As month three of my Thinking Healthy Not Thin blog continues, I’ll take a moment to reflect on the past two months. I’ve tackled drinking water, which I’m very happy to say I am quite successful with. In month two, I wanted to create a sleep routine and I didn’t think I was very successful. However something happened the other day that proved I achieved my sleep goal better than I thought. I had edits due for an upcoming novel, and as my fellow writers know, the deadline to get a book back to your publisher can be pretty stressful. Rather than be late, I stayed up until 3 o’clock in the morning working on it and then I got up at my usual nine o’ clock.
Know what happened?
I was exhausted for two days! LOL
I know that doesn’t sound like a very big epiphany, but I have been living that way for years and never noticed such a dramatic difference in how I felt. I guess I was just used to running on half steam and after four weeks of trying to go to bed at midnight and getting up by nine, my body had gotten used to actually getting sleep. Maybe I should’ve given last month more success than just 70%. LOL
So what am I going to tackle for this month?
FOOD
Yet how can one begin eating healthy without the words “That makes you fat” or “That’s fattening” lingering in the back of your mind? Isn’t the whole point of these monthly goals to make myself healthy not just skinny? Well, if a person wants to live healthy they have to put healthy things in their body, right?
Anybody who knows me knows that I like food. And actually I like healthy food more than I like fattening food…Oh wait!
Did you see what I just wrote?
Fattening.
Jeesh, will I never stop thinking thin?
What I should have said, or better yet, THOUGHT, was that I prefer fresh food and healthy stuff over processed junk. Lucky for me I’m not one for sweets but I do eat fried foods and all the things that are not very good for me.
So how do I make a change about food without thinking about my waistline?
I had to analyze my eating habits first. In doing so, I discovered that most of my poor food choices were made due to lack of preparation.
Well, there’s a no brainer, am I right? LOL
So how do I fix that?
A food journal? Yeah no. I have two jobs and I’m not doing that crap.
Counting calories? I already have an app for that on my phone and all it ever does is tell me that I need to lose 20 pounds and I’m not eating properly.
And isn’t counting calories just another way of making food choices to look a certain way, not on the importance of how my body works? Isn’t that exactly what I’m trying to change? I want food choices to be for my health, not my jean size. And if I want to start changing the way I think about food, first I need to identify when I make bad choices and nip it in the bud.
Lord knows I won’t keep a journal for more than a week and I WILL eat bad food again, so calorie obsession won’t work either. But if calorie counting and a food journal are off the table for me, what does that leave me with?
What lifestyle change can I do that I’ll actually stick with?
I was talking about this with a friend the other day and she mentioned when her boys were little she used to write a food menu for the week. It saved her time, money and eliminated all the “What’s for dinner?” moments that any wife or mother hates.
Eureka!
I’ll make a weekly food menu!
I immediately had these grandiose ideas of making something Pinterest worthy to hang on my wall. My little fingers were flying through my tablet, pinning all these cute chalk boards with clever sayings! Oh this was going to be so awesome! Of course when I presented these project ideas to the hubby—he’s been pretty supportive of my changes so far—he said, “Just write it out on a piece of paper.”
Hmm, okay. Maybe that’s best.
Why over-complicate things, right?
Besides, I’m supposed to get some of the stuff ready before the month starts so that I will be set up for success. And frankly making crafts probably would’ve never happened. Dragging out the glue gun, going to Hobby Lobby and buying yarn I don’t need and forgetting glue sticks. Hanging something on the wall, chalk dust that I KNOW I will never 
remember to clean off the base boards.
Yeaaaah, that sounds like something I will start and never finish.
Paper it is!
What do you think?
So that’s my goal for the month. Totally doable, not calorie or carb counting.
Just simply preparing a plan for my lunches and dinners for the week so that I make good choices.
I’m hoping several things will be solved with this.
One: I’ll stop having the “What do you want to eat? Let’s just make a pizza” evenings when I would’ve been just as happy with fish and salad.
Two: I save time and money
Three: I get organized—hey don’t laugh! It could happen!
Wish me luck!
I’ll post an update on my progress in a couple weeks. Until then, if you are a pinner, check out my new board Think Healthy Not Thin on Pinterest. You can also sign up for email subscriptions to my blog in the left column of this page.
Feel free to post a comment and share your suggestions for future months. I would love to hear from you!
~Deanna
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You can also find her young adult alter ego, K.D. Worth Facebook│Twitter
Buy Deanna’s books at Dreamspinner Press, Decadent Publishing, and Harmony Ink Press or at any reputable eBook seller
