Baby Step 11: Finding and Doling out the Food Dollars

Where are you spending money on food other than the grocery store?

Really.

Since we tackled the problem of time spent preparing healthier foods in Baby Step # 7, we Sis sisters thought we should address the cost of eating healthier food.

Food is available in many places, almost every place these days, and prices do vary.  I’m sure you’ve noticed.  It always hurts me to pay twice or three times as much for a granola bar in a convenience store than it would have had I bought a box (or made something and packed it in a little Tupperware cup).

And it also hurts to pay for food at work that costs much more than it would have cost me to pack leftovers because I ran out of time, or left my lunch at home.  We all do it, but we can’t honestly assess what we are spending on food each week or each month if we don’t include our expenditures outside of the grocery store.  I confess that my grocery bills are higher since we have begun eating more real food (un-prepared, un-processed fresh and some frozen foods).  However, I also spend less in restaurants, convenience stores, at work or on outings than previous to the change in diet.

While Little Sis and I have created some cheap healthy recipes (try the Cheap Eats category on the sidebar for a starting place), and can make many things ourselves more cheaply than we can buy them (almond milk, almond butter, high quality baked goods, macaroni & cheese, salad dressing, etc.), there is no denying that fresh fruits and vegetables, especially organic ones, cost more than a cart full of hamburger helper and canned green beans.  However, and again, the comparison is not fair unless you consider the entire picture of food costs.

Ways to compare the Cost of healthy food / real food versus processed / unhealthy food.

A) Cost per nutrients

B) Cost per week or month

C) Cost considering cost of healthcare

A) When you pay $1 for a box of cheap macaroni & cheese what are you getting?  Calories but not a lot of nutrition.  Some would argue that people eat more when they eat poorly (from a nutritional standpoint) because their bodies are seeking out the missing nutrients.

A USDA report (2012), found that healthy foods are actually cheaper than processed foods when viewed from a nutritional rather than a caloric standpoint.  You just might find that you feel more full after eating real food…. and less tempted to have seconds, or dessert, or a large serving of chips later in the evening.

This entry on The Mayo Clinic’s website discusses a study that showed that children who eat ‘slow food’ (versus fast food) have more cognitive gains and growth.  http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/cost-of-healthy-food/MY02252

Baby Step Action: Pay attention to what foods you buy – not just from a cost perspective, but from a nutritional standpoint as well.  Consider the nutritive value when you purchase a packet of whole grain pasta versus white pasta or a box of hamburger helper versus some fresh veggies and whole grain pasta to mix into your hamburger meat. Little Sis compares whole grain vs. white pasta here. When you’re spending that money, how much food is in your food?

B) Before you decide you can’t afford healthier food, understand where you are spending your food dollars.

Baby Step Action: Write down all the money you spend on food and beverages in a week and where you spend it.  This includes coffee shops, vending machines, snacks for kids at ball games or other gatherings.  This is not to make you feel bad or to say that you should never buy anything at the ball park again, but when you are unaware of where you are spending your money on food then you are not in charge of HOW you spend your money on food, and you are not in the driver’s seat for making actual choices about what you can and can’t afford, and what you want to eat.

Cutting out those extra expenditures will make the healthier food grocery bill lower than you think!  (Also remember that brown rice, dried beans and frozen vegetables are a great place to start with cheap, healthy food.)

C) Type II Diabetes and heart disease are very expensive diseases and are almost always preventable by changes in lifestyle, i.e. diet and exercise.

Baby-Step Action: Think about the true cost of poor health. This would include visits to the doctor, loss of productivity, fatigue, depression and early death.  Choose to stop purchasing over-priced food from at least one of the places from your list in part B for 2 weeks.  Plan ahead to fill that void so it is possible to make the change.

Dr. Mark Hyman is a physician who himself lost a lot of weight by changing what he eats and has lots of information and resources for improving diet.  He has a great article about the true costs of cheap, processed food at this link.  He includes some tips for learning to eat healthier without breaking the bank.

I also found a site with some interesting comparisons of $20 worth of fast food vs. $20 worth of healthy food.

You and your family are worth every extra penny for healthy food, but it might not be as expensive as you think!  Try these Baby Steps…. review old Baby Steps, and let us know how you are doing and what information or help you might need.

Baby Step 10: What’ll You Have?

My Southern grandmother’s way of asking if we wanted more was not, “Would you like some more?”  It was “What’ll you have?”

In other words, “Which of these delicious things will you have more of now?”  And it was hard, both physically and socially, to not promptly pick your personal favorite of her offerings.  For me it was her hot milk cake, her watermelon rind pickles, her homemade biscuits with homemade plum jelly or her sugar cookies.  Notice the sweet theme…. oh yes, I was a sugar hound!!  It was not only delicious but complimentary to have more.

Our culture has become very much about more.  If you have’t seen Super Size Me, I highly recommend it for an eye opener on serving sizes (and other outrageously egregious practices) in fast food restaurants.  The film has some rough language and frank talk about sex, so may not be appropriate for younger kids.

In the less is more and more is really more dichotomy of our culture that loves:
both skinny bodies and large breasts;
both many choices and extra large servings;
both designer names and cheap food;
both the most expensive health care system in the world and the 37th most effective health care system…
we are in a watermelon rind pickle indeed.

Baby Steps Boost

Now that the glow of yet another holiday is beginning to mellow, I find that it is time again to confront the kind and quantity of the food I’m putting in my mouth.  Truth to tell the stomach virus that plauged us over the break kept most of my holiday indiscretions in check, but man that sugar craving is an opportunist.  A couple of chocolate eggs (the little ones, not the big honkers) and it’s over.  I’m all in, wanting it all the time.  When I’ve been relatively well-behaved, I’m a salt kind of gal, but straight up candy or cake can get that sweet tooth rolling…  I find myself returning to my own baby steps, reviewing the things I’ve learned over time that work for me: indulging the sweet tooth with fruit for a few days while watching the other carbs, upping the veggie intake to promote well-being and satiation.  It occurs to me that many of you may find yourselves in the position of returning to food sanity after each of these holidays as well, and that what’s more a few more folks might be interested in climbing aboard after a weekend of peeps and coconut cake.

Mind the Gap – a Baby Steps Check In – and a WINNER

In our last Baby Steps post, we were considering the ways that we think and talk about food interact with our eating habits.  I had a mini-revelation about my own eating evolution while completing a home improvement project this week, and if you’ll indulge me I’d like to share that with you.

some of the gap crap

Our back door has never really closed properly.  The lock stuck, the handle was dodgy, and worst of all, there was a visible gap when the door was closed.  I could see light coming in.  And if there’s light, there is a draft I must stamp out. I HATE drafts.   The well-installed door jamb insulation just didn’t seem to cut the mustard. Because we had no idea what we were doing and because we had some on hand, we stuffed some rubber insulating crap into the gap.  The kind that sticks on one side and sits in the gap when the door is closed.  It blocked the draft, for a while. In case you’re wondering, we will get to food…

Salt, Sugar, Fat – It’s Not You, It’s Them

The release of Michael Moss’ book Salt Sugar Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us has prompted a flood of news stories. Moss is a New York Times reporter and a Pulitzer Prize winner. The guy has street cred as an investigator. I’ve not yet read the book; however, I’ve read the excerpt provided by Moss to the NYT Magazine. I also heard Moss interviewed on NPR’s Fresh Air yesterday. Moss’ revelation confirms the worst of my concerns about the producers of processed and convenience foods. The long and short of it is that when you feel like you can’t stop eating Oreo’s, that’s because you very nearly can’t. It’s not you, it’s them.

Moss reveals that in 1999 the Vice President of Kraft addressed CEOs of the other leading food producers and laid out his concerns about the growing obesity crisis and the increasingly clear links between highly processed foods and some of America’s biggest health threats. This individual worried about his industry’s culpability both from a moral and a financial perspective – we could get sued people. The response of his peers? We are responsible to our shareholders. We’ve spent a long time figuring out exactly how much salt, sugar and fat to use to ensure that consumers will buy our products and we cannot risk the loss of marketshare that would surely result from a change in practices.  Let me say that part again: we are beholden to our shareholders.  Guess who’s not in that sentence?  You (unless of course you are a majority shareholder in General Mills or something).

Let me be clear, I am aware that companies who make food are for-profit companies.  I realize that this is the arena in which they are making their living.  Somehow, however, the brazenness of the shareholder beholden-ness shocked me.  The implications of the food industry’s refusal to consider health crises in food formulation are vast.  For me, the takeaway from Moss’ revelations is two-fold: 1) processed and packaged has been scientifically researched and developed to maximize taste, addiction, and profit, and 2) the onus of providing your body with nutritious food falls entirely on you.

You Deserve Real Food….. Baby Step #8

“Psssst!”

“Who me?”

“Yeah you.  The one who is being unkind and intolerant to someone.”

“I’m nice to other people, what are you talking about?”

“Everyone?”

“Well, I certainly try.”

“And what do you say to yourself when you look in the mirror?”

(silence)

“And what do you say to yourself when you make a mistake or slip up on a plan or intention?”

“Well that doesn’t count!…… Does it?”

What do you think?  Does it count?

When my students would pronounce themselves stupid or a jerk after making an academic or behavioral mistake I used to ask them what they would say to their best friend in the same circumstance.  They always had lovely encouraging things to say to their best friend.  But we don’t treat ourselves like a best friend.  And although the deep seated human condition from which our self-directed harshness and nastiness arises is beyond my expertise in terms of explanation (or understanding, as I do it too), I do have some suggestions for overcoming it.  I believe that a lot of our problems related to diet and food choices stem from the same kind of negative self-directed language as well as the language that advertisers have drummed into our heads.

Sound Advice on Meal Planning

Hey there!  In our baby steps series we have urged folks to adopt a plan for changing their eating habits a little bit at a time.  Whether you’re following the Baby Steps or not, there is not way to avoid the fact that planning what you’re going to eat is one way to give yourself a shot at a healthier meal.  Our friend Barb Hoyer takes this one step further and suggests that you don’t just plan how you’re going to do it, but imagine how that’s going to work.  This is SO smart.  Big plans fall short if we fail to be realistic about how to put them in action.  Give her a minute of your time and increase your chances of planning healthier and realistic food choice. Thanks Barb for helping me see a detail that I often overlook!

Baby Step 7: Einstein’s Elephant -or- ReCon Convenience

Elephant skin is so tough they call it ‘hide’.  Have you ever wanted your hands to be as soft as ‘hide’?  Ever heard admiration expressed as, “Oooh.  This is as soft as an elephant’s hide!”  I’m guessing you haven’t.  Well, we at the pantry have been pushed up against the side of the elephant in our Baby Steps kitchen for a while and it’s time for a breather.  And Einstein isn’t as bothered by this elephant as we are because he understands the elephant much better and on a grander scale than do we.

The bumpy, rough-hided elephant of which I speak, is TIME.

“Finally, Bigg Sis, you are going to talk about time….It’s about time because I haven’t got much, and I’m thinkin’ all this cooking you do takes a lot of TIME!”

I hear your shouts of frustration rending the space-time continuum….. Oh sorry, we’ll let some disciple of Einstein address that.  In the meantime, Baby Step 7: ReCon Convenience.  For this step, we are all about figuring out time as it relates to eating healthfully.  One of the major objections that most people have to cooking and eating real food is that it simply takes too long, and one of the reasons most people offer for buying carry-out and convenience foods is that they can get dinner on the table faster.  We want to challenge these assumptions, and help you figure out your own time as it relates to how you eat.  A few questions:

1) Where is my time currently wasted in regards to food procurement and preparation?

2) Where is my time wasted when I think I’m actually saving time?

3) Where will I find the time that is the difference between pulling something out of the freezer and heating it up and preparing something with real food ingredients from scratch.

4) And finally, will the Sis sisters come clean my house for me on a weekly, or I’d even settle for bi-weekly, basis?

I’ll start with the last one.  No.

Okay that was a bit harsh.  We might clean yours if you’d clean ours, It  might at least be more interesting to clean someone else’s house for a change.  Back to Baby Step 7.  We’ve given the other three questions a longer think and want to share some of our thinks with you…

1) POSSIBLE TIME WASTERS

* Too many trips to the grocery store.  (This was a biggie for us).
POSSIBLE SOLUTION: Extend the period of time between grocery store trips.  Plan your meals for a period of nights, make a shopping list and get what you need.  We currently aim for 2 trips to the store a week.  One main trip after planning and another trip later in the week for the produce that won’t make it a week and/or the things I forgot!  Better than the previous 3 – 4 times per week.
STEP: come up with a plan for planning.  A time to do it, a system for recording and sharing, and a goal as to how often, or for what period of time.  Here is mine.

* Not making use of leftovers :
Always, always always make extra food and especially extra grain (rice, barley, quinoa, etc.) as these can be used in future meals (including some really fast and healthy breakfasts*).  Leftovers rule!  What is faster – making a sandwich for a lunchbox or placing leftovers in a container.  This can be done while cleaning up the evening meal as well…. 1 for Mom, 1 for Dad and 1 for whichever kid will eat that particular leftover in their lunch.
STEP: Make sure you have containers for holding leftover meals and grains.  Choose a meal to try this with, or a grain to try this with.  If you plan 2 meals in your planning time period that use the same grain you can make enough for both at one time.

* Going it alone – (I am woman, hear me roar and/or ‘nobody else does it right!’)
Make use of your technology and invite help.  My son loves to shred veggies in the food processor.  It’s like running branches through a wood chipper… what could be more fun than that?  I do believe that a food processor is a good investment in saving time in the kitchen. It shreds, it creams, it chops, and many of them are now dishwasher safe.  But honestly they are not hard to clean.  And if you plan ahead you can chop or shred the veggies for the next night’s dinner as well and only clean the machine once.
STEP: Figure out the pieces of preparation that can be done by your child or other adults in the house.  Put on some music everyone enjoys and boogie down while you cook.

2) ReCon Your “Convenient” Meal

* How convenient is a convenience stop? Sometimes the kids are melting down and they need something placed right in the pie hole before everyone is a puddle on the floorboards of the car.    We’ve all been there and we have to do something, and it might include fast food or snacks from a convenience store.
Try to stock reasonably healthy snacks in your car for just such occasions.
Include knowledge of your schedule when you plan meals.
STEP: A) Time yourself when you make the stop for a convenience meal or a convenience snack, or for a pre-made dinner at the grocery store.  See how long it takes and write it down. So you stop the first place you see and buy some convenience foods.  How long does that really take?  It depends on where you are, but even if something is close by, you have to park, walk in, choose (with much advice),purchase and go get back in your car.
B) Challenge yourself to make a meal, perhaps including leftover grains, or even scrambled eggs and salad in that same amount of time.  For extra fun, compare the price of your homemade fast meal to the price of your “convenient” dinner.

3) DEVELOP A LIST OF QUICKIES

You might be surprised at the number of recipes out there designed to be ready in 30 minutes or even 20 minutes.  There are 2 types of recipes for you to consider:

A) the kind that is actually 20 – 30 minutes from start to finish

B) the kind that is 20 – 30 minutes of prep time but requires some time in between steps for something to boil or roast.  These are still possible if you have someone at home who can start that step for you if you are not there.  Alternately, a crock pot or a rice cooker can go a long way to help some steps be done by the time you get home.

I made stir-fry this evening in 25 minutes and I was not hurrying like I do on nights when one of us is going to an early TaeKwonDo class.  I can make pasta from scratch in 30 minutes.  It’s faster if I saute double veggies and freeze, then that part is done next time around.  You can also have a pasta sauce ready at the touch of a blender button, and as fast as the pasta is ready – you can eat!

I made veggie burgers the other day which took a prep time of only about 15 minutes but then they had to bake for 40.  I made a bunch, froze the leftovers on the cookie sheet they baked on and now we have a stock of burgers on hand for nights with no time.

STEP: Choose one (or more nights) that you are going to try a quick recipe.  Here are a few of our faves – under the A category of 20 – 30 minutes, and the B category of 20-30 minutes of prep time with some boiling, roasting or other timed event in between.

A) Anything Goes, Fast Burrito 

Pesto Pasta with Veggies and Nuts

Mushrooms Pignoli

Noodles with Asian peanut sauce

Varia-Bowl Category A if using noodles or pasta, Category B if using grains -unless you have leftovers

B) Herbed Zucchini 

Kichadi (a quinoa based dish)

Sushi Salad  (with leftover rice it is in category A)

Beet Soup (Crock Pot)

Mustard Tempeh  (with leftover rice it is in category A)

Lentil Casserole

* Fast and healthy breakfasts: barley, oats, more oats, sweet potato

Remember that one of the most important elements of Baby Steps is that it is okay to make these changes a little at a time.  If you eat a healthy fast meal once or twice per week and/or send a healthier lunch once or twice per week more than you do now, then you are improving your health lifestyle.  Everyday brings new opportunities to make good choices about food.  So ReCon commercial convenience! …and find ways to have your own healthy convenience instead! 

Baby Steps Check In: Are You HONGRY?

I don’t know about anybody else, but since the holiday season I have been super HONGRY. I want to eat all the time. It doesn’t help that I still have a few holiday treats lingering (like these amazing cookies) that I can just scoop up and pop in without even breaking stride… I’ve slowly cut down on the sugar overdose (that was mild compared to years past, but still – whoa), but I couldn’t figure out why I was feeling SO deprived for just passing up on a cookie. So very, very HONGRY. And then it struck me, the sweets weren’t the only holiday slippage.

When I apply myself to a new initiative, I really go for it. Not much for half measures, this girl. Of course not much for finishing either but that’s a different and way too long to finish – HA- story. So when I made some pretty hefty dietary changes last spring, I really went for it. Eliminated a bunch of things systematically that I thought were making me feel blechy and upped the produce content of every plate and snack by A LOT. It was easy. I didn’t feel deprived. I felt great and I did NOT feel HONGRY. So in examining my habits since the holidays I noticed that I was not only eating more sweets but I was eating less of the things I was snacking on before – veggies and fruit – produce. So I decided to run a little experiment.

For the past few days every time I get HONGRY I’ve grabbed some plant matter (mostly carrots because I really like them and they require so little fuss) and jammed it in my gaping gullet, a little pre-emptive produce (PEP) as Bigg Sis calls it. I haven’t dictated to myself that there will be no more cookies, but I’ve instituted the same policy I have for my kids – if I’m hungry I should eat something REALLY nutritious first. Guess what? The HONGRY has calmed down to just hungry and the cookies are getting easier to pass up as my sweet tooth settles down again. Such a simple lesson that I learned a while ago, and yet in all the crazy holiday-ness I forgot one of the most important principles: your body needs food. If you only give it crap, you will be HONGRY.

How’s it going for you? Shaking off the holiday stupor? Finding yourself feeling deprived or HONGRY? What’s going on the plate as you take the holiday indulgences off? Feed that body; feed it good. And when you’ve done a good thing, and are feeling really proud of yourself – go outside and look at the birds. Rewards are all around us – not just in the cookie tin.

 

Interested in our Baby Steps Series?  Click above or on the sidebar, or just move straight to Step 1 here.  You’re not late; it’s always a great day to eat real food.

Baby Steps 6: New Habits – New Rewards

January 1st is a tough time to make a change.  I mean, how many of us still have Christmas cookies in the house?  Fudge?  Candy canes?  Chocolate…. no wait.  I always have chocolate in my house.  In my defense it is dark chocolate and I limit myself to about 150 calories worth a day.  What?  How can you stop eating chocolate you ask?  I’ll answer that in a second, but would just like to point out that although the holidays bring all sorts of unusual treats into our homes, most of us always have a lot of ‘food’ on hand that is not healthy food.  Food is a habit that is hard to break.  No wait, that sounds ridiculous… Poor food CHOICES can be a hard habit to break.  Habits are hard to break.  Time to develop new healthy habits.  They can be hard to break as well!

That is my segue back to the chocolate.  I used to adore Reese’s peanut butter cups and all manner of sugar-filled treats and candy.  Switching to dark chocolate took time.  I had to start with some in-between chocolate…, kind of dark, kind of milk / wishy-washy Charlie Brown kind of chocolate.  But as I developed new habits for snacks that were lower in sugar I began to find the more sugary versions WAY too sweet.  In fact, when I imbibe in a high sugar treat now I feel really bad in about 10 minutes.  No kidding.  It’s a great motivator to stay away from the crap, but it took some time to develop that sensitivity.

So my answer about having chocolate in the house without eating it is this.  The less sugar in the chocolate, the more deeply satisfying is eating a reasonable amount, AND the less sugar, the less likely to cause craving for more.  That is my experience.  And it is experience that has driven Little Sis and I on our quest to eat more healthfully, and to achieve a degree of success towards that proposition.  Experiences of wellness and satisfaction.  Repeated experience develops habits.  Paying attention to experience helps us develop healthy habits.  We would like to help you have experiences that will drive your own success towards healthy eating.  We suggest that you can develop new habits and new rewards.

If you are new to the Baby Steps series, I heartily recommend that you take a click back to the beginning and follow through the steps we have outlined thus far.  (Brief synopsis to follow)  If you are not new to the series – scroll on down to the next section which includes some tips for breaking habits.

Baby Steps Series (All offered with love and encouragement during successes and slip-ups):

Introduction: Baby Steps Down the Road to Better Health
a little why should ya for ya and links to recipes

Baby Step #1 - The Ol’ Switcheroo
Swapping out one or more of your worst choices for better ones – One Item, One Switch
some suggestions for where you might make a swap if you’d like suggestions and links to recipes

Baby Step #2 - Be Fearless, Be Honest
Facing up to what you are currently eating – we’ll still love you, I promise.

Baby Step #3 – Pantry Perusal
We help you assess what’s in your pantry.  Taking a hard look at what and why you find what you find.

Baby Step #3b – Peeping in our Pantries
A Peep into our pantries.  What are good items to have on hand for quick, healthy meals along with links to recipes

Go Back Jack – Baby Steps Check in
Encouragement to keep at it, even if you mess up.  Everyday provides new opportunities to make good choices about food.  We are with ya!  Hang in there!

Baby Steps #4 – Adventurous, Experimentation and Gratitude
So you’ve decided to improve your eating and your health, how do you get the rest of the family to come along?  Suggestions here!

Baby Steps #5 – It’s Time for a Plan
The name says it all – helping you make a plan after all your hard work preparing and experimenting.

Baby Steps – Happier, Healthier Holidays
Suggestions to eat as healthfully as possible during the holidays – or anytime when you know you will have tough choices coming your way!

Baby Steps – Don’t Say Diet
Reminders and encouragement that you don’t need to diet, you need to change what you eat.  You can learn to be satisfied and energized by healthy food.

And now Little Sis and I both have some things to say about New Habits – New Rewards….

I heard this guy interviewed on the radio the other day.  He had some really interesting, specific, and helpful things to say about habits.  I immediately thought of changing the way we eat in terms of habits.  So much of how we feed ourselves is habit driven, routine, doing what we’ve always done.  Habits can be hard to break.  We want to help and so does Jeremy Dean.  He gives 10 tips for habit change here that he covers in greater length in his new book Making Habits, Breaking Habits.  I was delighted to see how many of his tips sounded like the kinds of things we suggest in our Baby Steps to Better Health series.

Dean’s very first suggestion is “For Big Results, Think Small.”  He discusses the importance of making change in small, incremental, manageable and achievable bits.  Sound familiar?  Other themes that we both stress are repetition, tweaking (the same plan won’t work for everyone), and replacing an undesirable behavior with one that is desirable rather than just trying to suppress the “bad” one.  Yay!  These are just a few of his tips – there are a total of 10 in the article, and like I said they’re all from a larger book.  If you’re trying to make some healthy changes, this guy just might have some insight for you. And there’s nothing like having your advice validated by an official smart guy.

Indeed we do like smart guys, don’t we Little Sis?  I would like to add that we have cultural habits about using food as a reward.  We ‘deserve’ a treat at the end of a hard day.  We ‘earned’ a chocolate milkshake by cleaning out the garage.  Only problem is we are hurting ourselves with some of these choices… what kind of a reward is that?  Rewards aren’t supposed to hurt, are they?

Make yourself a list of non-food rewards.  One of mine is to step outside (when possible) smell the air and look for some birds or other wildlife.  That always makes me feel better.  A little break, no harmful intake.  Then if I am really hungry, I can eat something that will nourish me in all my bird-loving glory .  Seriously, make a list.  Little things, little treats… treats you can pay attention to like a cup of flavorful herb tea, a game of cards with your sweetie or friend, a flower or two to put in a vase where you’ll see it, a bath with scented water.  Make a list because options are good and options can help you overcome old, harmful habits.

Another benefit to the list of non-food rewards is that when the habit rears its head, if you go get the list, or read your list, you have a chance to move beyond the initial impulse.  Habits are in a way trained impulses.  Given a little bit of time to think about the consequences of our habitual actions, we might make a better, or less bad, choice.

Close your eyes when you’re sure that you ‘deserve’ that bag of Doritos or Reese’s peanut butter cup, breathe and count to 10.  Then look around you wherever you are and decide what you are going to do next.  Maybe the treat won’t seem so important anymore, or you will acknowledge a healthier choice and ‘treat’ yourself well.

Congratulations for reading a Baby Steps post.  That is a Baby Step right there!  You deserve a pat on the back and a healthier body!  Let us know how you are doing developing new habits and new rewards.  Please also let us know if there is specific information you’d like from us.  The Steps continue down the road to better health.