How Would You Characterize Your Old Eating Habits?
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The Cyclical Poor Man's Diet (and before that, just The Poor Man's Diet).
We grew up working poor -- that fun no-man's land between getting government aid and actually being able to make ends meet. As a result, I lived on basic foods -- tuna melts, Ramen, spaghetti with meat sauce were common staples, as was macaroni & cheese and venison. For what we could afford, we ate pretty healthfully, according to conventional standards. We rarely had much of the real junky stuff, though those Hug "juice" things made a regular appearance in my lunch box, as did a Little Debbie of one form or another. The bulk of my carbs came from grains and starches, though (pasta, wheat bread, corn, potatoes, etc). Salads made an occasional appearance, especially in the summer. Most of our veggies usually came out of a can.
Once I moved out, my financial situation slowly improved, so I went from living on peanut butter sandwiches, Ramen, macaroni & cheese, and tuna melts, to what could be described as "Cyclical Poor Man's Diet." The amount of extra money we had would cycle up and down. When it was down, we would eat more home made stuff, which included a fair amount of macaroni and cheese, spaghetti, and other pasta+cheese+tomato sauce dishes, with the occasional steak. When it was up, pizza was a regular member of our house. At that time, "getting healthy"/"losing weight" was switching from cow's milk to soy milk and attempting to not eat half of an extra large pizza (and attempting to not order pizza so often). The start of getting mired in CICO for a few years. This latter part, the attempts to get healthy, could probably be described as the "Mrs. Korg Meets Arnold Schwarzenegger Diet," as it wasn't far off from how Mark Sisson describes the modern wife (Mrs. Korg) in The Primal Blueprint, except I was a protein shake drinker more than a smoothie drinker, and I preferred things like martial arts and weight lifting to spin classes.
When that didn't work, and I found myself constantly hungry (tried the 6-meals-a-day thing, too; that went over like a lead balloon), I switched to Primal in a last ditch effort to see some kind of progress and not be battling with myself all the time. Dropped my carbs to 100g, dropped grains out of my diet, and the rest is pretty much history. I've since lowered my carbs even further, looking for my sweet spot, but that's about it.0 -
I've been raw vegan (2 years) and fruitarian (3 months), but through it all, and for the other 56 years I've been a complete food addict, particularly anything sugary. Well, anything that I found comfort in actually.0
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I've been in maintenance for two years now and my diet has been anything/everything I like, but in smaller portions (along with 16/8IF). I haven't kept a food journal since I made the transition and have been able to keep within my maintenance range (120lbs-125lbs) pretty effortlessly. However, over the past couple of months I've started seeing a creep and yesterday I was at my highest weight in two years, at 127lbs. That doesn't seem like a lot-but looking at my stats (I weigh daily and keep track in a phone app), I've gained 4 actual pounds in a pretty short period of time. I'm back into weight loss phase to lose the bounce, and I'm also exploring lc/going grain free to see if it helps with some annoying health issues I'm having.0
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I would describe my previous diet as utterly delicious. Gasp. I've gone up and down a couple of times since high school. The gain always started with me feeding whatever emotion I wanted to avoid. 6 years ago I was down to 120 pounds after a 20 pound loss that I did nothing to lose. I had just started dating my boyfriend and started grad school that fall. I have never felt more unloved in my entire life than those first couple of years of us together. We were horrible together. I have no clue why we both insisted on pushing through but we did. We're still together and couldn't be happier. Clearly I'm nothing if not persistent. After I finished grad school I got a job working in health insurance and hated every minute of it. Eventually, as a way of further avoiding my feelings I started on anti-depressants.
My "normal" way of eating was eating out multiple times a week, eating half a cake for breakfast if that's what I desired, eating in bed, eating when driving, etc. Basically eating at all times. If I made cookies, I would eat at least 6 cookies in one sitting. Never really noticing that no one else was eating like that. To be honest, I'm impressed that I'm not heavier. With that being said, I've tried a lot of diets and nothing worked. I was convinced that I had a thyroid issue or PCOS (particularly considering the amount of ovarian cysts I get) but I couldn't find a doctor willing to treat symptoms. They all wanted blood proof. I would quit nearly every diet I tried after about 3-4 weeks because I would simply gain weight instead of lose. There's nothing more miserable than spending every day hangry and then getting on the scale and gaining 4-5 pounds.
Eventually I realized that when people told me for all of those years that I may want to consider cutting carbs, they weren't lying. I started keto last spring, lost about 15 pounds and then went back to my normal way of eating. I went in and out of keto at least once a month but didn't stick with it. I saw a picture of myself from last summer when I was in keto and I looked so healthy and happy. I decided I was without a doubt going to do keto in January. I feel great now. I still occasionally crave sweets but those cravings aren't nearly as powerful.0 -
As a teen, early 20-something, riddled with eating disorders (anorexia, bulimia, laxative abuse, exercise abuse, etc.).
Gained 70 lbs during pregnancy (age 23), and promptly lost 55 of that in 9 months after giving birth.
As a 20 something - 30 something, ate pretty well, but lots of starches, and stayed fairly active and at a reasonably healthy weight (slightly overweight).
As a mid-30 something onward, health problems derailed me into depression and cyclical binging looking for comfort. My weight was pretty high during most of this time, and tipped over into obese in 2011. My binge of choice was sweets (particularly ice cream and golden oreos) and bread, bread, and more bread. I also naturally eat too much. I have a very large appetite and seemingly no "full signal".
Now, I eat LCHF to lose weight (I'm pretty much at goal), and I will continue to use this as maintenance, by slowly increasing cals and carbs until I hit a place where I start gaining again. I will keep a range of 140-145 lbs, I think. I would like to lower my BF% just a tad, though, so if I end up weighing more as a result, I won't let it bother me.0 -
My old eating habits: Suicidal. Eating fast food 7-10 times a week, drinking more soda than water for at least a full decade, going through periods where 90% of what I drank was regular, sugary sodas. Trying to make tons of changes that wouldn't work, at my worst points telling myself "you won't live past 50 this way, maybe not even 40, but hell, fixing it is too hard, may as well just enjoy yourself and not worry about it."
I'm glad I figured it out eventually
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tiffanycherie wrote: »I have never been in denial about loving sweets and junk food. I could care less about eating a meal or real food as long as I had some snacks to eat. Muffins, donuts, chips, crackers and cheese, whatever falls into the junk food category. Some people think about going low carb and say they wouldn't be able to handle it b/c they would miss the bread and pasta. My answer would be what about the cake and ice cream forget the bread. lol. If you would have asked me before did I get fat from overeating, my answer would have easily been no. I felt like I grazed/snacked all day and maybe had 1 meal. How could one get fat from that? It wasn't until I tried CICO and logged my food did I realize how little serving you get for the calories. It's very easy to overeat on junk food, b/c unless you eat A LOT you never really feel full or stuffed like you would from eating a meal. Hints the reason low carb is best for me. To avoid the sweets all together.
This would definitely be my story. I'm a jeckle and Hyde kind of person. Either I'm militant bout healthy eating, or making frosting just to " taste" it, better I just put that sugar monster to death and go very low carb.0 -
I'm a great cook, and not a sweet tooth, but I spent years eating too much and too many carbs. I love vegetables, but I would make cheese and spinach pastries, potato bake, all manner of unhealthy things. Home made bread rolls with butter. Pasta OMG, so many kinds. Home made lasagne, ravioli etc. Everything with butter, and cheese. Also the usual pizza, McDonalds thing when I didn't feel like cooking. I know there's something fundamentally wrong with me. I can NOT eat like a normal person. I do NOT know when to stop. Being hungry feels like a kind of anxiety to me, and being overfull makes it go away. I know that carbs are a big problem. I can go for months in Keto, in control of my food and my appetite, no problem at all. But one slice of bread, one piece of cheesecake at Xmas, and I can't stop eating for 3 months.
I'm doing okay at the moment. I'm on a very tight budget, so I did all of my shopping online. Ground beef, bacon, chicken, eggs, butter, cheese etc. Enough for 2 weeks until I get paid again. I can't deviate from my eating plan as there simply ISN'T anything else.0 -
I grew up lower middle class. My dad was the first person in my family with a sit down job (after a fashion). My parents were children of the depression. Dad was a WWII vet.
I was raised in the 60s and 70s on: convenience foods. Plain and simple.
My mother hated being a SaHM. (but didn't want to work, either)
breakfast: cap'n crunch or instant breakfast
lunch: school lunch, or a wonder bread bologna/"cheese" sandwich with a twinkie and a coke
dinner: something frozen (chicken and dumplings, meatloaf) or canned (green beans, creamed corn, chicken a la king) or both
snacks: cans of coke were readily available as were hostess products
Actual PRODUCE? That was something grandma or an aunt fed us when we saw them. There were NO fresh vegetables in the house. EVER, save the occasional red "delicious" apple that no one ate, giving mom the chance to say "why would I buy it, no one eats it".
I distinctly remember an aunt teaching me what green beans were when I was in elementary school.
They seemed exotic.
Things like yogurt were not allowed (bacteria!).
orange juice was a "waste of money"
Mashed potatoes? boxed
vegetables? canned
entrees? frozen
fast food? whenever we could afford it.
My mother believed everything the media "fed" her about food.
college: eating as close to that as possible, given my lack of cooking skills, with "food" introduced/cooked by others on and off. Horizons broadened!
Grad school: my food introduced by others, more restaurant eating, but still convenience foods were the staple when left to my own devices. Horizons further broadened!
This continued until Jan 2001. I decided to learn how to eat actual food, which meant I had to learn how to cook some foods. EVERYTHING changed. Then, a couple of years later I met hubs, who's a phenomenal cook.0 -
I was a carboholic previously. Especially bread. I could happily eat 20+ slices per day and think nothing of it. Oh and mashed potatoes...I could out do my partner on those.0
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Same here, carb a holic. Give me a bowl of pasta and half a loaf of bread and dessert I was all set. I lost 50 lbs a few years ago eating smaller portions more veggies and less snacking. Then started getting really tired and achey, lots of stress, stopped tracking my food and it quickly snowballed .0
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I'm a great cook, and not a sweet tooth, but I spent years eating too much and too many carbs. I love vegetables, but I would make cheese and spinach pastries, potato bake, all manner of unhealthy things. Home made bread rolls with butter. Pasta OMG, so many kinds. Home made lasagne, ravioli etc. Everything with butter, and cheese. Also the usual pizza, McDonalds thing when I didn't feel like cooking. I know there's something fundamentally wrong with me. I can NOT eat like a normal person. I do NOT know when to stop. Being hungry feels like a kind of anxiety to me, and being overfull makes it go away. I know that carbs are a big problem. I can go for months in Keto, in control of my food and my appetite, no problem at all. But one slice of bread, one piece of cheesecake at Xmas, and I can't stop eating for 3 months.
I'm doing okay at the moment. I'm on a very tight budget, so I did all of my shopping online. Ground beef, bacon, chicken, eggs, butter, cheese etc. Enough for 2 weeks until I get paid again. I can't deviate from my eating plan as there simply ISN'T anything else.
This is me exactly. For the longest time I thought I could have the occasional treat while on low carb. Not! I'd have a slice of cake or piece of chocolate one day and wake up surrounded by chocolate wrappers a month later. I'm an all or nothing person and I've now made my peace with it. I simply cannot have that sweet snack. In a way is a relief because I now don't spend any mental time on when or where or what my next treat will be.0
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