Learning to eat healthy

Slowly.......slowly.......I'm learning to sift through the vast amounts of info on nutrition and decide (for myself) which fits my life and which I should discard.

Replace the garbage foods with healthier options. Replace soda with water and unsweetened tea, french fries with baked potato, chips with carrots and celery, etc...

It's a personal matter, but you're going to have to experiment to decide how much you value certain food's taste. For instance, if you really love eating a bagel for breakfast, then eat a bagel. Just figure out the exact number of calories (including that you put on it), and how that will affect the remaining calories you can eat the rest of the day.

But say you realize you don't "love" bagels, and would be just as happy with a healthier breakfast, then try it (oatmeal, eggs, etc). It really takes some trial and error. After years of packing a sandwich for lunch I finally realized "wait, I don't even like sandwiches that much!" so I experimented with bringing in different types of salads until I found something I like a lot, and keeps me fuller for less calories.

Think of it this way: some women value designer purses and will save up for them. Others will say "eh, I don't really care about brand names. I'll be just as happy with a purse from Target and will save the money for something else" It's exactly the same concept. Think about your calories as a budget and decide which foods are totally worth it, and which are just so-so.

http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/819925/the-basics-dont-complicate-it/p1

That.

And there may very well be some habits you want to change. But just change them, don't demonize it. Like if you're eating half a box of cookies every day, don't do that. But that doesn't necessarily mean you can't have cookies... stop buying so many bags a week. Decide when you will have cookies in your day and how many and log that. Make substitutions for other times -- fruit, greek yoghurt, nuts, beef jerky, whatever you like. Or give something up, but not everything. (Like, I don't buy soda anymore, and haven't in years. I'll order the odd one in a restaurant, but otherwise, it's just a habit and expense I can live without. But I didn't give up every food labelled "bad" by someone in the world.)

You can lose just fine eating whatever you want -- you just need to hit your calorie target, and you'll need your day's foods to keep you feeling full and energized, so you'll need to make smarter choices on the whole than you would if you were able to eat with no limits on calories.

DjsMom243 wrote: »

How did you get out of the habit of eating unhealthy foods... I know I wanted to loose weight and I know I have to eat better and less but I don't know how.

Food is food. No need to label one as healthy and unhealthy. Eat what you want, but at a deficit. Invest in a food scale, and tighten up your logging. As long as you're in a deficit, you will lose.

cwolfman13 wrote: »

learn to cook...

my diet consists largely of whole foods and meals prepared from scratch, whole ingredients and/or minimally processed food stuffs...none of this has to taste like cardboard or be boring and bland...if you know how to cook, you can make awesome meals.

Anything and everything I make is a far cry tastier than any equivalent I could get pre-packaged.

Maybe I'm just weird, but my cravings aren't for dorritos or potato chips and the like...I actually crave nutrition.

Well said!!!

And just to add one more thing. Don't be intimidated by cooking. Its not rocket science and there's unlimited recipes online.

I'll take a from scratch meal full of flavor and seasoning processed stuff anyday, not because it's "healthy" but because it tastes way better