Yearofhealth2023's Journal, 25 September 2023

Hard to be around people that don’t support healthy eating!  

my ex was not supportive in the food dept or in the gym. he was incredibly non-physical after we had kids. he wouldnt even let me work out solo. i had to practically beg to do the running events i did, and even caught crap for that. that being said, i cant expect someone to restrict their diet because i restrict mine.  

Kay-is it fair to expect them not to bring threatening foods into the house you live in? I feel that it is. I feel like it is in the same arena as not having alcohol laying around for an alcoholic in recovery. Am i wrong? Genuinely asking. I dont have this issue in my household but my family member who is struggling with food and weight does. 

YOH I Have no experience with addiction so I'm not sure. I'm not so sure id compare food to addictive substances. i can live without cocaine. i can't live without eating. i won't date a smoker. but I'll date someone who's weakness is kitkats. perhaps he can hide the bad food... id consider that supportive 

It gets complicated when your partner likes certain foods you are trying to avoid. I was lucky when I started cooking foods to aid in my weight loss that Hubby bought into it & ate whatever I served. In the process, he lost weight, too & was happy with that. We still have snack foods in the house. I am able to resist the foods I don't want to eat too much of. I'm not sure how we'd manage if that wasn't the case. I make sure I have my acceptable snacks, so I'm not tempted to eat something less desirable.  

sherrey yes. like addiction, you have to want to help yourself and make your own changes. self accountability and responsibility has to be the driving factor for change. how else would you go to a grocery store, dine out, possibly even work, etc. the whole world cant wat just health foods because i want to.  

My spouse can eat more calories than me, exercise less, and still maintain weight. She does keep some foods around the house that I should not come near. Thankfully, she prepares meals that are soundly healthy. And, I do have enough inner-strength (for the most part) to avoid any foods that I should not eat. I have an addiction to peanut butter and chocolate. Both can be healthy foods, but not for me. So, they are avoided by me as much as possible. Stay the course !!  

YOH... WOW! YOU WERE NOTTT PLAYING!!! 🤣 My hubby still eats lots of things that aren't allowed on my WOE, but I don't buy most of them, even though he foots most of the grocery bill. He doesn't complain about that, so I don't complain when he drags in 💩 food from time to time. Compromise...lol. He is also naturally lean & has "hard working man" muscle, not from the gym. After a few weeks into keto, it hasn't bothered me at all. That's why lots of people are almost religious about defending keto. It's unbelievable how it can take someone from being a complete over-the-top junk food addict to not being interested in junk food at all. A complete 360°. There is no fighting cravings at all. POOF! GONE! Almost like magic. Maybe there are other WOE that can do this also. 🤷‍♀️ This is just my & other people that I know experience with keto. 

Although I do think we have to take responsibility for our own health & diet, I also think your partner needs to be supportive. If it is hard to resist certain foods, maybe they could abstain or make them less conspicuous in the beginning.  

My husband is supportive, and he just eats what I cook, which is keto/carnivore. But he started losing too much weight. His solution was to buy some bread to add to his meals. This works out for us, because I have Celiac and so gluten is not on my radar. I wish I had the problem of losing too much weight, as I'm currently stuck. 

Thank you guys. This question wasn’t for me personally as my hubs doesnt mind at all not having threatening (to me) foods in the house. I was just curious. Kay, my hubs is a recovering alcoholic. 22 years sober. He was 5 years sober when we first met. So i dont drink as i wouldnt want it to be threatening to him. He never asked me not to and i do enjoy a drink from time to time but care more about him than the drink. Therefore, i dont drink. Food can and for some people is every much as addictive as drugs or alcohol. Yes, needed to survive but not needed to survive in the quantities or with non-health promoting items. This is part of the problem. Many people do not recognize that food (it can be sugar, carbs, fats depending on the person) in some people is overwhelming and addictive. I do not have a problem with alcohol and never have. For me i dont understand why one drink isn’t enough because it takes up no space in my head. For folks who view food as just something you do when hungry and make healthy choices it’s probably the same view. As in, you know that 1/2 gallon of ice cream will make you sick and put weight on so why not just have one scoop? Well, in my case, my head fixates on that ice cream and i will finish it even knowing it will make me sick and fat. I don’t know why. I know where it started. I know why it started. I dont know how to get my brain trained back to non-fixation thoughts tho. Ive been fortunate that for the majority of my life i managed to stay at a healthy weight and be fit. But some foods have always been very very hard for me. Sorry for the diatribe just trying to put a little light on the food addiction vs alcohol vs drug addiction thinking. More people die from obesity related health issues than almost any other type of addiction. Crazy right? But true. 

i get it YOH Im absolutely a food addict. i will eat until I'm sickly full. and when i carb crash, i go hard. 2 weeks ago i had nothing but junk food, desserts, chocolate etc. but thats on me and on me only.  

Let's just state here that cardio-vascular disease, diabetes, alzhiemer's, and cancer are all related to metabolic disorders - otherwise known as unhealthy eating. If you have a food addiction, yes, it can lead to disease and death. Food addiction is as deadly as alcoholism.  

YOH... You know, perception is a powerful thing. Just because someone isn't fat on the outside or have apparent health problems, doesn't mean they aren't fat on the inside (visceral fat) & health problems aren't brewing. Even people that use lots of sugary treat to build lots of great looking muscle on the outside are no exception. Think of the animal muscle meat you buy in the grocery store; marble meat vs lean meat (don't shoot the messenger...lol). Some people are just "functional alcoholics". They (and most people around them) don't think they have a problem because it isn't slapping them in the face, YET. Knowledge is power also. ...but the most powerful thing of all is to learn that no one can love us like we can love ourselves, and live accordingly.  

i agree that partners should be some level of supportive, absolutely. but maybe not to the extreme of matching a diet. again, just my opinion. i think about food 24/7. a supportive partner could never change that for me.  

Call me weird but at whatever weight I have been at in my life I have wanted my friends and family to be comfortable in my home no matter how short or long their stay. I know most of their food (or WOE) and beverage preferences so if I am preparing meals it’s going to be something they like. Back in my twenties sharing apartments with roommates we respected each others food choices but didn’t dictate to each other what could or could not be in the kitchen. In fact, back in my early thirties I was dating someone and every single time we went out to eat or I made dinner for him at my home I drank red wine. On the first date he had “rose” wine (gag) so that is what I had in my home for when he came over. About 4-6 weeks in he invited me over and wanted to make me dinner. He asked me what I would like to drink after I sat down and I said wine would be nice. He handed me a glass of “rose”. Needless to say that was our last date. I never told him why. Lol 

He had a few other quirks but the “rose” wine just helped me walk away fast. He wasn’t observant and I wasn’t going to teach a man in his mid thirties how to pay attention to my likes, dislikes, or even what made me happy. Lol 

My best friend and former fiance is being helpful. At 6'6" and 198lbs he can pretty much eat anything and still stay lean. He visits frequently enough between 4-8 days on a 2 week work cycle that I'm learning to adapt. His chocolate ice cream is sacrosanct and I will not touch it. Where I struggle is when he fogets to take an opened bag of potato chips with him when he leaves. If he leaves an unopened bag, no problem, I won't touch it. Weird. Luckily he is supportive and doesn't grouse that I don't eat everything he cooks (trained as a chef for a hobby) as we eat mostly the same meals - like tonight will be haddock with asparagus and cauliflower as sides. He will add a potatoe or two for him, I'll have salad and more cauliflower in lieu. A bit of a balancing act as I'll admit that I covet his potatoes but so be it. 

O Kay im sorry you are just like me in that way. Food is very often in my head so frequently. I tried therapy in my early 20’s to redirect my brain but it was not successful. The logging of the food has often been my best defense against indulgence tho it’s not perfect. You seem to have mastered being healthy and happy tho pretty girl. 

Z-i dont eat 4 legged animals nor most two legged ones so i dont think even a trial of keto is an option for someone like me but the idea of food disappearing from my brain is definitely enticing. I agree with you that we must love ourselves FIRST in all ways not just for nutritional health. We are the captain of our own ship and cannot help anyone if we aren’t in tip top shape to do so generally speaking.