Learning to Eat to Live, Not Live to Eat

As a diabetic, people assume I eat well. Well meaning healthfully. Hello...people? I do not eat well. I eat more than I should, consume more carbs than I should, and I do it more often than I'd like to admit. In other words, I love food and have to work hard to not make my life about eating. I could go into the family history of a love affair with food, but I'll spare you my excuses. Excuses are just reasons you have found to be lazy or to blame someone else for your inability to change...at least for me they are.

This cake is why I don't make their cakes from scratch any more.
I ate half...by myself. Such a bad diabetic, but it was so good.

This week I'm focusing on those cues that tell you when you're actually hungry. Funny, huh? With all the food in the States, who thinks about actually being hungry? Do you remember what that feels like?Yeah, I do when I'm pregnant. It's called morning sickness. However, other than that, I haven't really felt real hunger pains in a long time. There's always something to eat or snack on. No more!

We already eat as much unprocessed, whole foods as we can afford. This month, our food budget was $200. That's for 6 people. Some how, we've not only done it but we've done it well. In addition to trying to keep food low cost and unprocessed, I have to try to keep everything low carb. That's easy, right? Just buy meats and veggies. Have you ever lived on just meat and vegetables for a long period of time? And I mean, no pasta or bread. No starchy "veggies" like corn, peas, or potatoes. It gets boring and expensive.

What am I hoping to learn this week, after I splurged on some homemade granola? I want to eat because I need to, not simply because I want something. So, I'll cook what I normally do for everyone else. I will just be cooking an addition portion of meat for me (or other protein source). It will be hard and I'll have cravings, but in those moments, perhaps I need to pray. I'll write and photograph through this week so you can see what progress I have or haven't been making.