Hi again! While many of my posts relate to staying healthy at college, this post will talk about taking what you’ve learned home with you on winter break since it is right around the corner. Whether you’re a Health Promotion and Wellness major, someone who reads my blog posts, or someone who has been trying to become more healthy, I’m sure you have learned a thing or two about healthy eating and many of you have probably applied it to your daily life. It can be challenging to take these methods and implement them at home, at least for some of us (i.e. myself).
The way you eat at home and the way you eat at school can be polar opposites. Either you buy your own groceries or eat at the dining hall while at college. That is a very controllable situation. At home, you might also buy your own groceries, or maybe your parents buy the groceries and cook for you, or maybe your parents may order food for dinner on some nights. The possibilities are endless, and without some sort of consistency, it can feel like an uncontrollable situation if you are someone who is trying to eat healthy.
For me, it’s very inconsistent, my parents love cooking healthy meals, but they definitely don’t want to cook every single night. I step in sometimes and offer to cook dinner, but a lot of the time, I find myself very lazy at home during winter break. Sometimes, my parents will get lazy with making the next grocery shopping trip and there won’t be much to eat in the house. Well, you can’t just keep complaining to your parents to keep providing you with healthy meals; we have to take some initiative! Having me complain about the groceries that we have or the meals that we eat is the last thing my parents want to hear, obviously. Instead of complaining, here is what I’ve learned to do over the years:
- Offer to grocery shop for your parents if they are busy and can’t get the next week’s groceries in a timely fashion.
- If your parents make a grocery list, ask if you can add a few staple items on there for yourself (i.e. things to put in a salad, organic, steel-cut oatmeal, maybe some salmon, etc.). Offering them some money, if possible, for the extra items on the list is never a bad idea either.
- Help your parents prepare meals! Maybe your parents are sauteing vegetables in butter and you know that this could be a healthier choice by steaming the vegetables instead. Suggest it and then step in to help if they’d like.
- I find that when I’m laying around all day at home whilst on winter break, I don’t have that much motivation to prepare myself healthy meals. On the other hand, when I am seeing friends and family, going to the gym, and staying active, I find that I don’t mind cooking and taking time to prepare myself healthy, satiating meals.
- On Thanksgiving and Christmas, don’t worry about limiting yourself! Those are just two days. Maybe don’t stuff yourself to the point of being very uncomfortable, but don’t stress yourself out if you want another slice of pie but you think it’s “not healthy”. Go ahead, eat your grandmother’s pie and be happy.
Excited for Thanksgiving?? Me too!