Was never like before. I've always eaten a sandwich and crisp for lunch or something with cheese.

We usually eat a lot of fresh veg but we lived on takeaways for a week when we had our kitchen renovated. It really affected my sense of well-being. I didn’t eat a takeaway for a long time afterwards, couldn’t face them 🤣

No I don't feel any different if eat lots of fresh fruit and vegetables or ultra processed food. I mess about with my diet a lot and will cut out sugar and/or alcohol/all junk food intermittently and never feel any better for it, it's annoying. However certain vegetables really upset my stomach.

I survived the 1970's when most of my diet was tinned food ! My grandmother used to buy me apples every week, and occasional vitamin tablets.

This is interesting . What type of foods were you fed on? I was born in 70s too late 70s though .

I feel the opposite 😂 I used to love having a takeaway but with childcare we've cut back. Everytime I have one I feel like heaven 😂

In general no, I feel OK on most foods.

Certain things however will make me feel a bit off. Anything oil heavy, msg and often tomatoey sauces all make me feel a bit rough.

I tend to feel similar if I have a week of eating lots of processed foods but I don’t think it’s about the food. On weeks where I don’t have the time or energy to cook there’s usually lots going on, so it might be that I’m not sleeping well and not drinking enough water because I’ve been very busy etc. I think it could be correlation rather than causation.

Back in my uni days when I ate a lot of junk and processed foods I definitely didn’t notice a difference, it was more of a lifestyle choice rather then something I did because I was short on time and energy.

I can’t say I feel healthier for eating healthier because until this post I’ve never thought about it. I have for the past 14 years cooked pretty much from scratch because I did at the beginning want to be healthier, then I did slimming world and that helped me lose weight and find new recipes we enjoyed.

BUT we’ve had enormous ill health in our family, think weeks turning into months sitting in hospitals, getting home late, going out early, missing lunches etc etc, somewhere in all that I started buying pies, supermarket curries, and odds and ends of processed foods.

I have for the past couple of months been really sick, been seeing a physio for foot, knee, hip and back issues, felt absolutely knackered and really put it all down to current medical/hospital lifestyle we’ve had to be doing. (not thinking food)

so OP, thanks, I definitely feel my own current poor health is attributable partly to the poor food choices I’ve been eating as well as the constant running around (and sitting around). I have been trying to drink more water but actually that’s just the tip of an iceberg I need to get back to proper nutritional cooking.

I love a big takeaway pizza. But my husband and I both feel awful after eating one.

I do eat a lot of frozen food, but 90% of it was batch cooked (admittedly I do use canned beans/ lentils/ sweetcorn) and tomato purée from a tube

Yes for me it’s like night and day—I usually eat cooked-from-scratch organic food with lots of veg, mostly vegetarian. If I eat ultra processed food I can actually feel pretty ill. A few days eating pizza (while travelling) and I get all bunged up with mucus. Too much sugar and my skin, which is usually clear, breaks out in spots.

Yes, and it has a noticeable impact on my family. I grew up if not on a processed diet with a fairly low quotient of fresh or fresh, frozen veg. If anything my diet got worse as I got older and my parents income improved and convenience foods became more accessible. Culturally, a salad was a few leaves on the side not 60% of the meal?

I feel lethargic, constipated (family the same but I'm slower to feel it possibly due to my diet growing up) and a bit bloated. I'm also more inclined to eat crap which is weird. Presume sugar breeds sugar cravings but I'm no dietician.

Beans on toast def the food of the gods. Not with manky mini sausages in there though 🤮

i’m guessing their bodies get used to it? or they feel constantly rubbish and that becomes their default

I can't believe the amount of people on here who seem to think everyone's experience is the same as their own and if they think it's different they must be mistaken.

Surely it's far more likely that some people are sensitive to aspects of processed food, and some people aren't? I could well believe it's a very common thing to be sensitive to without it actually being universal.

Me too.
Although I much prefer to eat takeaways and processed stuff, I really try to eat healthy food as I do feel so much better for it - both physically and mentally.

Yes I've had this, I call it the food hangover, when I joined slimming World and ate really healthy every day meals cooked from scratch filled with veg after a few months being on slimming world I had a takeaway and felt rough for 2 days afterwards, I didn't realise at first it was the food untill the next junk food meal a few weeks later.

I’ve never noticed feeling different based on what I’ve eaten, though when I go abroad
to places like the US I crave vegetables. I do notice feeling much better mentally and physically when I exercise which is annoying as I don’t like to exercise!

Short answer: No.

Long answer:
I dont feel better or worse after eating anything, unless it actually makes me sick or something. Fast food doesnt make me feel sluggish, neither does fresh food make me feel energised.

But I do eat a varied diet, which doesnt consist of any one thing, but a variety, and mostly cooked from scratch. However, theres not a lot of veg or fruit in my diet.

I feel like this after we have been away camping we are mainly a family of veggies and camping meals often lack fresh veggies I find we eat too much pasta and I start craving fresh veg.

I think we are eating well if we have beans, pizza or lasagne.
Eating badly for us is cake and biscuits all the time.

I love veg, and cooking buy having a dragon baby means meals in 20mins or starve.

Too much sugar salt and fat and my guts will get a bit groggy also my immune system coughs a bit. Eating healthily can mean different things to people.

We don't smoke, drink or drugs, our diet could be better, but we are not doing do bad.