How does Thomas like soccer? We're looking for sports for DS around here for that age group, but there aren't too many to pick from. Most start around 3 years old
if you can find something like soccer for dylan, i highly recommend it! look, it's not like thomas is quickly becoming the next pele at these soccer practices but he IS having fun. it takes him a little to get into it (like, he stands behind my legs for the first 10 min) but then once he let go and tried it he was saying, "more! more!" it's cute and fun. the other parents in the class are...interesting. we go to the class in westchester and of course the FIRST thing i was asked this morning was what SCHOOL thomas is going to. um, he's 2. he goes to school of mommy! and forget it when they found out we're from the bronx!
I am the worst kind of emotional eater. I eat for any emotion. If I'm sad, I eat for comfort; happy, time to celebrate with food; angry, i tear into my food.
My sister and I were talking about this yesterday. We need to figure out another way to address our emotions. It really helps that I track my food. It just makes me more aware of what is going in my mouth.
i think keeping track of food is a great way to deter some of the mindless eating. it's so easy to just pop a couple cookies in my mouth. or, whatever food my son doesn't eat i wind up finishing. i mean, do i really need to eat a half eaten soggy pb&j?? no!
finding a way to address our emotional eating is key - how can we do that??
What have I done RIGHT this challenge: I've been doing a really great job keeping my food to under 1500 calories a day, and I've been tracking it as well. What I've been doing WRONG: I've gotten a little slack with getting my breakfasts prepped in the morning, and have gone to Dunkin Donuts and gotten egg sandwiches and hash browns... which I've still kept within my calorie count, but it's gotten hard to keep my dinners and lunches reduced enough to make up for it. Soo... I baked some pumpkin muffins from Cooking Light this morning that I will freeze so that all i have to do is microwave for a few seconds before i leave in the morning. That plus a cube of cheese or a hard-boiled egg and some fruit will be a fast breakfast. The other BIG thing I've been doing wrong is no exercise, even though mentally I've come around to the idea that I should start being more active again. This week's healthy habit mini-challenge will be a great place to start that-- my BF and I decided to go for a jog tomorrow morning before going upstate to take care of grandma.
nice job on baking muffins in order to get your DD fix! and good job on sticking to your calorie limit! the exercise will come. you just have to make it a priority (says the pregnant lady who hasn't gone for a walk in over a week...
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I am an emotional eater-- when I get stressed out I do turn to food to try and comfort me. I've definitely noticed that this has lessened, however, since I started cooking from scratch more often and have therefore stopped keeping so many ready-to-eat foods around the house. Now when I'm going to eat something "mindless" it's either berries, veggies, a glass of milk, or a few nuts. When I'm at work, I now let going out for an iced coffee serve as my de-stresser rather than going out for a doughnut or other treat. The routine is actually what was so comforting to me, I think.
However, there's day-to-day stress and emotions, and then there's big stuff stress and emotions. I know there is research that fats actually are calming, which is why we crave them when we're emotional? I forget where I'd read that... But when I'm REALLY stressed out in situations that I just couldn't plan for (like 4 hours of sleep last night, grandma's gotta go to the doctor today but she doesn't remember, we've got to evacuate for a hurricane...) I will buy small single servings of things while I'm out like kid's scoops of ice cream, onion rings, small-sized French fry, an individual bag of potato chips. These aren't the kinds of situations that turn into habits, I don't have any offensive foods in my house for the next day, and it allows me to stop thinking about whatever I'm craving and move on with my life to the things I really need to deal with. Oh--and of course I'll write them down. None of the things I've listed, surprisingly, have busted my calories for the day... usually those days are so crazy, I don't get 3 square meals, anyway
So of course the ultimate strategy for minimizing stress eating has been making decisions that allow me to have a more structured, plan-able life, with as few of the days above as possible. I just don't try to do as much as I used to-- and that has been very healthy.
this was an excellent answer, thank you! and good tips - small servings of the bad stuff...enough to take the edge off!
oh hey, did you say you live in queens? i meant to ask you earlier but forgot. duh. my hubby is from queens - woodhaven. we lived in middle village for a while before we got married (livin' in sin baby!) and bought the house in the bx. was just on your side of the whitestone bridge today at the mets game
It depends. If I am really upset, I don't eat anything. If I'm only mildly upset, then I eat. I'm mostly a bored eater. I do end up keeping some sweets here, because as I'm finding out, if I start craving something and I have nothing in the house, I'll just eat everything and then the craving still hasn't gone away. But I am finding that I don't mindlessly eat like I used to.
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Just went to yoga this morning. I liked it and plan to do it again. May look into a yoga mat; my hands and feet weren't happy with me being on the floor by the end.
bored eating. that. is. me. by the end of the day i'm so pooped that all i want to do is veg on the couch and watch tv. and darned if i don't have something to shovel in my mouth. i need to take up knitting to keep my hands busy!
I had to get past the TEMPORARY good feeling of the food and onto the LONG-TERM good feeling of being slim and healthy! But like I said.... that attitude didn't come overnight!
this! this is an excellent way to put it. thank you. i seem to forget this all the time. when i was losing the 40 lbs that i had gained after going off birth control pills and figuring out my insulin resistance stuff, i was VERY good at making great decisions. i knew that eating the rest of the halloween candy just wasn't going to help me lose the weight. and i needed to lose weight to make my body work again. and my body needed to work again so i could have a baby. so losing that weight was almost easy. (by almost i just mean not excruciatingly painful!). so once i'm in weight loss mode again i need to remind myself that even though the garbage i want to eat when i haven't slept in days will taste good, it won't fuel my body in the long term to be able to deal with the kiddos...and not to mention won't help me in my marathon training!
This QOTD is so timely for me I have been struggling all week not to eat with my emotions.
A big problem I have is that I dont really have a good emotional support system. The people closest to me either have an attitude of dont worry, things will work out you could get hit by a car tomorrow, enjoy today, or have a way of turning the conversation into a well, MY problems are worse than YOUR problems, or are downright judgmental.
So after all this time, my defense mechanism is to keep it all in, put a big smile on my face and act like nothing is bothering me. But this week was hard.
I never heard back regarding the interview I went on and since they were making their decision Monday or Tuesday, by mid-week it was clear that I didnt get the job. This coupled with the fact that I am just about 5 weeks away from my unemployment running out, and two more visits to the vet with Sunny Doodle hit me like a ton of bricks. Suddenly every little thing was setting me off. (It didnt help that I was PMSing as well, I suppose).
In an effort to keep my emotional binges to a minimum, I had my food journal out in the open on the kitchen table where I could see it. That way, even if I had a binge, I would immediately write it down. It sort of puts you back on track when you see it in black and white.
I handled everything pretty well and stayed within my WW points every day except for yesterday. Last night, I was just craving junk and ate anything I could find (which isnt much, because I dont keep junk in the house!) I had a WW frozen dessert, a little bag of Pirates Booty, some Wheat Thins, a string cheese, some turkey and 2 low-fat Drakes coffee cakes. And I washed it all down with 3 cans of Diet Coke! But, I suppose it could have been a lot worse.
When I weighed myself this morning, I was pleasantly surprised to see that for the week I was down 1.5 pounds. I think that pushing myself to walk my daily 3 miles (even though I didnt feel like it and the weather was pretty crappy all week) helped out a lot. And I have to admit, being outside does help to clear my head a little bit.
- Laura
ugh, i can feel the stress coming from your words,

i'm sorry you don't feel like you're getting the support you need. it is SO hard to try to get a little help and support and the person you turn to decides to make it all about them. i think we ALL have those people in our lives!
we are here to support you laura! you can count on us!
what line of business are you in? how far out on the island are you? DH and i have some pretty good headhunters. maybe we can help?
QOTD: are YOU an emotional eater? what do you do to avoid the pitfalls of mindless eating? any tips or tricks?
I am a very emotional eater, always gave been. Some of the little things I do to help is drink a glass of water or grab a piece if fruit instead of the ice cream or chips.
So this morning we (DW, DD3, & myself) went for a run. The weather is great, sunny and 60. We ran/walk 4.5 miles down a concrete/rock path along a creek. It was beautiful and refreshing to say the least. DD wanted out of the jogger so we let her walk a mile at the end and she kept telling us to speed up. Nothing like a 3 yr old pushing you.
I hope all you have a great weekend.
Tim
nice job on the run tim! i'd love for my kiddos to get into it once they are old enough. they have so much energy and maybe they can push me to run harder!
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ok friends, so what did we learn from the QOTD? first off, most of us turn to food in times of, well, let's just say we turn to food...alot. and that's why we're fat (sorry to offend but this is coaching reality check time, right??). we need to figure out some ways to deal with our emotional eating. we got some good tips on here! some of them:
1)think before you eat!
2)write down everything you eat when you go on those emotional binges
3)find something else to do instead of eat - knit? (lol)
4)if you have to grab for something, grab for something healthy like a piece of fruit
5)not having junk in the house means you can't eat it!
6)if you have to have something, make it a mini portion!
7)think first: nothing tastes as good as being thin feels!
those were some of the tips we got today. all a great! and you know what else helps? posting on the DIS! if you're typing, you can't eat!
