Eat Good! Feel Good! -- Link up...

It has been a week since I introduced my healthy eating to post to you all and now it is time to update you all on my progress.

I am amazed at how well I have managed to follow my meal planner. Maybe it's my OCD of liking a plan and organisation or just because I have already seen the benefits. 

Breakfast:
I have found this to be one of the best switches I have made in my 'Be Healthy' quest. I was the type who'd have a a high sugar cereal and then sugar sprinkled on top of said cereal. Switching to porridge has made me feel less bloated and I notice that my energy level seems constant until lunch time. Why is this good? No mid morning chocolate snack is needed.  I've also began to feel much less bloated after breakfast which is even better.

Lunch:
This was a tricky one for me. Due to my energy levels being so low, I have found myself some days grabbing 2 or 3 bags of crisps for lunch so I don't have to make anything (naughty - I know!). I carried out a food prep Sunday night of vegetables and placed them in zip lock bags for the week. Then each evening while waiting for the kettle to boil, I chucked a bit of everything into a plastic container and voila - lunch was done. Quick and easy. Then for my lunches, having salad with vegetables and meat filled me up and once again I did not suffer an afternoon dip in energy. I paired it with an apple and a couple little caramel squares because I'm not THAT good.

Sunday meal prep...

Dinner:
The dinner was the hardest for me. As this week was the first week back in my phased return doing 3 full days I was, as you can imagine, physically and mentally exhausted by the time I reached home. This is when things can go wrong, I get in and fill up on chocolate and crisps while my tea is in the oven but because the salad was so filling I didn't find the need to do that. But the utter exhaustion was still a factor, I managed to get my fix of vegetables and something healthy but I definitely did not do as well as I would have liked with dinners. That will be something I work on next week.

Healthy Eating Week 1

This week also saw me get back to my pole dancing after a couple months of due to a shoulder injury. It coped well but has been a bit iffy since so I think I will have to relent and visit a physio to check it out. I loved my session and would hate to have to give it up again. The exercise made me feel like I had achieved something and that was a feeling I had been missing for some time.

Pole Fun!

How has your healthy week gone? I would love you to link up and healthy posts from the week and we can support each other in our journey to 'Eat Good! Feel Good'.

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Healthy Body = Healthy Mind

Way back last year, when I was diagnosed with severe anaemia (borderline transfusion level), I changed my eating habits big time. Having had a number of viruses previous (due to the lack of iron affecting my immune system), my appetite had waned somewhat. With the diagnosis I threw myself into researching how to up my iron intake to compliment the high dose of iron tablets I was on from the doctor (800mg daily). This all fell by the way side as I deteriorated with other health issues.

However, it is the New Year and I feel now is as good a time as any to try and get back eating healthy again. I must stress that it is not a diet, I will not be restricting myself food based on calories or anything like that. I will be focusing on healthy food. After researching links with depression and food, I created a meal plan for myself with as many of the ideas I could include. 

My planner that hopefully will keep me on track!

Two big things I will be cutting down on is caffeine and sugar. I cut out caffeine at the start of the year as it affects iron absorption but reintroduced it again as a comfort thing e.g. copious amounts of cups of tea. I have come to realise that my body does not react well to this in energy levels, bloating and it also affects my sleep - which I have enough problems with already! Sugar is another thing, I will still be having a chocolate treat on an evening or a little something after my lunch but I am a sugar fiend. I have it on my cereal daily so I start the day off with sugar pumping around. This, again, is not good for depression or energy levels. Since energy levels are a huge problem for me I am targeting this part of my diet to change too.

I therefore planned out my weekly food menu and created a shopping list to go with it. I have found doing so in the past really focuses me on what to buy rather than randomly putting items into my basket. I used my research to help me plan it. I have decided to try and food prep my lunches to start taking salad to get my vegetable intake - something which I am not a fan of and rarely eat. 

I set off today and spent time wandering the supermarket shopping for my 'healthy list'. In the future I would like to get my vegetables from grocers but for now just being able to get out and do a shop some days is an achievement.

My 'healthy' basket

I have planned in a pizza/treat night as I still want to indulge and as I said before, this is not about weight - it is about a healthy body leading to a healthy mind. I am sure I will lose weight naturally once I start eating healthy but I will see that as a by product. 

To cut out caffeine I have trained myself to drink herbal teas. Now I was never a fan of these but as I persisted I began to enjoy them. I drink a green tea with breakfast (I know this has some caffeine in naturally) then I drink Camomile tea throughout the day. On the evening I will either have a camomile or a hot chocolate. Also, gone are the frosted flakes and in is the porridge and wholewheat breakfasts! As I am still phasing back into work, I am planning scrambled eggs some mornings. 

I am hoping having such a structure will help me (almost CBT style) stay on track and keep up the healthy lifestyle. A friend told me that it takes two weeks to get used to something, so if I can only get through the first two weeks I will feel good. 

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Are you starting a healthy eating plan? Share the link in the comments for me to check out!     Head over to Venus Trapped to link up :