Breaking up with junk food
It’s been said over and over that weight loss and overall fitness are 10% exercise and 90% diet. It sounds simple enough, but I have one major downfall when it comes to a healthy diet – snacking. I have a deep love for sweets and other junk food. In fact, I even worked in our college’s bakery for a few years. Sweets are my love language.
Junk Food Experts
Cody and I have been known to constantly have candy corn in the house during the fall. People also have commented on our wine bottle full of M&Ms. We even have been known to indulge in ice cream every single night.
For a long time I justified it, saying that it was “just” one snack a day. No big deal. I even was careful to snack within my calorie allotment for the day. Even with the calorie limits and working with a personal trainer, I still wasn’t seeing results. People kept telling me to cut out the junk food, but . . . I just couldn’t for longer than a few days. But it was time to see if a diet change would really help me see results.
Why moving was good for our snacking
May 2017 was a crazy month for us. We moved out of our fairly comfortable apartment and into our ideal location townhouse. Notice I said ideal LOCATION and not ideal sight, smell, color, etc (but more on that another time). At the same time, I quit my personal trainer, because even though I liked my trainer, I wasn’t seeing results nor staying motivated to actually go to the gym every day.
Before we moved, we tossed out ALL of our junk food. Leftover candy from post-Easter sales, marshmallows, chips, cookies . . . you name it, it was gone! It sounds like I probably just lost my mind, but really there were a few things that led to this pre-move junk food purge.
The things that helped
I wasn’t seeing results with my trainer, and a friend showed me how to sign up for an at-home workout program that uses portion control containers and helps you refocus your diet, so I already had a little bit of pressure to step up with the other people in my accountability group.
I was FED UP with feeling down. My anxiety and depression symptoms were reappearing with more frequency leaving me feeling tired and just “bleh”. I read that what we fuel our bodies with can make a big difference to not only our physical health, but our mental health.
I was so sick of packing. So the idea that I could toss an entire moving box or two’s worth of stuff made getting rid of the junk food that much easier.
But, Osegards, I’m not moving. . .
We hear you. You don’t have to move to do a junk food purge; that’s just what made it easier for us! In the four months since “the purge”, we have been doing a lot better. We still have some bad foods that sneak in – some pop, chips (we make homemade salsa, so we can’t help it . . . or at least that’s our excuse), and of course the occasional ice cream. However, after going an entire month without any junk in the house, we are now a lot more conscious of what we allow in the house and how frequently we are eating it.
What are your tricks to keeping the junk food to a minimum at your house? We’d love for you to share your tips in the comments below or on our Facebook page! We love hearing from you no matter how you contact us!