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Original poster

Thread for those who are trying to eat "better"

997 replies

Octopus37 · 07/02/2014 14:26

Following on from yesterdays thread "Do I eat too much", which I posted on, I was unsurprising told that what I eat is crap. Have been feeling pretty crap the last few weeks, not enough energy low libido, sluggish, wound up, down - so have decided to see if changing my eating habits can shift things a bit. I'm not overweigh 5ft5, 8st6lbs, (slightly on the heavy side for me), but would be pleased if I did loose a few pounds, trying not to make weight the focus. Have decided to take a vitamin pill with iron every day, last year had v low ferratin levels so had to take iron tablets for a while. I'm not promising to do well every day and cut out sugar completely as I feel that I would be destined to fail. However, I am going to try to I improve. Today have eaten:
1 pack of Belvita biscuits
1 Actvia extra creamy yoghurt
1 large apple
1 Danone (high protein yoghurt)
3 Oatcakes
Some cashew nuts
I am planning on sweet chilli chicken & rice (ready meal cause of money diet) with some stir fried veg for tea and plan to eat some red grapes afterwards. Also may have some sort of a treat on school run. Also aim is to replace the Belvita biscuits with oatcakes for breakfast and maybe eat them with some cheese. Know I'm not doing perfectly but I am making an effort. Buddies welcome.

OP posts:
stilllearnin · 01/04/2014 14:07

Tbh I do worry about whether I am getting the right info. I get confused about carbs. But reckon we overloaded on that (as I think a lot of veggies can easily do) until quite recently. I read eat to live recently which made some sense to me in parts. I also followed the link to the nhs portion sizes which seems to massively favour fruit. eg 4 heaped tablespoons of green beans equals 1 medium tomato - but why?

Anyway it's my day off. I have fab new shorter than short haircut. about to get leek and potato soup on the go (i know its hot out there but my kids love soup) and then some berries from the market with natural yoghurt for dessert. We eat early usually by 5 pm and so I am trying to include good desserts so nobody gets evening munchies. I know munchies can be ok but they go for weetabix or anything they can find and I wonder if its better to have three proper meals.

DameDiazepamTheDramaQueen · 01/04/2014 14:11

I saw that thread tooGrin

Rummikub · 01/04/2014 18:43

I had read, a couple of years ago, that we should actually be eating 10 portions fruit/veg a day! But that won't get promoted as it might be daunting. Interesting though.

DameDiazepamTheDramaQueen · 01/04/2014 18:44

Food today was

Ready brek-ran out of eggs

Cold butter beans and feta

Fish cake, stir fry veg and spinach and avocado.

Yoghurt and strawberries/grapes.

Bramshott · 02/04/2014 11:02

I wish I liked eggs - my chickens are now laying with a vengeance and I have 19 of them lined up in the fridge!! I must dig out some egg recipies that I can eat. Last year we ate a lot of fresh pasta, but as I'm trying to stay off wheat as much as I can, we haven't had so much this year.

I might try a spanish tortilla, and maybe some brownies for the DDs.

Risette · 02/04/2014 12:26

I've been spending too much time in the garden and not enough on here!

Still doing really well with the healthier eating. I've had the odd bit of choc but not even half the amount I ate before become more conscious of what I was eating, and joining you all on here.

I don't eat as much fruit as I used to... I didn't know about the ten a day! I used to blend a lot of fruit to make smoothies but I got worried for my teeth! I was also advised to avoid thick skinned fruit.....any ideas on that?

Tonight's dinner is going to be healthy chicken curry with orange lentils.... Yum.

Hope you are all good. Despite my initial bout of spots my skin looks better

DameDiazepamTheDramaQueen · 02/04/2014 12:54

Fruit is ok as long as you eat it as a whole and not juice it as you lose the fibre and it's also bad for your teeth. No idea about thick skinned fruit but from what I have read berries are better for you in general. Bananas and apples are good for your heart so I eat them every day. I think in general people need to concentrate on eating leafy veg.

Glad your spots have gone, that's fab! Grin

Risette · 02/04/2014 14:10

It's nice to be spot free! If I could just get rid of the wrinkles. Still trying to up my water intake.

I saw some mangoes in the supermarket last time I went in. Will get a couple next time I'm in. I've been putting blueberries on my weetabix.

My gardening efforts have been good....strawberries are starting to grow. I also have fruit trees in the garden but not sure what they are going to yield as I have only been here a year and am just getting to grips with the jungle of a garden.

Bramshott · 02/04/2014 14:36

The more I think about it, the more I'm staggered that so many people think it's difficult or expensive to eat 7 portions of fruit and veg. I know I (like all of us here) am making an effort to eat well, but so far today, without really thinking about it, I've had:

  1. Dried fruit & nuts with breakfast
  2. A Pear mid-morning
  3. Sweet potato with couscous for lunch (and that wasn't even a very healthy lunch! I could easily have added a tomato if I hadn't been in a hurry)
  4. Followed by a pear
  5. Some dates just now with my cup of tea (although they're pretty much just unalloyed sugar!)

Later we are having smoked mackerel salad which will have lettuce (6), tomato (7), and possibly steamed broccoli (8), with a glass of fruit juice (9).

Risette · 02/04/2014 16:05

Just did a count of mine to see how many portions I got to yesterday
Blueberries (1) at breakfast
Chicken salad lunch with lettuce, spinach, half beet root two normal sized tomatoes and a few olives. (Say 3 or 4 portions)
Cod with sweet potato mash and green beans for dinner.

Maybe 7 yesterday.

Sleepwhenidie · 02/04/2014 16:21

I'm always a bit Confused about why fruit and veg are treated as the same thing when they are actually very different, mainly because of the sugar. To be fair I think most coverage of the story said it should be 2 pieces fruit and 5 veg and that fruit juice doesn't count....I suppose eating fruit is better than other sweet stuff too. I manage quite a lot most days but when I'm in a rush or cooking just for myself the veg count definitely drops off, yesterday was one of those days - pretty random and had to grab a sandwich on the run at lunchtime, but I still managed a whole small avocado on toast with chilli and tomatoes for breakfast, two satsumas, a massive pile of peas and half a box of sweetfire beetroot with dinner...so maybe 6. I'm going to start trying to add veg to breakfast more often too...spinach/mushrooms/asparagus are pretty easy.

In the interest of boosting the veg quota I've finally ordered a NutriBullet for making green smoothies, it pulverizes the whole fruit/veg so you keep fibre etc. Still not as good as eating the actual thing but has to be a good way of increasing veg intake Smile. I had been eyeing the Vitamix but it is £eye watering Grin.

DameDiazepamTheDramaQueen · 02/04/2014 16:30

Fruit is ok, I'm sure it is,an apple will be better for you than a Twix. As someone's grandad said upthread 'No one got fat from eating apples' Grin If you have a problem with sugar then obviously you can't eat it.

Sleepwhenidie · 02/04/2014 17:05

Fruit isn't bad, but much of it is high in sugar and no one should be eating loads of it, particularly if veg is the alternative. If you think about how much fruit would be available in nature, particularly in this part of the world, it would be limited and seasonal and the sweetness of it, in terms of function, compels you to want more...to gorge on it and fatten up before the winter when food will naturally be more scarce. Today, we also wouldn't necessarily choose to get more sugar in the form of whole fruit when there are so many other tempting options. In addition, 'unwrapped' fructose, used as an additive in a multitude of processed food, and what you get from juices and dried fruit is just disastrous, we just aren't designed to deal with that much sugar in one hit (ie it's much more concentrated than it would be had we eaten a whole fresh fruit)..Thats why it's much better to get nutrients and fibre from vegetables Smile.

fuzzpig · 02/04/2014 17:44

I am really swaying away from fruit in favour of veg now. Don't get me wrong I still LOVE fruit (my mum used to call me Fruitbat when I was little :o) but I'm making more effort to include more veg for the family.

I don't buy as much what I call 'boring' fruit anymore. I think before there was quite a drive to get the DCs eating lots of it (not that they needed any encouragement TBH, they are Fruitbats too!) so we always had heaps of apples/satsumas etc. But for myself, if I'm going to have fruit, I want it to be something I REALLY love, so I'm spending more on stuff like berries, pomegranate, melon, pineapple etc, as it's more of a treat and I really enjoy it rather than thinking 'meh, I'd better eat an apple I suppose'.

It really is getting easier to have more veg too. The DCs haven't even noticed the changed proportions on their plates and just eat what they're given (DS is still a bit picky though, and won't eat nearly so many different types as DD)

As an aside, I've decided to permanently switch to organic carrots - I don't deliberately buy anything organic (except milk, quite a recent change) but I did last week and OMG the taste difference is staggering (we usually have carrots raw).

Rummikub · 02/04/2014 21:14

That's one of the reasons I buy organic. Organic bananas taste like they do in the tropics, yummy. And organic tomatoes taste like tomatoes used to. I am scared of the fruit & veg that don't go off, ever! I once found (non organic) tomatoes in my fridge a month after the sell buy date, and they hadn't aged a bit!

DameDiazepamTheDramaQueen · 02/04/2014 21:27

I grew up with a huge fruit garden-strawberries, raspberries, melons, Logan berries, apples, gooseberries. The only thing I hated was rhubarbGrin oh we had a cherry tree too. I've always loved fruit!

Original poster
Octopus37 · 02/04/2014 22:26

Hi,

I just wanted to post to wish everybody else luck as I'm not going to be posting on this thread anymore. Basically I started off, didn't do very well and have done 5:2 for 4 weeks with minimal weight loss and I haven't really felt many healthy benefits when I have tried to eat ore healthily. Mentally I find it very hard to separate healthy eating from weight loss and I have found the whole thing has made my diet and binge mentality worse. I have got other stuff going on at the moment (know I'm not alone in this as a lot of you are the same and are still managing to be focused in a healthy way) so figure that this isn't the right time for me. Just want to wish everybody else luck.

OP posts:
DameDiazepamTheDramaQueen · 02/04/2014 23:21

Oh octopus, I'm sorry you have a lot going on, that's rottenSad you have to do what you can cope with and no more, as you said perhaps it's not your time. Hope things improve soon loveThanks

stilllearnin · 03/04/2014 07:05

Hi Octopus. Bloody food and bloody weight- I know what you mean. I agree with Dame. There has to be an element of being kind to yourself and sometimes that means stepping back for a while. It can be the right thing to do long term as you come to it more naturally later on maybe.

I have dd's friends over after school and also my home ed teen went back to school this week and it's not working out. His class sent texts to loads and loads of kids to 'break him' and are basically relentlessly on at him even in the classroom so that he couldn't even do a presentation without them drowning him out! They don't seem to realise he's really tough emotionally and his own person so he'll actually not buckle.

Oh I digressed! My point was in these circumstances (friends and school grief) I'd reach for the junk food but not today!

fuzzpig · 03/04/2014 08:16

Good god stilllearnin that's horrific. What is wrong with some people FFS :( well done to your DS for trying.

Hugs, octopus, good luck with everything and hope things improve ASAP x

DameDiazepamTheDramaQueen · 03/04/2014 08:18

Bloody hell what are the school doing about it?Shock

Sleepwhenidie · 03/04/2014 08:48

Octopus Thanks, so sorry you are having a tough time. It is a very complicated knot, untangling that mental link between food and weight. It's all about the small changes and being patient with yourself and we need to do it as and when we are ready. If it's all too much to think about on top of everything else at the moment then it's no problem, come back to it when life isn't so stressful. Fwiw I thought you were doing really well, you'd made some good changes but because you still had some of your old habits then naturally weight isn't going to shift yet iykwim? Too much in the middle ground if that makes sense? Good luck to you, I hope life improves soon Smile

Stillearnin Shock at your DS, poor kid, must be horrendous for you too Thanks.

Risette · 03/04/2014 10:08

Octopus...agree that sometimes a step back is the right thing to do. We put so much pressure on ourselves. I hope a bit of breathing space helps.

Stillearnin...what an awful situation. Hope your ds gets the support he needs. Hope you're all ok.

stilllearnin · 03/04/2014 10:27

Thank you for your messages - I wasn't expecting that. Ds will actually be ok because he has a really good life and lots of opportunities. He also is friends with the 6th formers (he's yr 8)! Some teachers send the kids out, some don't bit either way it all starts again in the next lesson. He won't get traumatised. He'll try to make it work but if not he'll come out and do something else - he invented the word bouncebackability!! But yes, I've not slept!

I agree about the food/ weight tangled knot. It takes ages. Acceptance, kindness, compassion is key.

fuzzpig · 03/04/2014 10:33

Bouncebackability :o love it! :o

Sleep I totally agree about small changes. I used to be very 'all or nothing' in many aspects of life, and when applied to diet it is quite an unhealthy way to think.

But by taking baby steps it has felt like no effort at all TBH. Still got a way to go but I'm enjoying it rather than dreading it.