Do you turn to food when you feel stressed or overwhelmed? Does a bad day at work send you off track with your eating or exercise plan? Does an out-of-control to-do list leave you craving chocolate?

There are ways to avoid the stress eating/emotional eating trap. Here are three straightforward strategies you can try.

1. Know that you ARE a stress eater.

This one sounds like a no-brainer, but it’s an important tip. If you are someone who turns to stress in response to food, it’s an important fact to respect about yourself—because it allows you to understand what might be going on and once you understand and take it seriously, you can intervene. If you know that stress leaves you fantasizing about a trip to the office vending machine, then the next time that urge hits, you have the opportunity to work backwards. Instead of heading off, quarters in hand, on auto pilot, you can stop and examine what might be going on that is leaving you feeling–not really hungry–but stressed. As you get practice at asking yourself this question, you might even find that you start to refine the word “stress” even further. Over time, you might find yourself asking really specific questions like, “What feels out of control right now?” “Why am I feeling overwhelmed?” or “Is anything going on that would contribute to my feeling anxious?”

2. Put some other tools in your toolbox.

The benefit of step one is that it allows you to ask different questions. Instead of asking yourself, “How can I stop eating these cookies?” you are able to target the real trigger for your hunger and ask yourself about what you really need to address the stress. For this, you are going to need a different set of tools. Emotional eaters use food as a strategy to cope with emotions. While this might work as a temporary band aid, eating never solves the real problem. Focusing on what and how much to eat doesn’t address the stress you are feeling at all.

As you get clearer on what the situations are that lead you to stress eating, you can begin to ask yourself what you can do instead of turning to food. Know that at times of overwhelm, our ability to problem solve is not at its best. Make a list in advance of as many strategies you can think of to help you with stress or overwhelm. Keep it handy. It’s one thing to know that you want to eat in response to stress. It’s another to have some ideas about what to do INSTEAD.

3. Be prepared.

Too many of us take the ostrich approach to stress and overwhelm. Sticking our head in the sand, or “not thinking about it” never keeps the stress from happening. Practice identifying the potentially stressful situations before they hit. Make a note of upcoming events or times that have the potential to be difficult and spend some time on the front end strategizing about how to handle them. If you are truly facing a situation that is out of your control, identify some strategies (in advance) that you can use to comfort yourself, distract yourself, or to cope with the difficulty.

Melissa McCreery, PhD is a psychologist, certified life coach, and the founder of Enduring Change Coaching. Recognized as an expert in difficulties with emotional eating, she helps her clients take control of overeating and emotional eating, make weight loss permanent, and create lives that feed their cravings. She is the creator of the Emotional Eating Toolbox™ and the Weight Loss Winner’s Circle™. You can contact her and find free resources, tips and strategies about emotional eating and weight loss at http://www.enduringchange.com. Her blog is http://www.peacewithcake.com.

"Eat well. Live well. Be well."

One of the biggest challenges to healthy eating is a busy schedule. The responsibility of working ten hour days, getting the kids where they need to go and keeping your house in order can lead to take-out meals and quick dinners that often lack in the nutrition department. With a little preparation and some simple strategies, healthy eating throughout the day doesn’t have to take a lot of time and energy.

Instead of Take-Out

1. Make enough for tomorrow. When you have time to cook a healthy meal, make a double batch and save the extra for leftovers or freeze the second batch for a night when all you have time for is popping a casserole in the oven.
2. Have a plan. Take 30 minutes to plan what meals you’ll have during the week. Make sure you have all the ingredients you’ll need and decide what you’ll do on nights you can’t cook.
3. Be prepared. Stock your pantry with healthy, quick options for those inevitable and unexpected nights when you don’t have time to make a meal from scratch. Canned soups (with minimal sodium), frozen vegetables, canned tuna, or pasta and jarred sauce make great bases for speedy meals.
4. Make your own take-out. Instead of ordering a greasy pizza, you can have quick, healthy, homemade personal pizzas in a just a few minutes. Don’t believe us? Try our simple Pita Pizza recipes.

When Take-out is the Only Option

1. Utilize the hot- and cold-food bars at your local grocery store. A rotisserie chicken (skin removed), a large tossed salad and some light salad dressing make a perfect, and relatively cheap, on-the-run dinner option.
2. Go Chinese. A stir-fry is usually filled with vegetables and cooked in small amounts of oil. You can ask for any sauce on the side to save additional calories and request brown rice, if possible, for an increase in fiber. Remember to avoid fried options and, since servings may be large, split a dish or save half for lunch the following day.
3. Stick with basic salads. A salad topped with grilled chicken can make a quick and healthy meal, but be careful to avoid toppings like “crispy” chicken, creamy dressings, or other high-calorie add-ons.
4. Think small. Order the smallest size, a lunch portion, or a half serving of whatever you’ve chosen. You’ll minimize the calorie damage and still relieve your hunger.

Find some strategies that work for you and do a little planning, and eating on the go will be heathier and less stressful–for you and your family.

"Eat well. Live well. Be well."

National Nutrition Month® is the perfect time to try a food you’ve never eaten or cook up a dish that you’ve never made. Or do both by picking up a novel ingredient at the grocery store and finding a recipe that uses it. If you’re struggling for ideas, here are a few ways to shake things up.

• Try a new fruit or vegetable.
• Give whole wheat pasta a chance.
• Cook with an herb or spice you’ve never heard of.
• Substitute barley, quinoa, or bulgar for rice in your favorite rice dish.

If none of those ideas get you excited about new foods, give this recipe a try instead.

Bulgar with Lentils and Feta
Makes 2-4 servings

Ingredients:

1 cup water
1/2 cup bulgar
1 1/2 cups lentils (canned or precooked)
2 oz. reduced fat feta cheese, crumbled
2 TBSP chopped fresh dill
1/4 cup lemon juice (or juice of 1 to 2 fresh lemons)
salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:

Bring water to a boil in a medium sauce pan. Add the bulgar and simmer, covered, for 15 minutes or until all the water has been absorbed. Remove from heat and stir in the remaining ingredients.

Adapted from The Flexitarian Diet by Dawn Jackson Blatner

"Eat well. Live well. Be well."

Welcome to the first post in our Ask the Dietitian series. We have a lot of great questions to answer and we’re planning to answer them regularly. We’d like to make this a regular and ongoing feature around here, so if you have a question you’d like to ask, please feel free to leave a comment with your question on any post and we’ll add it to the queue. Now, on to our first question.

If I want to lose weight, which is more important, cutting calories or exercising?

This is a great question, and one I hear often. In our efforts to lose weight, we always want to do the thing that will get us where we want to go fastest. Ultimately, cutting calories and exercising are both important–to your weight loss efforts and your health in general.

Losing weight basically comes down to burning more calories than you consume. To lose 1 pound of fat a week you will need to either burn or cut 3500 calories each week. You can do this by exercising more, eating fewer calories, or some combination of the two. Remember that, while exercise isn’t generally necessary to lose weight, it is important for your overall health and well-being. And you should never cut your calories to less than 1200 per day, no matter how slowly you’re losing weight.

"Eat well. Live well. Be well."

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"Eat well. Live well. Be well."

March is National Nutrition Month® and the American Dietetic Association (ADA) wants you to “Eat Right”. But what is “eating right”?

Eating right can be as simple as making a few small changes to your current eating habits. Focus on the� basics of healthy eating: include more fruits and vegetables, lean protein sources and whole grains in your diet everyday; choose low-fat dairy options; and limit your saturated fat, trans fat, cholesterol, sodium and added sugar intake. If you need some ideas to get started, try working on one of these healthy eating goals each week:

• Make smarter food choices. Instead of focusing on whether foods are good or bad for you, consider whether they are packed with vitamins, nutrients and fiber and have a reasonable number of calories.
• Mix things up. We all get in food ruts, eating the same foods and meals every week because they’re easy or convenient. But changing things up can be easy. Add fruit to your breakfast and a salad with your lunch. Try a new vegetable or whole grain every week. Get your protein from beans or fish instead of your usual chicken and beef. Find an interesting recipe online and make dinner preparation a family affair.
• Find the right fats. Fats aren’t all bad. In fact, while watching your saturated fat, trans fat and cholesterol intake is important, our bodies need fat to function. Just make sure the majority of your fat intake comes from monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats. Also try to include Omega-3 fatty acids in your diet regularly.

Eating right doesn’t have to be hard. In fact, mixing things up can make meals more satisfying and fun. Try something new–you just might like it!

"Eat well. Live well. Be well."