So, school took over there for a few months. To be more precise, school kicked my ass for a few months and was down to sleeping only an average of 4-6 hours a night. My current philosophy is that if I don't have enough time to sleep, I don't have enough time to work out. Unfortunately, my diet went to hell also. I'm trying to pinpoint the area of where I get messed up the most.
I know I have a sweet tooth like you wouldn't believe. Given the choice I would probably live on cookies and ice cream. My other main diet are problems are a little more complicated. A lot of it is time related. If I'm running behind in the mornings or in general I don't have time to eat breakfast, pack a lunch, etc. This leads to me eating fast food or junk food from a vending machine. Now I could get a salad at a fast food place, but salads tend to be more expensive when I get a burger and soda for $2. Of course, I can get a week's worth of salad at the store for $5. Obviously the better option, but I have to have the time to make a salad either the morning of or the night before. Dilemma 1) No time to make lunch/breakfast.
The next problem is going to the grocery store. I don't mind going to the store, but that is also a time issue. My only choices in Cleveland are Ingles and Walmart. Both of these choices suck. Ingles has a great produce section but is VERY EXPENSIVE. Walmart has crappy food. End of story. I work in Dawsonville and there is a Kroger there. Kroger is wonderful. They have a wide variety of choices with great prices. So my choices become I can spend 30 minutes going to Ingles and purchase a mere 2 days of groceries for $30-$40 OR I can spend 2 hours (includes drive time) going to Kroger and purchase a week's worth of groceries for $60. Kroger is obviously the better choice. When I don't have the time to go to Kroger I usually just opt for food from gas stations or fast food again because its actually cheaper than shopping at Ingles and about as healthy as shopping at walmart. Dilemma 2) finding time to purchase healthy food at the store
Finally, when I'm stressed out all I want to eat is junk food. I want to binge on ice cream, cookies, chips, you get the idea. I'm a student who works and does research. I'm CONSTANTLY under stress. When all of my classes decide to have a test and paper/projects due in the same week any semblance of health is thrown out the door while I stress eat my heart out. Dilemma 3) Stress leads to binging.
My goal is to solve these problems. Part of this is just recognizing that they exist and will always be problems. Part of this is finding ways around it. Next semester I'm planning on getting a block plan which is a limited meal plan where you essentially pay per meal but it is cheaper than just stopping in at the dining hall. This will fix the don't have time to eat breakfast/lunch problem. Now I can just hop over to the dining hall and get something healthy. In the meantime, for breakfast I'm thinking about making some muffins or smoothies in bulk. I can freeze them and then when I'm running out the door I can just yank one out of the freezer and I'm good. I'm not so sure how to figure out lunch. If I make something too far ahead of time it will be gross by the time I need it. I suppose the effort will be to make something the night before, but this has been met with limited success before. I'll keep brainstorming and if anyone has suggestions, fantastic!
Solution 2) I'm thinking that since I've been just eating crap from fast food, gas stations, and vending machines which is far from fresh produce I could maybe purchase more than a week's worth of food. But go for frozen and canned veggies. I'll keep it stored and when I haven't been able to make it to the grocery store I have frozen dinner just waiting on me. The other thing is I'm thinking I may make lots of meals when I have the time and freeze those. I may even try portioning them out in small ziplocks so I can just pull out the one ziplock and bam, dinner.
Solution 3) I got nothing on this. Maybe just try to be aware of it and find something other than eating to calm down? All I can think of just keeping a box of whine around, but thats not really much better is it?
I know I have a sweet tooth like you wouldn't believe. Given the choice I would probably live on cookies and ice cream. My other main diet are problems are a little more complicated. A lot of it is time related. If I'm running behind in the mornings or in general I don't have time to eat breakfast, pack a lunch, etc. This leads to me eating fast food or junk food from a vending machine. Now I could get a salad at a fast food place, but salads tend to be more expensive when I get a burger and soda for $2. Of course, I can get a week's worth of salad at the store for $5. Obviously the better option, but I have to have the time to make a salad either the morning of or the night before. Dilemma 1) No time to make lunch/breakfast.
The next problem is going to the grocery store. I don't mind going to the store, but that is also a time issue. My only choices in Cleveland are Ingles and Walmart. Both of these choices suck. Ingles has a great produce section but is VERY EXPENSIVE. Walmart has crappy food. End of story. I work in Dawsonville and there is a Kroger there. Kroger is wonderful. They have a wide variety of choices with great prices. So my choices become I can spend 30 minutes going to Ingles and purchase a mere 2 days of groceries for $30-$40 OR I can spend 2 hours (includes drive time) going to Kroger and purchase a week's worth of groceries for $60. Kroger is obviously the better choice. When I don't have the time to go to Kroger I usually just opt for food from gas stations or fast food again because its actually cheaper than shopping at Ingles and about as healthy as shopping at walmart. Dilemma 2) finding time to purchase healthy food at the store
Finally, when I'm stressed out all I want to eat is junk food. I want to binge on ice cream, cookies, chips, you get the idea. I'm a student who works and does research. I'm CONSTANTLY under stress. When all of my classes decide to have a test and paper/projects due in the same week any semblance of health is thrown out the door while I stress eat my heart out. Dilemma 3) Stress leads to binging.
My goal is to solve these problems. Part of this is just recognizing that they exist and will always be problems. Part of this is finding ways around it. Next semester I'm planning on getting a block plan which is a limited meal plan where you essentially pay per meal but it is cheaper than just stopping in at the dining hall. This will fix the don't have time to eat breakfast/lunch problem. Now I can just hop over to the dining hall and get something healthy. In the meantime, for breakfast I'm thinking about making some muffins or smoothies in bulk. I can freeze them and then when I'm running out the door I can just yank one out of the freezer and I'm good. I'm not so sure how to figure out lunch. If I make something too far ahead of time it will be gross by the time I need it. I suppose the effort will be to make something the night before, but this has been met with limited success before. I'll keep brainstorming and if anyone has suggestions, fantastic!
Solution 2) I'm thinking that since I've been just eating crap from fast food, gas stations, and vending machines which is far from fresh produce I could maybe purchase more than a week's worth of food. But go for frozen and canned veggies. I'll keep it stored and when I haven't been able to make it to the grocery store I have frozen dinner just waiting on me. The other thing is I'm thinking I may make lots of meals when I have the time and freeze those. I may even try portioning them out in small ziplocks so I can just pull out the one ziplock and bam, dinner.
Solution 3) I got nothing on this. Maybe just try to be aware of it and find something other than eating to calm down? All I can think of just keeping a box of whine around, but thats not really much better is it?
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