does anyone else feel scared to eat?
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I try to avoid all horrible chemicals and low-this and extra-expensive-that food scams, so in that sense, I am sort of 'afraid' to eat crap that will make me ill. We buy all organic when it's available, and avoid stuff that isn't, and I wish I trusted that the local restaurants didn't use terrible ingredients, but we've tried them a lot and the food tastes very lacking in goodness and flavour. Yuck. So we don't go out much locally. I go to good places in New York City, especially the organic ones, but that can be very expensive. I read every label and have done for decades, before they were standard--I've been a longtime vegetarian, so ingredients are important to me. I just stick with 'real' foods, organic stuff, and it works out somewhat. It really grossed me out that since we moved to NJ sort of near the turnpike, my bathroom habits smelled muchmuch worse, and it seems to be due to pollution. Doctors think it's not a health condition or vitamins or spices etc., so it grosses me out to be consuming enough pollution even in filtered water and the best quality food I can buy that it shows up in the waste--yuck!0
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ok guys, I dont mean literally scared so I wont eat. What I mean is, I want to make sure Im eating healthy..even low fat and 'diet' foods are laden with sugar.
1) Cook your own food.
2) Stay on the outside ring of the store. This is where all the perishable (natural) foods are.
3) If it comes in a box, bag or can and can sit on a shelf for months you most likely don't want to eat it.
4) Processed sugar is bad but sodium is worse. Read labels.
5) Once you detox from all the crap we eat you will learn to enjoy eating.
I love eating.0 -
If you feel scared to eat, or grossed out that you have eaten, you have a disordered relationship with food. You might want to talk to a professional about that. It's not normal and it won't be beneficial to you in the long run.
Don't freak out. Having a disorder is a matter of degree. If you always feel grossed out, even when you eat a normal, healthy amount of food, you binge often and feel disgusted with yourself, you purge, or you won't eat a reasonable amount of food for fear of gaining weight, then yes, getting help might help, and there is no shame in that. But maybe you aren't going that far.
I get overwhelmed by the question of what is healthy, when there is so much contradictory information about things like whether I should be avoiding saturated fat and eating unsaturated fat, or vice versa.0 -
ok guys, I dont mean literally scared so I wont eat. What I mean is, I want to make sure Im eating healthy..even low fat and 'diet' foods are laden with sugar.
1) Cook your own food.
2) Stay on the outside ring of the store. This is where all the perishable (natural) foods are.
3) If it comes in a box, bag or can and can sit on a shelf for months you most likely don't want to eat it.
4) Processed sugar is bad but sodium is worse. Read labels.
5) Once you detox from all the crap we eat you will learn to enjoy eating.
I love eating.
^ this is also very disordered thinking. you may have orthorexia.0 -
ok guys, I dont mean literally scared so I wont eat. What I mean is, I want to make sure Im eating healthy..even low fat and 'diet' foods are laden with sugar.
1) Cook your own food.
2) Stay on the outside ring of the store. This is where all the perishable (natural) foods are.
3) If it comes in a box, bag or can and can sit on a shelf for months you most likely don't want to eat it.
4) Processed sugar is bad but sodium is worse. Read labels.
5) Once you detox from all the crap we eat you will learn to enjoy eating.
I love eating.
^ this is also very disordered thinking. you may have orthorexia.
You are throwing around big words. That is a very disordered thinking.0 -
I fear blowing all my calories for the day and not having enough by the end of the day. so, i understand what you mean.
This !0 -
I fear blowing all my calories for the day and not having enough by the end of the day. so, i understand what you mean.
That's what the food diary is for. Plan your meals, don't just record you meals. Think of your calories as money you need to budget. Have a rough idea of how much you can "spend" on each meal, and treat your macros like the bills. You NEED to pay your electrical and water bills and your mortgage, and you need to get adequate protein and fat and fruits/vegetables. When your housing and utilities are paid, the you have some left for fun things, like ice cream.0 -
I have been consulting this website quite a bit to get ideas of healthier eating choices. This helps me feel better about the food choices I am making. www.100daysofrealfood.com/0
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[...]I don't eat any candy or pop or anything like that. I just do (mostly)healthy choices in moderation. I can now eat something and not panic about what I have just put into my system!
You're not alone!!
All the best to you!!
No candy, ever? Aw, life is too short to not have a little sweet treat every now and then. And dark chocolate is very good for the heart!0 -
I think that there is a lot of hype and misinformation floating around about what foods are "bad" or "good.' Tons of people can eat processed and sugar laden food and still lose weight, maintain weight and be healthy. This is a personal choice, of course, but realizing that you don't have to change what you eat when you're trying to lose weight...you just have to change how much. To be a big clearer, if you're switching your diet completely and restricting yourself to only "healthy" options, and at the same time avoiding some of the food you enjoy eating and the food you love, you are more likely to feel guilty for those times where you "mess up" and have some fried food or cake or breads. This can lead to an unhealthy relationship to food.
You can make more informed choices, and wiser choices, find the foods you like, plan your meals around those foods. If you happen to go over once in a while...so be it. Enjoy vacations, family and friend gatherings, holidays without the fear of going over, let it happen and you'll still be fine. Just keep within your goals more times than not...I try for about 90% or more. Exercise to help with the deficit, and if you follow the MFP guidelines, eat back those calories...you can use those for cake or bread or whatever.
For me, it's not so much about changing everything I eat, I just make more informed decisions and I'm not trying to just blindly ram food down my throat. I can enjoy the foods I love without feeling that I'm going to gain weight or "blow my diet."
Honestly, if you look at this as a process and as something you will be doing long term, plan your calories around the foods you enjoy, exercise, and just treat it as making a few minor changes here and there...then you'll look at this in more of a "Hey...I can do that!" attitude. For example, I stopped drinking my calories. Instead of a Rt. 44 Cherry Coke from Sonic 2-3 times a day, I'm drinking more water or coffee. If I want a coke, I go for a Coke Zero. I look for foods I enjoy that have good protein, carbs, and fats that will help me reach my macro goals, and I don't worry about the sugar or sodium anymore because I realized it didn't really matter to me. I'm on vacation right now, 4 days, I'm not logging a bite that I eat nor am I passing up anything I enjoy, i.e. chocolate cake, peach cobbler, pasta, bread..etc. I don't and can't eat as much as I used to, I get full faster these days, but I also know that in the long run, this little vacation might put be back a week at most, if that. I don't do this often, so one week or even a month's worth of "off" days (when you add vacations, holidays, and other such events over the course of a year) isn't much if I look at this as a long term process. That just means that 11 months out of the year I was on target...even if I go 2 months worth of "off" days, I'm still golden at 10 months of being on target. That a million times better than when I used only be on target 2 months outta 12 in years past.
At least that's my opinion, and I'm only posting because I'm trying to pass the time waiting on the other people to wake up so we can go do vacationy stuff, so take it for what it's worth to you.0 -
I try to avoid all horrible chemicals and low-this and extra-expensive-that food scams, so in that sense, I am sort of 'afraid' to eat crap that will make me ill. We buy all organic when it's available, and avoid stuff that isn't, and I wish I trusted that the local restaurants didn't use terrible ingredients, but we've tried them a lot and the food tastes very lacking in goodness and flavour. Yuck. So we don't go out much locally. I go to good places in New York City, especially the organic ones, but that can be very expensive. I read every label and have done for decades, before they were standard--I've been a longtime vegetarian, so ingredients are important to me. I just stick with 'real' foods, organic stuff, and it works out somewhat. It really grossed me out that since we moved to NJ sort of near the turnpike, my bathroom habits smelled muchmuch worse, and it seems to be due to pollution. Doctors think it's not a health condition or vitamins or spices etc., so it grosses me out to be consuming enough pollution even in filtered water and the best quality food I can buy that it shows up in the waste--yuck!
Personally, I don't trust the whole "organic" food industry. I've done some reading on it and, much like the 'bottled water" industry, there seems to be this automatic assumption that organic or bottled means "safer". Not really. There are no regulations on bottled water, and the organic industry has its own form of pesticides it uses on its produce. Here is a link to an interesting article about what really is sprayed on organic foods:
http://www.elephantjournal.com/2013/03/eating-organic-may-be-harmful-the-truth-behind-organic-produce-doug-smith/
I'm not sure of his qualifications, but it does shed a bit of light on the controversial topic.0 -
To be honest, when I first started out, I had a hard time eating veggies whole and without dressing. I mean do you know how AWFUL they taste?!
Well, that was at one point anyway. After years of eating Taco Bell, Subway, Quiznos, Pizza, you name it... my sense of taste was rather distorted. I liked vegetables.... as long as it had a gallon of ranch on top of it.
It wasn't an overnight process. I never "forced" myself to eat veggies I don't like. I started with the easy ones to eat, broccoli, potatoes, and asparagus. I limited myself to two spoonfuls of mayo for the greens, two spoonfuls of sour cream fort he potatoes. No butter, no salt, nothing else. I ate them steamed.
Over a few months I ate less and less mayo/sour cream, and enjoyed the veggies more and more by themselves. I still can't eat veggies raw, but I can eat steamed veggies raw and enjoy the taste.
I don't know exactly what the process is, why it's like that, etc etc. I'm sure a bunch of people will throw around fancy words like detoxifying or blah blah. But that is what worked for me to be able to enjoy foods "plain". They don't taste plain to me anymore, I can eat tomatoes, pepperoncini, spinach, avocado, onions, and many others. And LOVE the taste. A year ago I would have been mortified at eating them without a 5 gallon bucket of Blue Cheese dressing to dip it in. lol.
That's my breakfast this morning. All from the Farmer's Market, except the onions I grew in my backyard. No ketchup, sauces, dressings. It tasted amazing.
There's no reason to be so worried. Eating is a learning process, just keep tring new things until you find what clicks with you.0 -
I should have def worded it better, my apologies. But have some great responses thank you. It may seem that I do have an eating disorder but I am 100% in a better position than last year. Maybe just being a little over analysing when choosing food....
The thing is, no random person the internet can (or should!) diagnose an eating disorder from a short forum post with somewhat vague language. However, I think a lot of the posters here would rather err on the side of caution and encourage someone to consider whether they might need help, rather than just gloss over it. Making an unnecessary assumption might irritate you, but ignoring an eating disorder could kill you.
I think it's a natural tendency to be a little overly obsessive and cautious when you're first starting out. That's why I recommend a 90/10 approach (or 85/15, or 80/20.... however close you can get). Mostly healthy stuff, and don't stress over a few treats now and then. Speaking as someone who has suffered from high levels of anxiety for years and who has definitely experienced that sense of "OMG, if I eat processed chemicals I'm going to get cancer and DIE," that kind of obsession and anxiety is exhausting and hard to maintain in the long term. It would always eventually lead me to crash, burn, and binge. Taking a more relaxed approach, telling myself that I'll do my best to eat healthy but I'm not going to obsess over every article, study, and blog post that I read, has allowed me to I think be healthier overall, feel more in control of my life and my diet, and have a greater enjoyment of my life. My goal here is not to be thin by next month, it's to be healthy until I'm 100 years old and beyond. That requires a sense of balance that I can maintain long term, and obsessing over not eating the exact right thing all the time is just not going to get me there.0 -
Recently I was on prednisone for 10 days. I was ravenous!! Those days I was afraid to start eating, as I was really afraid if I started eating, I wouldn't be able to stop.
I just made sure to stay as busy as possible between meals and tried to think about the fact that it is ok to be hungry, that I didn't have to overeat! I actually lost a pound that week!!
It was scary at first though, as I haven't been hungry for months.0 -
I fear blowing all my calories for the day and not having enough by the end of the day. so, i understand what you mean.
That's what the food diary is for. Plan your meals, don't just record you meals. Think of your calories as money you need to budget. Have a rough idea of how much you can "spend" on each meal, and treat your macros like the bills. You NEED to pay your electrical and water bills and your mortgage, and you need to get adequate protein and fat and fruits/vegetables. When your housing and utilities are paid, the you have some left for fun things, like ice cream.
^This.
And OP, maybe it was just the wording of your question but still, the idea of being "scared" to eat isn't normal.
Being concerned about making good choices and being conscious of what you are eating are fine. That's normal. We all track our calories, try to get adequate amounts of nutrition and we all think about the things we are eating. But saying you're "scared" to eat because you're not sure it's healthy is disordered. And the second person who posted that she was "grossed out" by the feeling of food in her stomach - yeah....that's definitely not ok.
And I want to caution you against being too extreme with your "healthy" choices. You CAN save calories for treats. It's okay to have pizza occasionally. If you want some chocolate, you can have some. As long as you are getting adequate nutrients from a varied diet, having a treat or something that some people would classify as "unhealthy" won't hurt you. If you restrict your diet too much, you could trigger the desire to binge or overeat when the temptation becomes too strong.0 -
I should have def worded it better, my apologies. But have some great responses thank you. It may seem that I do have an eating disorder but I am 100% in a better position than last year. Maybe just being a little over analysing when choosing food....
The thing is, no random person the internet can (or should!) diagnose an eating disorder from a short forum post with somewhat vague language. However, I think a lot of the posters here would rather err on the side of caution and encourage someone to consider whether they might need help, rather than just gloss over it. Making an unnecessary assumption might irritate you, but ignoring an eating disorder could kill you.
I think it's a natural tendency to be a little overly obsessive and cautious when you're first starting out. That's why I recommend a 90/10 approach (or 85/15, or 80/20.... however close you can get). Mostly healthy stuff, and don't stress over a few treats now and then. Speaking as someone who has suffered from high levels of anxiety for years and who has definitely experienced that sense of "OMG, if I eat processed chemicals I'm going to get cancer and DIE," that kind of obsession and anxiety is exhausting and hard to maintain in the long term. It would always eventually lead me to crash, burn, and binge. Taking a more relaxed approach, telling myself that I'll do my best to eat healthy but I'm not going to obsess over every article, study, and blog post that I read, has allowed me to I think be healthier overall, feel more in control of my life and my diet, and have a greater enjoyment of my life. My goal here is not to be thin by next month, it's to be healthy until I'm 100 years old and beyond. That requires a sense of balance that I can maintain long term, and obsessing over not eating the exact right thing all the time is just not going to get me there.
great advice thank you0 -
You're at the beginning of your weight lose journey (judging by your meter) - I think that's why. You're still in the mindset of a "diet" and you feel like you're going to mess it up even if just eating a bit over your allotted calories. I was like that for a few weeks at the beginning of my journey. I don't think it's abnormal and I highly doubt it's a disorder/severe issue unless you're having breakdowns or it's causing you emotional stress.
Don't listen to people who are making this a bigger deal than it is. It's normal to be a bit over-concerned with what you're consuming/how much you're consuming at first. Just make sure that it doesn't affect you and that it's not a long term issue. Remember that not EVERYTHING you put in your mouth has such a heavy impact on you. Your body does a great job of cleansing itself out and eating 100% clean is not necessary.0
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