After a lifetime of bad eating habits how do start eating healthy!

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  • katscoots
    katscoots Posts: 255 Member
    edited December 2014
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    wamydia wrote: »
    First of all you have to be ready to make the commitment. I mean really ready to put the work in, not just kind of sad and unhappy with your weight.

    Then you start slow. Pick things that you know you can do and do them consistently until they become habits. Start with just a few things and, when you have built them into habits, add a few more things and go from there. When I started, my first habits were logging everything I ate (even if it was way over goal), and trying to buy more fruits and veggies at the grocery store. After that, I slowly built in trying to hit my calorie goal, weighing and measuring my food, trying to eat certain numbers of servings of fruits/ veggies per day, trying to drink more water, trying to go for a walk every day, weighing myself once a week, trying to eat more protein, switching to healthy oils, reducing my carbs a bit, etc. But you have to understand that I've spent the better of four years working on building all of these new habits and it's not a perfect process. I've lost a lot of weight, but I've also hit a lot of stalls, regained a few pounds and lost them again, etc. And that's the most important thing to remember -- no matter what you do to be healthier, you have to be mentally prepared for setbacks and then be ready to get right back on the horse.

    ^^ This...100% agree
    Also - try to refocus your thoughts on food - food is fuel...sugar has basically zero nutritional value and therefore you are not fueling your body for success. I love breads and chips, but when I look at the macros of the nutrition they offer, it makes me rethink that choice.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
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    NuggetLovesEdie wrote: »
    There's also a weird but true fact that just recording all of a behavior makes the behavior change, probably because we're bringing more awareness to the behavior and make different choices because we're committed to writing it down.

    This is so true.
  • JenPc1978
    JenPc1978 Posts: 34
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    Thank you everyone this is a lot of help! :-)
  • AmbitiousButRubbish
    AmbitiousButRubbish Posts: 246 Member
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    Start slow. Don't give up everything all at once because it isn't sustainable. Over time I find I am giving up on more and more bad foods. Just recently I have found that I really can't handle sugar as much as I use to. Too much makes my stomach really upset and I feel sick for a day or too. Taken me over a year to get most of the bad stuff out of my diet but I feel it is more sustainable now rather than in the past when I tried to go cold turkey.
  • JenPc1978
    JenPc1978 Posts: 34
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    Yeah I tried cold turkey many times and it last for a few days and then I binge big time lol. Thank you for the help :-)
  • Kalikel
    Kalikel Posts: 9,626 Member
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    Just like a band-aid, there are two schools of thought on this. Some want to go the "Yank it off and get it over with" route, switching from junk to all healthy, all the time. I went that route for my own reasons and about six weeks into it, I caved and had a cheeseburger. It tasted SO GOOD, but left feeling poorly, so that sealed the deal. About 18 months later, I added some less healthy stuff back in.

    I thought I missed donuts and Crunch Berries and all that junk, but when I took a diet break, it was less than two days before I wanted my healthy foods back. On that "break", I found out that all the time I spent wishing I could have donuts and restaurant food...I didn't actually want it, lol. As soon as I could have it, I was like, "No, thanks." :grinning: My new habits have stuck and it would be as hard for me to change to a bunch of junk as it was for me to change from a bunch of junk. I'd rather have actual berries than Crunch Berries and that's the truth. :)

    Some people prefer to eke that bandaid off millimeter by millimeter, stopping at pain. This takes a lot longer than just ripping it off, but is easier for them. The experts recommend this method. Start by drinking water instead of juice and pop. Switch to low or no-fat dairy. Then add in some fruits, then add in some veggies. Stop buying red meat...little by little, you adjust your diet so that in the end, it is a healthy one.

    Pick the one that appeals to you and go with it.

    Everyone says dieting begins in the kitchen. IMO, healthy eating begins in the grocery store. Read about nutrition in reliable places and read labels.

    Healthy eating: http://cdn1.sph.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/30/2013/04/HEPApr2013.jpg

    More healthy eating: http://www.fitness.gov/eat-healthy/how-to-eat-healthy/

    I love you, salt, but you're breaking my heart: http://sodiumbreakup.heart.org/sodium-411/







  • JenPc1978
    JenPc1978 Posts: 34
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    Thank you for all the info :-) I'll check out out :-)
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,371 Member
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    Great advice. I agree with just logging everything you eat, until you get a good idea of how many calories are in things... Then you can adjust as needed. You can start with a small goal if it's too overwhelming... lose one pound a week or something (a lot of people start with two, that was too much for me). Then log everything.

    I love food, I love eating, and I've managed to lose 80 pounds. It's very possible if you want it badly enough. I agree that it's very important to choose carefully what you want to spend your calories on.
  • Kalikel
    Kalikel Posts: 9,626 Member
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    I want to add - look into new foods. There are so many out there and if you haven't been big into fruits and veggies, keep trying all the different ones. You will almost certainly find some you like! Don't be scared off by names or similarities to things you don't like and don't freak out because you have no idea how to prepare them. The Internet holds all the recipes you could possibly want. :)

    There are so many foods to be tried!
  • girlviernes
    girlviernes Posts: 2,402 Member
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    Another thing about trying new foods is that it takes 8 or 9 tries to figure out whether or not you'll like something. So don't give up just because it might not be appealing the first time. You might be surprised how much you can grow to love lots of healthy foods.
  • JenPc1978
    JenPc1978 Posts: 34
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    Okay thank you :-) :-) :-) :-) you guys are awesome :-)
  • Liftng4Lis
    Liftng4Lis Posts: 15,150 Member
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    By bad eating habits, you mean overeating right? You don't have to give up anything to lose weight, just eat at a deficit.
  • KingRat79
    KingRat79 Posts: 125 Member
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    there is some really good advice in this thread :) For me I started slowly and not making any massive changes overnight, that way I did not feel like I was depriving myself, cutting out one thing at a time, so I cut down the number of takeaways I was buying, and then the next month, I started cooking meals from fresh (it makes it easier to cut out calorie dense foods if you know whats going in to your foods) I then replaced soda's with diet soda, then reduced the number of sweet snacks I was eating. over a period of about six months I gradually shifted from having very unhealthy diet to eating well.
  • JenPc1978
    JenPc1978 Posts: 34
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    Thank you for your guys advice :-) and when I say bad eating habits I mean to much but mostly junk food hardly anything healthy lol I crave sugar constantly!!!
  • JenPc1978
    JenPc1978 Posts: 34
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    Thank you for your guys advice :-) and when I say bad eating habits I mean to much but mostly junk food hardly anything healthy lol I crave sugar constantly!!!
  • LAWoman72
    LAWoman72 Posts: 2,846 Member
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    Replace some of the junk food with veggies to bulk things up. 200 calories of Pop Tart is, well, one Pop Tart. 200 calories of broccoli and cauliflower will take you a while to get through!

    That doesn't mean you can never have Pop Tarts, of course. But if you want to feel more physically full, replacements like that for part of your day are great.

    Of course, now I want a Pop Tart. :) Strawberry iced, please!
  • Liftng4Lis
    Liftng4Lis Posts: 15,150 Member
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    LAWoman72 wrote: »
    Replace some of the junk food with veggies to bulk things up. 200 calories of Pop Tart is, well, one Pop Tart. 200 calories of broccoli and cauliflower will take you a while to get through!

    That doesn't mean you can never have Pop Tarts, of course. But if you want to feel more physically full, replacements like that for part of your day are great.

    Of course, now I want a Pop Tart. :) Strawberry iced, please!

    um....chocolate
    gxi6yqyrvgzp.jpeg
  • JenPc1978
    JenPc1978 Posts: 34
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    Lol thank you!!!!! :-) :-) :-)

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