Today I want to share a personal story with you about my struggle with food! I’m not sure if I’ve ever shared this with anyone before outside my immediate family.
Let me begin by telling you that I have an addictive personality. Whatever I do, I go all out! In some areas in life, this has helped me immensely. My strong personality helped me with sports, my military career, and with my businesses. And at other times my addictive personality can be a huge obstacle that I have to overcome (food especially).
So what is my biggest struggle with food? Here’s what I struggle with:
– I love to snack, especially at night.
– I love junk food. I know I shouldn’t eat it, but I do anyway.
– I love chocolate. If something says chocolate or even looks like it, I want it!
– I tend to eat a lot when I am bored.
I would say that my biggest challenge is sweets and carbs. I love sweets and I love anything with carbs in it. Whenever I have carbs, I want more. If I have one chip, I want to eat the whole bag. It’s a lot easier for me not to eat one chip that it is to eat one chip and not eat the rest of the bag. I hope that makes sense to you.
During the past, I’ve battled my “food addiction” by working out a lot and by having a high metabolism. But as I get older (almost 36 now) my metabolism is slowing down. As a result, I have to work even harder at keeping the extra pounds off.
I’ve tried different diets: my wife calls me a diet junkie sometimes. But I can never seem to stick with anything for a long period of time. I lose 10 pounds and gain back 12 pounds. I think I’ll struggle with food (to some degree) for the rest of my life. No, I’m not obese or real heavy right now, but I could definitely lose 10 to 20 pounds.
Well, now the cat is out of the bag! If you’ve ever struggled with food, or anything else, I would love to hear your story. Leave a comment to tell me what you are thinking.
Chuck Holmes
Former Army Major (resigned)
Publisher, Part-Time-Commander.com
Email: mrchuckholmes@gmail.com
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I cannot relate in terms of food, but I have struggled with several things throughout my life. Personally, my struggles have been with staying committed to working out or struggling with money and saving for my future. It’s hard to stick to something good when there is so much “bad” out there. Like food, anyone can pick up a pack of carrots and eat them but as you travel down the road all of the flashing fast food restaurants and advertisements for fatty or “bad for you items”. The temptation is just there, right in your face.
The same goes for staying committed to my workouts or with money – particularly money. I am a spender and if I have a twenty dollar bill I’m already thinking of what pair of shoes I could buy, or how I could spend it that day. It literally “burns a hole in my pocket”. So I have had to learn how to discipline myself and only allow myself to enjoy these struggles every now and then rather than on a regular basis.
My food battle is something I deal with daily, but I am doing much better with it now.
Junk food is the best and I hope you never give it up. But yeah, you gotta find a way to maintain control. Carbs aren’t the worst thing in the world either. Carbs are energy and you need them to do just about everything, including the cardio you’re doing for the purpose of losing weight. It nice to eat good clean foods, but at the end of the day it just depends how many calories you eat in a day. If you have a surplus of calories you will gain weight if you have a deficit you will lose weight.
Chuck,
Boy can I relate. I don’t so much struggle with food, I think I have a healthy relationship with it – but I do struggle with body image, no matter how much I exercise and what I am eating. I naturally crave meat, vegetables, and other things that are considered ‘healthy’, I drink wine and rarely ever drink beer, and I limit my intake of things like ice cream (never was much for cake or cookies, but I do love a good cheesecake). I don’t overindulge on those sugary coffee drinks (I tend to reserve the indulgence for drill weekends), and try to stick to black coffee or tea. That, coupled with the fact that I do high intensity workouts 4-5 days a week – and one would think that I am in phenomenal shape.
I think that the Army has made me more conscious of several things. One, there is definitely more than one body shape that is combat effective. Two, they seem to prefer a tiny fast runner over anything else! Three, unless I am running half marathons regularly, I will never weigh under my limit and will always be taped (This has made me respect Soldiers that get taped and struggle with fitting into the Army’s ideal body image).
We are all a work in progress! My husband and I both have a commitment to fitness, and while he is in superior shape compared to majority of other soldiers both in his unit and elsewhere, we both have goals that we strive to reach. It is nice to encourage each other and know that we are not alone in our journey to always better ourselves. We talk about food and how we can eat better, and try to follow a plan together. It’s been helpful that we always eat breakfast, eat a healthy bigger lunch, and a healthy smaller dinner. We have seen more success with that, as well as limiting bread/grains to one meal a day.
Good health tips, Candace.
Limiting bread to one meal a day is good. Eating a smaller dinner is good too.
What’s most impressive is that you and your husband work together. That makes a huge difference.
I wish both of you all the best on your wellness journey.
Chuck
Candace brings up some good points, one being limiting how much of the less healthy foods you eat. Moderation is key. In my case, I should really eat only two Oreos, instead of a whole row from the package. Yes, I have my weaknesses too!
She also brought up another point that often sneaks up on us. We often don’t realize how many calories we consume just by drinking a white chocolate mocha latte or eating one McDonald’s Big Mac (I really prefer them in pairs). Did you know that a white mocha latte Venti, with whipped cream and whole milk has a whopping 628 calories? The Big Mac has 550. I won’t even go into the fat content.
Finally, Candace brought up a concept that has proven to be effective when trying to lose the extra pounds and tighten up a bit, and that is working out with a partner. It’s awesome that she and her husband work out together, and this idea can translate into anyone finding a workout buddy, maybe even creating a little friendly competition.
Hmmmmm…maybe I don’t need that bowl of ice cream right now after all.
I’ve recently dropped a few pounds, and continued to exercise and walk as much as possible, and am looking fitter than ever at age 47 (170 lbs, 5’9″) – it can be done and it’s worth it!! I have emphasized protein, fiber, could be doing better on fruits and vegetables. I look at the food nutritional facts and think about if it is worth running a mile for that 100 calorie hit (x ###)! I did a diagnostic APFT with 87 pushups and 84 sit ups and 15:10 2 – mile at altitude (here for 3 weeks), after running 6 miles yesterday – I hope to improve the run in a month! Every meal, morsel, workout, and day – does it help toward your goals – that is the question!!!! Best wishes!
Good for you David. It sounds like you have taken control of your fitness and health. At any age, especially age 47, you are doing very well. Heck, you can probably outperform 90% of those 18-21 year old Soldiers. Keep up the good work. And thanks for the comment.
What is your ethnic background, Chuck? I find myself too struggling with certain foods, particularly breads and the like as I am German-Irish and always have enjoyed them. I have, however, made the very hard transition to not eating simple carbs in my diet, which obviously includes breads. I must say that it has been difficult, but achievable. Another tough one to shake was MILK!
I have some English, French, Scottish and a variety of other cultures in my background. The worst thing for me is carbs. When I start eating any type of carbs (candy, fruit, breads, etc.) I just absolutely pig out. It makes me lose all self control. It’s very frustrating and I am working on getting rid of all carbs for good. I consider myself a work in progress.