The Mind of an Eating Disorder

What is your relationship with food?

Do you feel you have a healthy relationship with food, or are there areas that you could work on? Do you listen to your body? To your hunger cues?

Do you obsess over every calorie and macronutrient that you consume?

So many people suffer with eating disorders, even beyond anorexia and bulimia. While these are severe and life threatening diseases, there are other eating disorders. An unhealthy relationship with food, in my opinion, is an eating disorder. I think we all suffer with eating too much occasionally, but how does this affect our mood, our inner thoughts, or our opinion of ourselves?

I am going to do a series of posts over the next few weeks that delve into eating habits, whether healthy or unhealthy, and look at peoples relationship with food. I will obviously draw a lot from my own experiences and my relationship with food, but I will also look into poetry and literature from people who have suffered with eating disorders.

My main goal is to use art to portray different emotions associated with foods. I will do sketches, write, and create a few completed pieces of artwork that tell a story about different relationships with food.

this picture is from EveryBody is Beautiful's Facebook page, go there for inspiration on having a healthy relationship with yourself and loving the body you were given!

I admit that I sometimes have an unhealthy relationship with food and can have negative self talk based on what I have eaten and food can play a large part in my moods. I will delve more into moods associated with foods in my future posts.

Throughout my "study," I hope to look at ways to heal our relationship with food. I think our society has become very detached from our food, which plays a role in eating disorders. Being able to connect more with our food and listen to our bodies is extremely important to creating a healthy relationship with food and a healthy relationship with ourselves. Food is fuel and should be used to nourish our bodies, but we seem to have made it more about comfort, sadness, control, a way to celebrate, social, and many other different things. While food should be delicious and appealing and enjoyed, it should be appreciated for its ability to provide energy and nourishment to our bodies.

Nourish your body, your mind, your environment, and most importantly your soul.

if you fail to plan, you plan to fail...

Okay, so we all like convenience, that's why so many people eat fast food and go for unhealthy processed foods. But how about creating our own convenience foods! Food prep is something that is so important to keep you on track and eating healthy, especially when going local.

Sometimes, you go to the farmers market and get so many different things, but are unsure how to make a meal out of it. These are a few things that I have made from my goodies that I will have in my fridge and ready to take to work or when I am hungry and don't have time to make a meal.

I roasted up some local veggies to have for the week. These are so delicious and so simple, that it is definitely a go to. I used eggplant, zucchini, squash, tomato, peppers, and green onion. I put pink himalayan salt and truffle olive oil on them.

Here, I wanted to try something a little creative, so I made a slaw. I had purple cabbage and granny smith apples from the farmers market, so I chopped them very finely and then added my non-local ingredients of greek yogurt, lemon, pink himalayan salt, coconut sugar, ground pepper, and a little olive oil. I might go buy a sweet white onion to add to it as well. This is very refreshing, crisp, and crunchy, which I love.

I had a little bit of purple onion in my fridge, so I decided to cut some cucumbers thinly with them, add some salt and raw apple cider vinegar to "pickle" the cucumbers.

I really love the way these came out, so I will definitely be coming back to this recipe. I boiled the butter beans, then added chopped peppers, garlic, and coconut oil. Absolutely delicious!

This is called a sunburst squash! It is in the oven cooking right now and I think I am going to try something a little interesting with it for breakfast in the morning.

EAT LOCAL!!!!

Visitors, plus you will want this kale chip recipe!!

I have had a couple people visiting me this week so I didn't want to spend time on my phone or computer, so I took a little break from posting all my local eats. Remember to spend time with the people around you and appreciate it. Don't be sucked into all the screens!

I did however take a few pictures that I want to share!

These have been some of my favorite snacks and breakfasts, talk about amazing. I cannot get enough! Asian pears from the farmers market, mmmmm!!

These are a bunch of local veggies that my friend and I roasted up, they were sooo delicious! Red peppers, banana pepper, zucchini, and okra

Okay, so we were so obsessed with the kale chips that they didn't leave the pan and I barely got a picture. You definitely want the recipe for these babies. 

Local Kale with a Local veggie dressing:

Local veggies dressing recipe:

2 garlic cloves

1 tomato

1/2 zucchini

1 red bell pepper

1 tbsp olive oil

pink himalayan salt

I blended this together and tossed the kale in it and put it in the oven on 425, it turned out amazing! Tasted like pizza or marinara. I would definitely use the sauce as a marinara sauce if cooked or dressing if raw.

This was one of my breakfasts with a local peach, greek yogurt mixed with perfect fit protein and a tiny bit of ezekiel sprouted grain cereal for some crunch!

With people visiting we did go out to eat, but we went to the local co-op so that the money was going straight back into the community and much of the food was local. We also went to a local restaurant that uses fresh veggies and seafood. Eat as much local as you can, but it's okay to make exception, just try to make the best choices, like supporting a local restaurant! :)

beautiful day at the beach!

Today I didn't have to work, so I got to spend the day at the beach swimming and playing with some amazing people. I was definitely getting rocked by some waves! Now back to the local eats :)

Breakfast was an apple, I would have preferred one of my delicious local pears, but I had the apple and needed to eat it. I also had two local eggs, one whole, one just the white. I also had some local figs and bluebs!

Snack was greek yogurt with perfect fit protein mixed in, sooo yummy! Another snack was a local pear and some raw almond butter mmm

Lunch was going to be a local raw salad, but I was headed to the beach with a friend and we didn't have a cooler and I was going to be over at their house, so instead lunch was from a local restaurant, surf house. It was organic mixed greens and some yummy chickpeas with mint.

Dinner was completely local except for some onion and the seasonings. I made okra and butter beans with salt and coconut oil, I cut up one heirloom tomato, and I had a salad of cabbage, kale, and cucumber with apple cider vinegar, mustard, and some coconut sugar! My protein was some fresh caught local shrimp!

"dessert" was this greens powder that tastes a little like chocolate, yum!

So many goodies...

It was a great day at the Farmer's market today with quite the selection! I was very excited about the number of heirloom varieties that they offered and almost everything was pesticide free!

Today at the farmers market I was able to get butter beans, kale, collards, purple cabbage, zucchini, cucumber, tomatoes, peppers, cantaloupe, pears, figs, blueberries, peaches, shrimp, and okra! 

Today's breakfast was a perfect fit protein, local peach, and strawberry smoothie!

Lunch was local bok choy, local cucumber, local pear, carrots, and garbanzo bean salad. I made a dressing with raw apple cider vinegar, cold pressed olive oil, salt, and a little coconut sugar!

Snack time was a local peach, local sprouts, and an over easy local egg! I am obsessed with over easy eggs, sooo yummy and farm fresh! This ended up turning into dinner. I added another egg, a local tomato and some garbanzos. mm!

extended vacation.

It seems I have taken quite the extended vacation from my blog and I do apologize for neglecting. However, I am starting this welcome back with a challenge, eat as local as possible for the next month! What this means is, buy everything you can from farmers markets, but continue eating what you already have stocked that isn't local.

I plan on starting this tomorrow and I will be updating everything that I eat daily. I have yogurt and other foods that are not local that I have already purchased (these items are at least purchased from a local co-op so the money is going back into the community!), so there will be a few non local things, and every once in a while I may have a treat, but for the most part, I am trying to go at this 110%. For me, I do plan on still incorporating the raw brown rice protein powder (it tastes delicious and is also non-gmo, vegan and gluten free!!) that I already own in my local fruit smoothies because I want a power packed smoothie. I also plan on using spices, raw apple cider vinegar, olive oils, and coconut oils that are not local.

So get your reusable bags out, find out where your local farmers markets are located and what days/times and EAT LOCAL! You won't only be doing your own body good, but the environment will thank you too!

Just another reason to eat local

Check out this article about how eating locally can actually alter your genes.