Making Adjustments

The "plant-forward" plan is going so-so for me. I am finding myself hungry every 2 hours or so and I have just been pushing my hunger aside because "in an hour I'll be home or going to lunch or what have you. I do have nuts with me as a backup but I am not being smart about keeping myself satisfied so then I get home and rush to the warm bean burritos in the freezer with a side of tortilla chips. It's not a big deal but I know I can fix this so my eating feels controlled by reason instead of feeling like it's driven by extreme hunger. I am noticing that some of what's driving my after work behavior is the fact that I have experienced the most challenging part of my day before that and being home is a release and a comfort and I find myself wanting my food to feel that way too. Also, I really notice the lack of feeling warm and full with my food during the day and sometimes I am so hungry that I just want to feel full. There is a MENTAL satisfaction that comes along with that and I am going to have to experiment with ways to satisfy my mind with my evening meals. For now, I at least know that eating cold things for dinner (a salad like this week's planned dinner) isn't a good idea for me because I will seek out warmth that time of day. So my plan is to switch out my lunch (warm food) with my dinner (salad). I am also going to work on eating when I am hungry so I never get so hungry that it overpowers reason. And finally, I will need to break the habit of eating right when I get home. I have conditioned myself that home=eat, even if I ate only 1 hour before arriving home. There are non-food ways to relieve the stress from my work day and feel the fullness of being in my safe, warm place again. I have allowed more sweets, junk food and chips to creep in last week/weekend and I do know part of it is the mental aspect of feeling less full eating healthier so that will be something I have to work on as well. In general, I am slowly making positive changes in my diet, learning somw new recipes and I am getting way more plants in my diet. I am well on my way to making this a lifestyle change and I look forward to seeing how it affects my overall health down the road.