"Health is a cultural construction, not a “fact” that can be defined in terms of science"

[kuronosan]

You know, I apologize for making this such a partially personal need to help someone. In doing so I've made some oddly unnecessary and insensitive observations.

I'm sure your doctor wasn't really implying that. Part of me was, and only because I believe you'd be of much more help to yourself and your daughter if you put half the energy into yourself that you put into your daughter.

[Xajii]

I agree. For what it's worth, Ksandra, your and my situations sound fairly similar. I have a physically bad reaction to eating something I don't like (i.e., most healthy things). I gag and generally can't keep eating the stuff. I don't know how to handle that - if anyone hs advice, that'd be great.

Thing is, my parents tried. They tried a lot of different ways and got me to eat marginally healthy but once my dad left around age 11 it all pretty much went to shit. I can enjoy some healthy foods but not most that you would recommend to people. I also have a real hard time spending time cooking because of long work days and travel home. I know the latter is an excuse and not an actual problem.

For me what has worked is simple portion control. It hasn't done wonders, and it's difficult when your body is used to certain volumes and habits, but you'd be surprised what will really fill you up.

[Ksandra]

I agree. For what it's worth, Ksandra, your and my situations sound fairly similar. I have a physically bad reaction to eating something I don't like (i.e., most healthy things). I gag and generally can't keep eating the stuff. I don't know how to handle that - if anyone hs advice, that'd be great.

Ya I am the same way. Those turkey meatballs I made, she loved them. I took two bites and never ate another lol. The after taste was just ugh ><; Even my husband liked them so I know it's not just baby.

[GoggleHead]

I also have a real hard time spending time cooking because of long work days and travel home. I know the latter is an excuse and not an actual problem.

Making huge pots of stew solved that for me back in college. I didn't always have time to cook, but when I did I'd make enough stew to last for a few days and just eat leftovers for the rest of the week. Might be something to try.

[Shade]

Did anyone else watch this documentary? Someone posted it in another thread about weight a few months ago, and I thought it was actually pretty interesting.

Why Are Thin People Not Fat?



Cliffnotes- 10 people eat 2x the calories theyre supposed to and don't exercise, for a month. Their body fat % is measured at the end. Also info on various prison experiments, why the ability to gain weight quickly has been biologically selected for in all time periods except now, how some people crave foods even when they're full and others just don't care (making "just have some willpower" kind of relative), and some other interesting things.

I agree. For what it's worth, Ksandra, your and my situations sound fairly similar. I have a physically bad reaction to eating something I don't like (i.e., most healthy things). I gag and generally can't keep eating the stuff. I don't know how to handle that - if anyone hs advice, that'd be great.

re making yourself like healthier foods. I dont know. I can only speak from personal experience. But I was a picky eater. I liked plain everything. My family never served a cooked vegetable that wasn't a potato. I would pick onions out of spaghetti. I couldn't cook and I was proud of my microwave skills. Then I moved out, with a roommate who could cook, liked vegetables, and was determined that I would pull my weight in the kitchen and we would both eat well. We did. Some things I still just don't like (avocados, water chestnuts, seaweed), but a lot of things I acquired a taste for through sheer repetition of exposure. Squash soup (smells like pumpkins, ugh), green beans (ick), salad (blah), broccoli, cabbage, cooked carrots, everything. I changed my attitude because I realized if I knew I wasnt going to like something, well... I wasn't. So I tried to just see if I would. I put goldfish crackers in the squash soup so I could stand it. I ate green beans in small amounts (and cooked with various other spices or vegetables). I put red peppers in everything because I knew that I liked them.

I don't deprive myself of anything. I eat chocolate. I eat cookies. I just don't eat entire chocolate bars, or boxes of cookies. I go for walks. If I eat pasta, I probably put piles of vegetables in it. Spinach is amazing, you can toss it into practically anything and its incredibly good for you. Stirfries and slowcooker meals are easy. My entire approach to food is different, and I cannot go back. If I don't have vegetables with supper or at least some point during the day, I feel gross.

[Kerberoz]

Tangentially related, but this should be required viewing for anyone moving out for the first time: http://www.youtube.com/user/GoodEatsComplete

Cooking is so fucking easy and rewarding if you just learn the basics.

As for pickiness... lots of people are picky eaters as kids. Then we grow up.

[Tyrath]

As someone who is moving out soon and always feels lost in the kitchen, I'm gonna check that series out, thanks!

[kuronosan]

Tangentially related, but this should be required viewing for anyone moving out for the first time: http://www.youtube.com/user/GoodEatsComplete

Cooking is so fucking easy and rewarding if you just learn the basics.

As for pickiness... lots of people are picky eaters as kids. Then we grow up.

This.

[Shade]

Tangentially related, but this should be required viewing for anyone moving out for the first time: http://www.youtube.com/user/GoodEatsComplete

Cooking is so fucking easy and rewarding if you just learn the basics.

As for pickiness... lots of people are picky eaters as kids. Then we grow up.

Alton Brown is a complete genius, so I'll third the suggestion.
Bitchin' Kitchen is my current favorite though. Don't hate.

[Marootsoobutsu]

stuff

Your daughter will learn as much from what you do for yourself as much as from what you feed her. Y'know that whole "Do what I say, not what I do" bit? Yeah, how did that work out for you? Cook the food that tastes good; just cook less of it. Variety is fantastic, especially in veggies. Find a way you can stomach 'em, and slowly remove the less healthy bits from the recipes. But if you're not doing it, too, it's going to ingrain the idea that there's grown-up food, and there's kid food. You *can* change your tastes... you just have to be willing to. And honestly, from all that I've seen in this thread, the problem isn't that you can't, it's that you don't want to. Not because it's too hard, not because you don't have ideas presented, not because of the myriad of "It's too hards" that are thrown out. Ya just don't want to change. You aren't resigned that you'll be where you're at; you'd just rather be where you're at than work at it.

Replace "surgery" with "FAR TEH CHILLINS!", and this is all I can think of:




Edit: I know you don't know me. In re-reading it, I come off as far more an ass than I intended. I just hate the "I've tried before, I can't" thing, because... well, defeatism is self-fulfilling. I'm probably projecting myself more than anything; I had that, I hated it about myself (and still utterly loathe it when I recognize it creeping up again), and found that the reminder that it's a *TON* of hard work to get anything worth having is just a truth that I never learned as a kid, except as a platitude. Now, as an ostensible grown-up, internalizing that lesson and applying it universally is a bitch.

[kuronosan]

Already had that conversation. Went nowhere.

[Gadritan]

eat more meat / and lift.

No / Yes

[Rhyis.]

Already had that conversation. Went nowhere.

You didn't have scrubs to back you up.

[kuronosan]

I'm in the medical field. That should count enough (although I love that quote).

[Milkster]

I'm in the medical field. That should count enough (although I love that quote).

You're one of the monsters this woman was talking about:

A few years ago, I was rushed to the emergency room because I was having such severe pain in my lower right side that I passed out. When I arrived to the (first) ER, I declined being weighed. As I was sitting on the bed, in agonizing pain, the nurse was fiddling with something on the front of the bed. Come to find out, she was weighing me with the bed scale, even though I had declined being weighed. How did I know? Because she loudly announced “Oh my god! You are SOOOOO damn fat!” to everyone in the ER. She then proceeded to walk around the ER, nudging the other nurses and pointing to me and laughing. Finally, the doctor came back, asked me what I had eaten that day and what I eat daily (I had not eaten anything in about two days because of the pain), to which he snorted and told me I was “obviously eating a lot.” He did not even examine me. I then get to overhear his loud conversation to the second emergency room I would be visiting that night, informing the person on the other end of the line that he had a “whale for a patient.” When the doctor came back, he told me they did not have any way of examining me due to my “massive size” and I would need to go to the second ER. I refused an ambulance, to which the nurse threatened me with jail if I did not go to the second ER (is this even legal?). I was scared and in pain, so I went. Bad idea.
The second ER left me in a room for over seven hours, not once sending anyone in to see if I was okay or to offer me something for the pain. The ER was not busy at all (small town, few emergencies). By the time someone finally came to my room, I was so exhausted I could barely keep my head up. After getting a shot, I was informed they thought I might have appendicitis, even though I had not been examined by anyone at this point at either ER. I have a CT scan, they tell me nope, not appendicitis, and discharge me. I was never told what the source of the pain was that night.
Thin privilege is going to the ER with a potentially serious illness and not being forced to wait 14 hours to have a CT scan to confirm if you do have that serious illness. If I had had appendicitis, I could have died before they bothered to do the CT scan. Thin privilege is not being ridiculed by both the nurse and doctor, especially not while you are in severe pain.

[kuronosan]

Shirley you can't be serious.

[Brill Weave]

Shirley you can't be serious.

I just want to read the part where she says it was a broken chicken bone stuck in a fat roll.

[kuronosan]

I just want to read the part that's actually true. No self-respecting hospital staff in the fucking world would ever act that way.

[Dotsudoku]

If nothing else they'd be desensitized to the point of apathy. I have to imagine an ER staff has seen a ton of fat people in their careers.

And don't call me Shirley.

[Rhyis.]

If nothing else they'd be desensitized to the point of apathy. I have to imagine an ER staff has seen a ton of fat people in their careers.

I was thinking the same. Hospitals are full of nothing but old and fat people.