Journal Challenge Day 19: Your Relationship With Food.
I wouldn't say I'm a picky eater, just selective I guess. Like I'm always down for trying new things, it just depends on what it is. That probably doesn't make any sense, I have no idea how to word what I want to say.
When was little, I had those dividing plates because none of my food could touch. I would also only eat one thing at a time, I wouldn't alternate bites of other food. Textures don't really bother me, some people can't eat mushroom because they're slimy. I could eat mushrooms all day. Every so often a texture will get me though, for example, I don't eat cereal because I know I can't eat it fast enough before it gets all soggy and that's fricken disgusting.
I will eat pretty much every fruit and vegetable known to man, except artichokes. Those are gross. Brussel sprouts, cabbage, broccoli, kale, I will eat all that shit up. I am not a meat person, I'll eat chicken, fish (I love sushi) sometimes turkey, but pork and beef are not a big part of my diet. When I'm home, I'll usually eat what my momma makes for dinner because she's an amazing cook. I wish that was passed down to me. I feel like I have the potential to be a decent cook but it's gonna take some time. Usually, when she makes beef, or things with beef in it, I'll make my own dinner. It's not a taste thing, I think beef tastes okay, it's not my favorite thing to eat. I was a vegetarian for the few years I had my own place and I loved it, however, I don't think I knew enough about how to do it the right way, so it was a little bit unhealthy. Not unhealthy in the way that I was eating garbage food but unhealthy in the way that I probably wasn't eating enough or getting the nutrients that I needed. Once I understand more about how to do that, I'll probably adopt that lifestyle again.
I would eventually like to be vegan, that's my goal. I feel guilty when I eat meat. We don't go anywhere special to buy meat, like a local farm, we just go to the grocery store and I've seen sooooo many food documentaries about how animals are treated before they get butchered. Every bite I take is a; "What did this animal go through in order for me to eat this." I used to think "I couldn't be vegan, I love cheese too much" but as of lately anything dairy has been killing my stomach. I don't know what happened but I woke up one morning and just like the snap of my fingers, I can't eat it anymore. I could not figure it out, I felt nauseous, my stomach hurt to the point of crying. I handle pain pretty okay, but this made my eyes water. It took time to figure out what it was like I cut out multiple foods, I took two pregnancy tests (Thank god, that was not the case) I even went to the doctor, which is huge for me because fuck doctors. She prescribed an anti-acid and suggested that maybe I just have too much stomach acid and when I eat it overflows, I don't know. I tried that and it was nice because I have acid reflux like a mother fucker, but it didn't help much with the stomach issue. I continued to leave dairy out of my diet, and after a while, I guess my body adjusted, and now I'm fine.
It's kinda hard to live without dairy though, everything has dairy in it, and I love dairy. Coffee creamer... French vanilla coffee creamer... a godsend. Can't have that. I've been putting unsweetened almond milk and 2tsps of sugar in my coffee though and it's actually pretty good.
There are foods that I just will not touch and I feel like they're self-explanatory, like liver, and frog legs, pig's ear. I've eaten a cow tongue before unknowingly and was not thrilled. I will not eat fast food, you will never see me at McDonald's, or Burger King. I used to get the occasional ice cream from Dairy Queen but I guess I won't be doing that anymore. I fucking love subway, I will always be game for some subway. Pizza sometimes, but I feel like I've had it so much when I was younger that I'm not excited about it anymore. I will go to A&W in Canada and get poutine. That's about it though, I'm pretty conscious about what I eat and from where. I'm not one to eat overly processed food either. We went camping last weekend and I had my first (and last) hot dog in years. I prefer the organic versions of things like Mac and Cheese and honey. I look for things with the best and least ingredients. The closer it is to its natural state, the better.
I don't eat sweets often, I hate cake. Cheesecake, on the other hand, I will devour, but only if it's homemade. Oh and carrot cake but it has to be the one from the Food Co-op. I don't like chocolate much but I'll eat it every now and then. The only ice cream I eat is the Strawberry Acme one. I never eat candy.
I think that sums up what I eat and don't eat, and what I like vs what I don't. My relationship with food is complicated. For how healthy I eat, I feel like my relationship with actually eating probably isn't very healthy. I don't have an eating disorder, but I think it would be so easy for me to develop one. Some days I feel like I have to try harder to push myself past them. Again I'm not entirely sure how to word that the way I want to. It's like I have to try to not have an eating disorder. As I've said, I am extremely conscious of what I eat and sometimes I think it's a little too much and it worries me. One thing I do that drives me nuts and I don't mean to do it, but I can't stop it either (I would never say anything out loud to someone) I will judge you based on what you have in your shopping cart. One hundred percent. It happens all the time and makes me super uncomfortable. If you're ahead of me in the line and you're unloading your cart with boxes of pop, and chips, and beef, and candy. My automatic response is to be disgusted. I will also look at your body type, and if your overweight I'll probably judge you more. If you have kids and you're only buying them snacks loaded with sugar, I will judge you. If you have an even balance between healthy and unhealthy, then I won't judge you as much. I've tried so hard to stop doing this because it makes me feel like a shit human but I just can't. I figure as long as I don't say anything and keep my mouth shut in grocery stores then it's fine.
I also get embarrassed, if I'm shopping with someone, even if it's their grocery shop and I wouldn't eat any of it. If they have a lot of unhealthy things in their buggy then I get embarrassed to be associated with that. Not the person, but the eating habits. Another thing that's maybe not the healthiest is I don't really allow myself to indulge in things, or enjoy those things when I do. Like if I go to a family event and they have sweets or junk food, I won't really eat those, I might pick at them but never very much. The times I do actually eat things like that, I feel the need to work harder when I exercise to work it off.
Also, I am not an emotional eater, quite the opposite. If I'm stressed or sad or angry I just don't eat. Not on purpose either, I don't feel hungry and I forget. Sometimes that lasts for days and then I have to actually make myself eat something. Sometimes I just get bored with food too, eating feels like a chore and I just won't feel like doing it. I don't know why but I feel like food is a privilege more so than a necessity. that's probably why I'm such a slow eater. I've ever had a shortage of food though, well that's not entirely true. When I was living on my own there were times when I couldn't afford groceries so I had to make do with less, but those times never lasted longer than like a week.
I recently downloaded a calorie counting app, because one of my Love List List items to achieve my dream body. I've never really been overweight, I'm pretty average, but I've never looked the way I want to either. I just need to tone up a bit. I got his app though because I want to do it a safe and healthy way, and I like knowing the numbers. I set my app for a fat loss and it set my daily calorie intake for 1450. I believe the daily average for a woman my size is 2000 and that's to maintain her weight. This app has made me realize how much I have actually been undereating. At the beginning I struggled to achieve half of that 1450, now I can get there but it's still a bit of a struggle. Most of the things I eat don't have many calories in them. I have gone over my daily food budget a few times which I have very mixed feelings about. I'm proud of making myself eat that much but also I feel disappointed because I'm pretty goal-oriented and if I eat over my budget all the time then that's not helpful to my dream body goal.
I try to push better eating habits on the people I love, which sounds weird to me right now after saying what I said in the last paragraph because my eating habits don't sound very healthy. I just hate to see people I love eating food that I know has negative health benefits. I watch food documentaries as often as I can because I enjoy the shit out of them and I love learning things about food. That's probably why I want to be a nutritionist. I feel like I know a decent amount about how what you eat impacts your body, every inch of it. I don't want the people I love to end up with the health problems that a bad diet leads to, and I also don't want those problems. Sometimes I might be a little bit hard on them about food but I have good intentions, I promise. Other times I feel like I should be harder on them about it because they don't really listen. Maybe if I could get them to watch some of the food documentaries with me? I'm not entirely sure that it would change anything, but if I have a chance to have them on this earth for a couple more years, it's worth it, right?
Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed learning that I like carrot cake and hate Ronald Mcdonald.
-Courtney :)
When was little, I had those dividing plates because none of my food could touch. I would also only eat one thing at a time, I wouldn't alternate bites of other food. Textures don't really bother me, some people can't eat mushroom because they're slimy. I could eat mushrooms all day. Every so often a texture will get me though, for example, I don't eat cereal because I know I can't eat it fast enough before it gets all soggy and that's fricken disgusting.
I will eat pretty much every fruit and vegetable known to man, except artichokes. Those are gross. Brussel sprouts, cabbage, broccoli, kale, I will eat all that shit up. I am not a meat person, I'll eat chicken, fish (I love sushi) sometimes turkey, but pork and beef are not a big part of my diet. When I'm home, I'll usually eat what my momma makes for dinner because she's an amazing cook. I wish that was passed down to me. I feel like I have the potential to be a decent cook but it's gonna take some time. Usually, when she makes beef, or things with beef in it, I'll make my own dinner. It's not a taste thing, I think beef tastes okay, it's not my favorite thing to eat. I was a vegetarian for the few years I had my own place and I loved it, however, I don't think I knew enough about how to do it the right way, so it was a little bit unhealthy. Not unhealthy in the way that I was eating garbage food but unhealthy in the way that I probably wasn't eating enough or getting the nutrients that I needed. Once I understand more about how to do that, I'll probably adopt that lifestyle again.
I would eventually like to be vegan, that's my goal. I feel guilty when I eat meat. We don't go anywhere special to buy meat, like a local farm, we just go to the grocery store and I've seen sooooo many food documentaries about how animals are treated before they get butchered. Every bite I take is a; "What did this animal go through in order for me to eat this." I used to think "I couldn't be vegan, I love cheese too much" but as of lately anything dairy has been killing my stomach. I don't know what happened but I woke up one morning and just like the snap of my fingers, I can't eat it anymore. I could not figure it out, I felt nauseous, my stomach hurt to the point of crying. I handle pain pretty okay, but this made my eyes water. It took time to figure out what it was like I cut out multiple foods, I took two pregnancy tests (Thank god, that was not the case) I even went to the doctor, which is huge for me because fuck doctors. She prescribed an anti-acid and suggested that maybe I just have too much stomach acid and when I eat it overflows, I don't know. I tried that and it was nice because I have acid reflux like a mother fucker, but it didn't help much with the stomach issue. I continued to leave dairy out of my diet, and after a while, I guess my body adjusted, and now I'm fine.
It's kinda hard to live without dairy though, everything has dairy in it, and I love dairy. Coffee creamer... French vanilla coffee creamer... a godsend. Can't have that. I've been putting unsweetened almond milk and 2tsps of sugar in my coffee though and it's actually pretty good.
There are foods that I just will not touch and I feel like they're self-explanatory, like liver, and frog legs, pig's ear. I've eaten a cow tongue before unknowingly and was not thrilled. I will not eat fast food, you will never see me at McDonald's, or Burger King. I used to get the occasional ice cream from Dairy Queen but I guess I won't be doing that anymore. I fucking love subway, I will always be game for some subway. Pizza sometimes, but I feel like I've had it so much when I was younger that I'm not excited about it anymore. I will go to A&W in Canada and get poutine. That's about it though, I'm pretty conscious about what I eat and from where. I'm not one to eat overly processed food either. We went camping last weekend and I had my first (and last) hot dog in years. I prefer the organic versions of things like Mac and Cheese and honey. I look for things with the best and least ingredients. The closer it is to its natural state, the better.
I don't eat sweets often, I hate cake. Cheesecake, on the other hand, I will devour, but only if it's homemade. Oh and carrot cake but it has to be the one from the Food Co-op. I don't like chocolate much but I'll eat it every now and then. The only ice cream I eat is the Strawberry Acme one. I never eat candy.
I think that sums up what I eat and don't eat, and what I like vs what I don't. My relationship with food is complicated. For how healthy I eat, I feel like my relationship with actually eating probably isn't very healthy. I don't have an eating disorder, but I think it would be so easy for me to develop one. Some days I feel like I have to try harder to push myself past them. Again I'm not entirely sure how to word that the way I want to. It's like I have to try to not have an eating disorder. As I've said, I am extremely conscious of what I eat and sometimes I think it's a little too much and it worries me. One thing I do that drives me nuts and I don't mean to do it, but I can't stop it either (I would never say anything out loud to someone) I will judge you based on what you have in your shopping cart. One hundred percent. It happens all the time and makes me super uncomfortable. If you're ahead of me in the line and you're unloading your cart with boxes of pop, and chips, and beef, and candy. My automatic response is to be disgusted. I will also look at your body type, and if your overweight I'll probably judge you more. If you have kids and you're only buying them snacks loaded with sugar, I will judge you. If you have an even balance between healthy and unhealthy, then I won't judge you as much. I've tried so hard to stop doing this because it makes me feel like a shit human but I just can't. I figure as long as I don't say anything and keep my mouth shut in grocery stores then it's fine.
I also get embarrassed, if I'm shopping with someone, even if it's their grocery shop and I wouldn't eat any of it. If they have a lot of unhealthy things in their buggy then I get embarrassed to be associated with that. Not the person, but the eating habits. Another thing that's maybe not the healthiest is I don't really allow myself to indulge in things, or enjoy those things when I do. Like if I go to a family event and they have sweets or junk food, I won't really eat those, I might pick at them but never very much. The times I do actually eat things like that, I feel the need to work harder when I exercise to work it off.
Also, I am not an emotional eater, quite the opposite. If I'm stressed or sad or angry I just don't eat. Not on purpose either, I don't feel hungry and I forget. Sometimes that lasts for days and then I have to actually make myself eat something. Sometimes I just get bored with food too, eating feels like a chore and I just won't feel like doing it. I don't know why but I feel like food is a privilege more so than a necessity. that's probably why I'm such a slow eater. I've ever had a shortage of food though, well that's not entirely true. When I was living on my own there were times when I couldn't afford groceries so I had to make do with less, but those times never lasted longer than like a week.
I recently downloaded a calorie counting app, because one of my Love List List items to achieve my dream body. I've never really been overweight, I'm pretty average, but I've never looked the way I want to either. I just need to tone up a bit. I got his app though because I want to do it a safe and healthy way, and I like knowing the numbers. I set my app for a fat loss and it set my daily calorie intake for 1450. I believe the daily average for a woman my size is 2000 and that's to maintain her weight. This app has made me realize how much I have actually been undereating. At the beginning I struggled to achieve half of that 1450, now I can get there but it's still a bit of a struggle. Most of the things I eat don't have many calories in them. I have gone over my daily food budget a few times which I have very mixed feelings about. I'm proud of making myself eat that much but also I feel disappointed because I'm pretty goal-oriented and if I eat over my budget all the time then that's not helpful to my dream body goal.
I try to push better eating habits on the people I love, which sounds weird to me right now after saying what I said in the last paragraph because my eating habits don't sound very healthy. I just hate to see people I love eating food that I know has negative health benefits. I watch food documentaries as often as I can because I enjoy the shit out of them and I love learning things about food. That's probably why I want to be a nutritionist. I feel like I know a decent amount about how what you eat impacts your body, every inch of it. I don't want the people I love to end up with the health problems that a bad diet leads to, and I also don't want those problems. Sometimes I might be a little bit hard on them about food but I have good intentions, I promise. Other times I feel like I should be harder on them about it because they don't really listen. Maybe if I could get them to watch some of the food documentaries with me? I'm not entirely sure that it would change anything, but if I have a chance to have them on this earth for a couple more years, it's worth it, right?
Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed learning that I like carrot cake and hate Ronald Mcdonald.
-Courtney :)
