Only Three Weeks?
Why is it so hard to change bad habits? I know what I need to do. I know how to make healthy food choices. I know that exercise is important. I know these things. But do I DO them? Nope. Not lately I haven't. Why is that? I think perhaps I have been using IVF as an excuse. Why don't I make the changes I know I need to make in order to accomplish my goals? Why is it so darn difficult?
One of my bad habits when stressed is that my eating proper meals turn to garbage. Well not literally cause that would be gross but you get what I mean...don't you? Work was crazy yesterday. Heck...life has been crazy lately and one thing that I do when life gets a little crazy and stressful is to stop eating proper meals. I was planning on getting a salad for dinner last night. I was looking forward to eating a big salad. I really craved a salad. I was even going to stop again at the Walmart SuperCenter (making sure that my zipper was indeed zipped up) to buy salad making supplies. But when 5 pm rolled around and I started eyeing the tin of cat food that was sitting on a nearby desk, thinking that I was hungry enough to go for a little Fancy Feast (I mean, it's FANCY and it's a FEAST. How bad could it be? Wait a minute...why does a work mate have a can of cat food on their desk?), I started rethinking my salad idea. By the time I left work and drove past a drive-thru and then got to the drive-thru, I was so hungry that I ordered a burger much to big for such a small me, an order of fries, a large Coke and of course, dessert. I mean, I was hungry, people! Who wants to take the time to chew on field greens when they're emaciated? I want a cow!
Another time I eat garbage is when I'm overwhelmed. I work well under pressure. I like being busy. When my calendar is full of commitments, I buckle down, organize everything and get cracking. No problem, right? But I've found there's a fine line between busy and overwhelmed. When I start to cross that line, I shut down. I no longer prioritize and take care of business. I can no longer break projects into smaller chunks and get it done. I sit there like a deer caught in the headlights, not knowing what to do. So I do nothing at all. I don't know where to start, so I don't start at all. Instead, I reach for the pretzles, or chips, or ice cream, or skittles, or sugary pillows of goodness. OK, fine - I reach for all of the above. Hey, I keep busy that way, right? Well, my mouth is busy anyway.
I read somewhere that it takes 3 weeks to break a habit. It does make sense, I suppose. It takes time to retrain our brains. If only we could replace a negative behavior with a more positive one for 3 weeks (only 21 days!), it might just become more natural to us. If we could just replace that half hour of TV in the evening with a brisk walk around the neighborhhood, maybe after 3 weeks, we'd start to look forward to our evening walk instead of old episodes of Modern Family. Maybe if we could manage to reach for celery sticks instead of cookies every day for 3 weeks, we'd naturally gravitate toward the vegetables without thinking too much about the cookies. I'm not saying that it would become "easy" to make the healthy choices, but maybe it would become a little easier. Perhaps?
Who's with me? Who wants to try to ditch a negative behavior and replace it with a healthier one for a mere 3 weeks? I'm going to give it a try. Starting tomorrow, of course. There's a piece of velvet cheesecake calling my name right now.
One of my bad habits when stressed is that my eating proper meals turn to garbage. Well not literally cause that would be gross but you get what I mean...don't you? Work was crazy yesterday. Heck...life has been crazy lately and one thing that I do when life gets a little crazy and stressful is to stop eating proper meals. I was planning on getting a salad for dinner last night. I was looking forward to eating a big salad. I really craved a salad. I was even going to stop again at the Walmart SuperCenter (making sure that my zipper was indeed zipped up) to buy salad making supplies. But when 5 pm rolled around and I started eyeing the tin of cat food that was sitting on a nearby desk, thinking that I was hungry enough to go for a little Fancy Feast (I mean, it's FANCY and it's a FEAST. How bad could it be? Wait a minute...why does a work mate have a can of cat food on their desk?), I started rethinking my salad idea. By the time I left work and drove past a drive-thru and then got to the drive-thru, I was so hungry that I ordered a burger much to big for such a small me, an order of fries, a large Coke and of course, dessert. I mean, I was hungry, people! Who wants to take the time to chew on field greens when they're emaciated? I want a cow!
Another time I eat garbage is when I'm overwhelmed. I work well under pressure. I like being busy. When my calendar is full of commitments, I buckle down, organize everything and get cracking. No problem, right? But I've found there's a fine line between busy and overwhelmed. When I start to cross that line, I shut down. I no longer prioritize and take care of business. I can no longer break projects into smaller chunks and get it done. I sit there like a deer caught in the headlights, not knowing what to do. So I do nothing at all. I don't know where to start, so I don't start at all. Instead, I reach for the pretzles, or chips, or ice cream, or skittles, or sugary pillows of goodness. OK, fine - I reach for all of the above. Hey, I keep busy that way, right? Well, my mouth is busy anyway.
I read somewhere that it takes 3 weeks to break a habit. It does make sense, I suppose. It takes time to retrain our brains. If only we could replace a negative behavior with a more positive one for 3 weeks (only 21 days!), it might just become more natural to us. If we could just replace that half hour of TV in the evening with a brisk walk around the neighborhhood, maybe after 3 weeks, we'd start to look forward to our evening walk instead of old episodes of Modern Family. Maybe if we could manage to reach for celery sticks instead of cookies every day for 3 weeks, we'd naturally gravitate toward the vegetables without thinking too much about the cookies. I'm not saying that it would become "easy" to make the healthy choices, but maybe it would become a little easier. Perhaps?
Who's with me? Who wants to try to ditch a negative behavior and replace it with a healthier one for a mere 3 weeks? I'm going to give it a try. Starting tomorrow, of course. There's a piece of velvet cheesecake calling my name right now.
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I want to eat better, but I don't want cold foods like salads in the winter. I want hot foods, preferably fatty that will stick to my ribs while I hibernate. *sigh*
ReplyDeleteI think you and I work the same way. That line between good and busy and overwhelmed is so fine, isn't it? And I do the same thing. If there's too much on my plate, I ignore it and go put something on a real plate and eat my anxiety. Why do we do this? Ugh.
ReplyDeleteOh no. I find it helps to bring healthy snacks to work to stave off the starvation eating. Here is a list I've found helpful:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/health/ask-a-health-expert/ask-a-dietitian/what-calorie-free-food-can-i-snack-on-besides-celery/article2284345/
Good luck!