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Does eating feel like a chore for you? Are you feeling overwhelmed with the thought of prepping meals and eating multiple times a day? You are not alone.
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If you think about it, nourishing your body really can take up a significant portion of your life!
Eating can feel like a chore because:
- Prepping meals takes time
- The social experience of a meal feels like work
- You might have to stop what you are doing to eat
- Cooking meals can be a long process
- Plating, chewing and swallowing seems to take forever
There are social, emotional, and physical reasons why eating might feel like a chore for you.
This article will dig into some of the signs that you might be avoiding food, why it might feel annoying for you to eat, and what you can eat when eating feels like a chore.
Signs You Are Avoiding Food
Avoiding meal prep or eating can happen for a variety of reasons. Some reasons that can be common for avoiding food that have nothing to do with wanting to lose weight include:
- Feeling like you’re too busy to eat
- Not wanting to take time to prep meals
- Not wanting to take the time to eat with other people
- Not feeling like you’re in the mood to eat or prep meals
- You have food fatigue and nothing sounds good
For some people, when eating feels like a chore it can be a symptom of an eating disorder. If this is the case, you will need to work with a dietitian to help you to develop a custom meal plan you can follow when you have no interest in food.
While you might not have a full blown eating disorder if eating feels like a chore, this is a symptom of a disordered relationship with food. You will need to implement strategies to get in regular meals and snacks as soon as possible so that the problem doesn’t get worse leading to malnourishment.
I’m Too Busy To Eat
If you feel like you really want to eat but you’re just too busy you are not alone!
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Meal prep, food shopping, and sitting down for a meal can feel like a huge chore when you keep a busy schedule.
You might be too busy to eat if:
- You are caring for young kids
- You work a lot of hours
- You have adult household dependents
- You work nights
- You have a lot of family obligations
There are a million reasons why you might legitimately have less time for the meal process than other people.
Why Does Eating Feel Like a Chore
In our busy world, sometimes the last thing you feel like you have time to do is eat. You might feel like eating is something you HAVE to do rather than something that you enjoy doing.
Lifestyle Reasons Eating Feels Like a Chore:
- It interrupts your workflow
- You feel like you could be doing something more productive
- You might eat only to get rid of hunger that interferes with productivity
- You might have really high energy needs (you exercise a lot or do physically demanding job)
- You often have to eat more/longer because you have waited so long to eat
- You don’t have normal hunger cues because you don’t eat regularly
- You feel overly full after you eat and it makes it difficult to be productive
While all of these reasons are valid reasons for feeling resentful towards meal time, you still have to eat!
Resenting grocery shopping, meal prep, and actually taking time to eat will not help you to nourish. In fact it’s likely to just leave you grumpy and feeling low in energy.
Instead, try creating strategies to simplify the process of shopping and preparing meals.
There are also emotional reasons that can make eating feel like a chore.
Emotional Reasons Eating Feels Like A Chore
- You are suffering from anxiety or depression
- You are lacking energy to prep meals (which will become worse from not eating)
- You’re overwhelmed with counting calories and selecting the “right” food choice
- You are overwhelmed with sharing meals with others
In order to work through the emotional reasons why you are unmotivated to eat, you will need to work with a therapist to identify the underlying concerns.
7 Strategies to eat when You Feel Too Busy
Steps you can use to shop for, prep, and plan food include:
- Do grocery store pick up
- Do grocery store delivery
- Do small easy meal prep for 10-30 minutes daily
- Choose canned or frozen produce, meat, and beans
- Repurpose leftovers
- Hire help with grocery shopping, meal prep, or cooking
- Use frozen entrees
Eat Healthy Without Cooking
Did you know that you can follow a relatively balanced meal plan with little to no cooking?
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Cooking a minimum of 3 meals and 3 snacks daily that will meet the nutritional needs of most people can feel overwhelming.
While some of these options may cost a little more than prepping all of your meals yourself from scratch, when you look at the overall benefit to your lifestyle they may be critical.
13 tricks to eat healthy without cooking include:
- Make a 5 minute smoothie a meal or snack
- Pick a frozen entree and toss on some frozen veggies on top to make it a meal
- Throw some peppers & veggies on frozen burritos and bake
- Hire a personal chef to prep or cook meals
- Use a meal delivery service
- Buy garlic and veggies chopped to quickly add to meals
- Make extra for each dish so you can use them for leftovers
- Choose nuts, yogurt, and protein bars, or pre cut produce for snacks
- Assign cooking tasks to other family members
- Order out and base your meal around the produce
- Order extra when you order out and combine the leftovers with foods you have on hand
- Keep a pantry stocked with dry goods and batch cook foods like lentils & quinoa
- Use simple tools like a veggie topper or hand food processor
Remember, you don’t have to fill up on the most nutrient dense foods out there to have a balanced and satisfying diet. All foods fit in a healthy diet.
Simple meal prep also gets much easier and much faster the more you do it. So sometimes just getting started setting aside 10-30 minutes to meal prep a week can make eating feel less like a chore.
Eating Less More Often
If you really want to reduce the friction around getting meals on the table and eating, try eating more often.
Believe it or not, smaller, more frequent meals take less mental and physical prep work than trying to create multiple perfectly balanced meals throughout the day.
If you are really busy, try eating every 1-3 hours and combining variations of macronutrients each time you eat to build full meals throughout the day.
For example:
- Snack/meal 1: 2 hard boiled eggs and cheese stick
- Snack/meal 2: yogurt, nuts and fruit
- Snack/meal 3: Pita chips and hummus
Combining snacks like this over a few hour time span takes less prep time, and less time to eat! And if you’re trying to create a balanced plate, it hits all of the food groups as well!
Regardless of if you are choosing a meal plan service, simple meal prep, or even getting a personal chef it’s important to prioritize eating regularly throughout the day. If you feel too busy to eat, just know that optimal nutrition is exactly what you need to function optimally for your many tasks of the day.
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