Going kicking & screaming towards healthy

I agree with the above post. You will do very well if you just apply yourself and take baby steps...You say you don't like the healthy fruits and veggies but have you tried ALL of them? I'm sure you can find a few more that you do like that don't have to be covered in butter or salt or sugar. For example...grilled peaches sounded gross to me the first time I heard of them but the heat really brings out the sweetness in the peaches and are wonderful! Also, do you like Subway? That's a good place to start if you think you don't like some foods...aside from the meatball sub and the melts everything else is ok for the most part. Perhaps you should try putting a little big of veggies on at a time and just a little sauce to help reduce calories. That way you aren't tasting the veggies alone but as a part of the sandwhich. This should give you enough time to slowly develop a taste for them.

Keep your head up and say positive. You CAN do this! :flowerforyou:

The biggest thing I can say to you is that it doesn't matter what anyone else wants.....YOU have to want to succeed or it will never happen.

My favourite foods to eat before this site were cheese, rice, pastas and baked goods. I was exercising, and not losing weight, so I came here. Then I found out what portion I should be eating versus what I was actually eating. It was a shock! I was probably consuming well over 1000 calories a day extra at least, so no wonder the exercising wasn't making a dent! I slowly started changing my diet. I did not eliminate the foods I liked, I just eat them in much smaller amounts now.

I am being more adventurous and trying new things. Foods I thought I hated before now are tasting better. I found vinaigrette dressings that I like, which have less calories than creamy ones like ranch, so I eat more salads. I still use margarine, but a teaspoon at a time instead of a scoop. I mix it well and still get the flavour without all the calories. I have discovered I like corn on the cob plain! I always had butter and salt before. I measure EVERYTHING I eat, so I know exactly what I am consuming. No more eyeballing or estimating.

As for other vegetables, get fresh if you can. Find a farmer market, grow a garden (which is great exercise to tend it) and you will find more you like. Fresh vegetables taste so much better than store bought!

Be adventurous! Try new things with an open mind and not with the mindset that you are going to hate them before you even try them. I hated bean salads with vinaigrette, but got a plain can of beans and added my own dressing (1 tbsp) and loved it! Chick peas now go in my salads for extra fibre. I am choosing portion wise multigrain breads, so that I still get 2 slices, but at 100 calories total instead of 170. It all adds up.

And remember, if you exercise, log it in to the website, because it gives you more calories to eat in a day if you are hungry. Some days I use up all my extra calories, but most of the time it is about half of them.

Once things start happening it will inspire you. I am down almost 21 pounds in 2 months and I am not hungry. I exercise several times a week and try new things to eat every day. This week was cottage cheese. I can't stand it plain, but found that if I added a portion of canned fruit (in juice) to it, I had a really healthy and tasty addition to breakfast.

Hope that this helps you out and remember, you need to do this for yourself and no one else!

Trisha

Instead of filling up on Fibre 1 bars (bad idea - those bars are filled with high-fructose corn syrup and are not healthy!)

Not true; I just looked at the ingredient list and there's no HFCS. Granted, there is high maltose corn syrup, but it's not HFCS, and there's more real ingredients than manufactored ingredients so it's not that terrible for you compared to other fiber bars out there. Again, not the best, but certainly not the worst either and would be a good start for her to transition to/from on her way to transitioning her tastebuds to healthier foods.

Like the above post start small, I was told last year I have type 2 diabetes and he gave me time to loose some weight and eat healthy. I am down 23 pounds and still no meds. I am winning this battle. I was very picky as well. Over the last year I have kept an open mind and even tried things I have hated in the past. To discover I really like them.

Start by cutting down on the salt (water weight), drink losts of water will flush some of the salt out. Cut back on servings that is one thing I realized when I started logging my food was how many calories were in the things I loved. As I am getting healthier I now enjoy the new tastes of foods. Make a goal to try one new food a day or a week. Small steps.

You have to really want this for you. Good like and happy tasting. :drinker:

People's taste buds do change over time. You will be surprised at how certain fruits and veggies will taste to you now compared to a few years ago.

Adding sugar to fruits tend to make them too sweet in my opinion. You should eat strawberries in season. They are so sweet. If you can get to a farmer's market, buy what is in season and you will be amazed at how much different the taste is compared to them in a grocery store. Tomatoes have so much flavor when in season compared to the bland dry ones in the grocery store.

Trying new foods could spark your taste buds and want you to try other new things.

As for the Subway sub you like. You need to stay away from that. The fat and sodium alone is a killer. Always lean towards turkey with lots of veggies. I always get the veggie sub with lots of veggies and the honey mustard sauce.

Experiment with different foods and recipes to see what you like and don't like. It is all trial and error, but think positive.