I find them restricting and complicated. I need something simple, just like, what do I need to eat to be healthy and how much? A drag and drop system would be lovely, and maybe I’ll make one someday. I went to the library the other day and brought home 4 books, remarkably, after flipping through most of them before coming home, the most helpful (so far) has been Food Rules.
It’s kind of…perfect, and freeing. I was almost lamenting the other day about how if I’m really serious about this (and I am), it seems so complicated that it’s probably going to turn my life on it’s head and I’m going to need to become a food/nutrition guru just to be healthy. Unfortunately, as nice as that is…it’s not really my personality and the idea of putting all of my energy into some kind of plan just seemed…daunting and a bit suffocating.
Especially with the books I brought home. Admittedly, I brought them all home for different reasons. Food Rules seemed like it’d be a great guide (and it is!), the Mayo Clinic book has colorful charts, and The Perfect Body Diet I ironically didn’t get for it’s diet, but because it lists and describes some interesting exercises that I think I can do in my second floor apartment. Ideally, I’ll get a $10 yoga mat, because I don’t like slipping on my hard floors. The um, encyclopedia I got because it’s an encyclopedia and seemed handy, though it’s remarkably hard to hold open.
Maybe I’ll garner up the nerve to watch Food Inc. on netflix. Food Rules was great in that it explained everything clearly and took off a lot of the pressure I was feeling to focus on individual elements in food, rather than how healthy and processed it is as a whole. So while they’re important I feel less need to think “okay, I’ve eaten 8 grams of protein and now I need to eat 12 grams of vitamin __” because honestly, that was just stressing me out.
As much as I want to lose weight, I want to be healthy more. I’m not sick, but I’m definitely not exactly healthy either. I think that if I can eat well (which sadly means cooking, but I’ll be 21 in February so maybe if I drink a glass of wine while torturing myself by cooking, it’ll be more tolerable…and also healthy. Though I guess it’s better to have with food…but I’ll experiment) then my weight (and possibly hormones) will start to balance out as well.
This weeks’ diet of frozen dinners and ramen noodles has definitely angered my system enough for me to be open to change (I don’t think there was any chicken in my nuggets :S). The biggest and most helpful thing I’ve gleaned from Food Rules is basically that the biggest thing is how processed everything is. If you can stay away from as much processed stuff as possible and eat small/proper amounts (and lots of plants) of food in moderation, then you’re good. Which for me means I’m not restricted with what I make or what I eat, as long as it’s in moderation (which I kinda have down, because I get sick if I don’t :P) and as un-processed as possible.
While I don’t feel the need (or have a big enough wallet) to go to whole foods every week (as ideal as that would be) I’m okay (now) with spending more, for better quality food and shorter shelf life. Food Rules in combination with this article kinda helped with that. I tend to be a bit uptight when it comes to buying food…since I don’t particularly enjoy it anyway.
So that’s a step.
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