92: How to stop sabotaging your health + your weight

Lyndi Cohen: 0:03

Hello and welcome, lovely people, to this week's episode of no Wellness Wankery. I'm your host lyndi, Cohen, dietitian nutritionist and lover of food, and I'm joined by my faithful, divine co-host, jenna dapice. Welcome.

Jenna D'Apice: 0:17

Welcome, welcome. Hello, I love being here. Huge topic today because there are so many things that you do then you're like is this helping me?

Lyndi Cohen: 0:28

I do a lot of things that sabotage my health. In fact, I think this is the whole process of working in your health is identifying the things you're going. Hmm, listen, I've been doing that habit for a long time. I don't actually think it's serving me anymore and this is hopefully going to act as episode, is going to act as a moment of you going. Hey, you know what I have been thinking about? Doing a change, making a change, and this episode. I want you to walk away and go. Okay, we now are going to enact that change so we can stop sabotaging our health.

Jenna D'Apice: 0:55

And I think the biggest thing for me with this type of topic is I've had my whole life only doing habits and focusing on habits that I think will affect my weight, and I am ignoring all the habits that might be, in turn, affecting my health, and that is like a whole new way of looking at your day to day habits.

Lyndi Cohen: 1:15

So brings us perfectly onto a list of 21 ways we've decided that you could be sabotaging health. Now, this is not an inclusive list of everything. There are far more ways that you could be doing it, but that seems a bit overwhelming, so let's just start with the ones that we think are most important. And number one, tying in with weight, is weighing yourself when it's triggering for you, and I think the reason that this is sabotaging is. I think people think if I don't weigh myself, I will lose control. I won't be able. You know, my weight will spiral out of control.

Lyndi Cohen: 1:49

And yet I know so many people who hop on the scale, and seeing the wrong number can completely ruin your day. Not only that, but it derails your health efforts. Either it makes you under eat and restrict, which can lead to subsequent binge eating, or it makes you go well, screw it. I've come this far anyway, I may as well just keep eating. So is it triggering for you? Is the question, and if it is, then you have to realize that that scale is not being supportive and it's not your friend, even if it once was, and it's so easy.

Jenna D'Apice: 2:21

Once you've done it once, I think it is so easy. If you are an adopter's thing and they need to weigh you, you can say I just don't want to see it, and everyone will just be like, okay, like I had to go to the hospital for like something I had ages ago and they wanted to weigh me before that and I was like I'm just not really interested in seeing the number and the lady was like, oh, that's fine. And I was like, oh my gosh, it's actually that easy.

Lyndi Cohen: 2:43

So this is called a blind weigh in. This is a very socially accepted within the health community. They everyone understands. As you could say, I'd like a blind weigh in. Or, as Janet did, you say, hey, listen, I don't want to see the number. Or you could say have history of disorder to eating, which is what I do, I'm not really interested, and you can turn around. Or they don't tell you the number and it's just a non issue.

Jenna D'Apice: 3:02

So that is a huge one. And even if you feel like, oh, I think I'll be okay, if you're thinking the thought, I think I'll be okay, just there's, it's not a thing.

Lyndi Cohen: 3:13

Yes, I have now, after so many years, reached a point where I can hop on the scale and feel totally neutral to it. I do not even think I was just going to ruin my day, and so that is. Maybe at some point you're going to reach that point. But if you're in doubt the scales, get them out of your bathroom, because that can be very tempting. Put them in the garage If that's going to be helpful, a very high up cupboard, or get rid of them. You don't need them. And if you absolutely need to know that, your doctors will be on top of it. And two on the second way that you could be sabotaging your health. This is something that I used to do. A lot.

Jenna D'Apice: 3:46

This is huge, buying clothes that you need to lose weight to fit into, holding onto clothes that don't fit, or you need special underwear, all of that jazz, generally wearing clothes that don't fit you.

Lyndi Cohen: 3:58

That's it. Why do we do this? I used to buy all these clothes that I'd be like, okay, well, if, if I just had the right bra and that I write underwear, and then like something's sucking me, and then I'd feel comfortable. If I had a very like flat stomach day and didn't eat, I'd be able to fit into these things.

Jenna D'Apice: 4:16

Yeah or oh, this event, oh, wear those pants when I just have to stand up all night, because they're really good ones. I don't need to. If I don't need to sit down, they'll be great pants.

Lyndi Cohen: 4:23

Breathing allow. No, we are done. We are done with that, and you know what happens is you open your wardrobe and all you see are all the clothes that do not fit you. Do not underestimate how triggering it can be when you try to get dressed in the morning and you feel like nothing looks good on you. I think that can ruin your entire day A week. I think you can start in a major binge avalanche where you just the eating gets worse and worse and worse.

Lyndi Cohen: 4:51

And so I think that creating a wardrobe that actually fits you and I know this sounds so basic, but it's so important, A wardrobe that fits you is so important, and a bra that fits you and undies that fit you. I've talked about this before, but I always have to size up my undies at least two or three sizes. Not kidding, I have no idea why. That's the size I need so it doesn't dig into me and it sits nicely on my body. Otherwise, I always feel quite squished in my undies, even though I feel, you know, comfortable in the clothing at that size.

Jenna D'Apice: 5:22

And I think it's also important to note that this applies to active wear and things you exercise in as well, because sometimes I'll see other girls in the gym and sometimes I'm guilty of it too like pulling down their pants or trying to adjust themselves all the time, and it's like those clothes aren't comfortable.

Lyndi Cohen: 5:38

Yes, In fact I've actually started going sized up my jeans, my denim, and because you know denim doesn't really have stretch, you know it's gone on skinny day kind of leggings which were pretty comfortable and now you kind of have these other kinds of jeans. So I did have to size up and I feel so much more comfortable. Sometimes they get a little bit too baggy and I have to put them in the drive so they fit better, but I think that's much better than feeling like all squished up in my pants Very unenjoyable.

Jenna D'Apice: 6:07

Another huge topic, which is probably a big thing that many people do that could sabotage their health scrolling mindlessly on social media.

Lyndi Cohen: 6:17

Jenna, I'm addicted to my phone, I have to admit, and I don't want to be, but I can't help but think everyone listening is to some degree going to be addicted to their phones Because, the way I noticed it for myself, I'm watching TV and I'm like scrolling on my phone while I'm watching TV. Like, clearly, I'm so addicted to my phone I keep picking it up all the time.

Jenna D'Apice: 6:40

Well, they're built for you to be addicted. So everyone's like, oh, I'm addicted. It's like, well, yeah, because psychologists and people that do the same same techniques they use on, like poker machines and things that I know to work on the human mind, are in our phone and it's not like something we can just rise above because they know how our brains tick Exactly.

Lyndi Cohen: 7:04

And so they're using it against us.

Lyndi Cohen: 7:05

Something you can do on your phone is you can go I know I've got an iPhone and you can go into your settings and you go see your screen time.

Lyndi Cohen: 7:11

Just search screen time in Android you can do this as well and you can see how many hours a day and I do say hours a day you are simply using your phone and remember, this does not include your laptop or your computer. The time you spend working, this is just your phone how many hours you spend on social media a day and I hear this thing often we go I don't have time to me time, I don't have time for me time, I don't have time to go grocery shopping, I don't have time to exercise. We have these things, but social media is something that we are getting addicted to and, as a result, we're not having time to fill up our own cups. So you know, I think so often in the health world we're like we need to eat less. No, there are so many habits like this that are having a profound impact on so many facets of our health, and I want us to focus on them because they can really have beautiful flow on effects.

Jenna D'Apice: 8:01

And something that can help you to have less scrolling time on social media is tip number four, which is the following of unhealthy accounts on social media. We don't need that.

Lyndi Cohen: 8:12

No, that's sabotaging us. And what do I mean by unhealthy accounts?

Jenna D'Apice: 8:16

Anyone who's very into themselves, anyone who's posting content that feels triggering to you, any account that makes you feel bad about yourself or your life.

Lyndi Cohen: 8:28

You are allowed to unfollow and sometimes I feel guilty for unfollowing or I feel that they're going to notice that I unfollowed them. But you know what you can mute people, you can hide people. You can still follow them and just hide all their content Maybe they used to be a friend just kind of handle seeing their disorder. Whatever it is, you can just hide them as fully an option to you. And number five another sabotaging habit and I think this is also a very addictive kind of thing is on YouTube or on social media, when your algorithm starts to show you a lot of day on a plate videos.

Lyndi Cohen: 9:04

If you are into a habit of watching those, I just want you to have a few reminders. One just because someone looks good in a crop top, doesn't give them credentials to tell you how to eat. Number two even if you ate like them, you wouldn't end up looking like them. I've had to have some serious conversations with myself or I go listen, lindy, if you buy all the skincare ingredients, the celebrity users, you will not have skin like a celebrity. I finally accepted that fact and once I did, not only did I spend less money on shit I did not need, but I'm definitely feeling a lot better. So just notice. If you do feel like that's where your algorithm is leading you, it's a pretty good sign that that's a habit, that's sabotaging you.

Jenna D'Apice: 9:47

And still on the topic of our phones, because it is a huge one, number six, using screens too close to bed or doing something else of that nature. That's just too stimulating when you're trying to wind down for our slumber time and sleep is so important.

Lyndi Cohen: 10:03

We've talked about this on previous episodes. If you are not getting enough shut eye, enough quality rest, your body is going to crave energy during the day from whatever it can, and the easiest source of that is food. So let's not downplay the impacts sleep has on our hunger hormones hunger hormone, ghrelin, leptin, our satiation things that tells us okay, we've had enough food to eat and also on things like our mood and how much we feel like exercising. So this is such a fundamental one is not using our screen too close to bed, and if you are addicted like me, this is a real challenge. Jenna, you've been working on your sleep.

Jenna D'Apice: 10:40

What have you been doing. Well, I have been doing a lot with my sleep, trying to not put the phone in my bed and read before I go to bed. But then I also have found on the flip side of my reading is my somewhat addictive personality. If the book's too good, then I also don't want to go to bed. So I feel like I'm still working through that, because I was reading this book and I just wanted to finish it. So then I was going to bed too late because I was reading my book. So I feel like my next thing is I need to find books that I'm moderately interested in, so then I can put the book away and go to sleep. But I do find it's a lot easier to fall asleep when you've just been reading as opposed to the phone. 100%.

Lyndi Cohen: 11:21

I definitely find educational books have this influence on me. I remember at university when I wanted to fall asleep, I'd pull out a textbook. I'm very quickly. After one page I'd be like I'm sleepy now. But I definitely find, you know, educational books can have that impact. So if you, I'm currently reading a book called the Life of Trees. It's very interesting, but also not interesting enough to keep me awake, and that's kind of just perfect, okay, this is what you need to find.

Lyndi Cohen: 11:47

For me, I've noticed as well. I can't use my phone, so anytime after 8pm, that that's it. That's it. I can't be on social. I might be able to watch a TV show. That's a bit mindless, but nothing scary, nothing that's going to get my cortisol up and make me feel a little bit scared. I'm just a bit sensitive to scary movies as well.

Jenna D'Apice: 12:06

So I think that's like being mindful of. If you're having trouble falling asleep or you're going to bed too late, what are you doing at the end of the day? That's sparking you up a little bit, or what could you do differently?

Lyndi Cohen: 12:17

If you've got kids as well. They call this kind of pro. It's a real form of procrastination, because your kids might only go to sleep at 8pm and then that's your me time, so it's very hard to go. Well, now I have to start going to sleep. I didn't even get time to fill up my cup. So simply noticing if that's how you're feeling and going, okay, where does the other me time need to be? Maybe there is that social media time and you can reclaim some of it during the day.

Jenna D'Apice: 12:39

So we're falling asleep and that brings us into tip number seven because, shockingly, the phone is a problem before bed and then the moment you open your eyes as well, and that is waking up and checking your phone.

Lyndi Cohen: 12:51

Yeah, you know you kind of be more plugged into your phone than you are to your family or anyone else around you or to how your body is feeling, and so if it's the first thing you notice you're doing, certainly charging your phone in a different room is a very good idea. I used to, when I was young, go through an entire routine. In fact, jenny, you sent me a message this week. Being like Lindy, your morning routine in this blog post sounds outrageous. Please tell me you don't do it still. And no, I didn't. This is pre-kids Lindy, whose life was very different. So I used to run down to the beach, drink a green smoothie, properly meditate on a rock like a wanker, and now I am wrangling children and desperately clutching at my phone. But I'm definitely trying to keep it outside of my phone because this is a very important one for me to have better connections with the people in my life, or better connections with myself.

Jenna D'Apice: 13:43

And I think it's also important to notice on that. A lot of the time, if I pick up my phone, it's kind of like a what's happened in the world in the last nine hours and, yeah, generally the news only highlights terrible things, so no one needs to start their day before they've basically opened their eyes being like what are all the horrible things that have happened on the news? It's just such a jarring way to Start your day.

Lyndi Cohen: 14:06

Particularly at the moment, is so awful, everything that's happening, so it's incredibly hard and we need to also take care of ourselves. We are the only ones who will take care of our bodies and our minds, and this is one way you can do it. Finally, our eighth way of sabotaging yourself is still related to your phone, but I promise it's the last one is scrolling on your phone when you're with other people. Now, it's a tricky one. Now, if you're expecting, you know, maybe an emergency phone call from daycare or work or whatever it might be, that can still happen. But generally, what are you doing when you're catching up with friends?

Jenna D'Apice: 14:41

Chatting to them and, I think, not looking at my phone, which, and I think something that I try to do when I'm with my friends is just put my phone on loud, because then I'll know if someone's called me and they need me, as opposed to I'll be on silent and then feeling like you've got to check it, like it has inbuilt alerts to tell me if someone's calling me, and then guess what, probably 95% of the time no one will call and I don't need to look at it.

Lyndi Cohen: 15:08

I love this tip because I've always thought about doing the opposite. I'll put it on silent, that way I won't check it, but then you still get all those vibrations and you check it anyway because you're addicted. As we've talked about, I like this idea of turning your phone on loud, something that millennials and gents that's probably never do.

Jenna D'Apice: 15:25

Correct. It's never on loud, so you're always in the back of your brain. Be like what's happening. I don't know. It's built suspense, is something there, whereas so often my phone could go hours without actually anyone calling or texting me. I just think is there a text or is there a message?

Lyndi Cohen: 16:17

I really like this. I really like this. I was listening to a podcast the other day and she said that every day she tries to message three of her friends and reach out to people, and I really like this. I think I could definitely get a better proactively reaching out to people instead of just sending them silly memes on Instagram.

Jenna D'Apice: 16:32

I know it's hard, though, because then you're like you send someone a message and they send it back and it's like oh, this is tennis. I think I was actually. It's funny because I have ADHD and I was reading something about why messages and phones and emails are so overwhelming, because someone was saying that for an ADHD brain like mine, every text message is another task. And then it's like oh, that's five things, like I know. Right now I have six messages in my inbox on my phone and I'm like that's six things I got to do and I'm not doing anything about it. I've just been leaving them there. So it's like another tasks to do, yes.

Lyndi Cohen: 17:07

Whereas we know from research, from people who live high quality, long lives, that the connections we have with the people in our lives is one of the most important things and aspects that contribute to our well being. So how can we not see it as a task, as a to do list item? That's something that brings us joy. Probably getting off our phones is seems to be the theme of this chat. I think that is moving away from phones.

Lyndi Cohen: 17:30

One thing that we do do to sabotage our health is drinking too much alcohol too often and thinking it's just normal, because that's just what we've always done. And I'm not saying we all need to cut out alcohol. I have kind of on this little booze break thing where I'm not drinking at the moment and I never thought I'd be the poster girl for not drinking alcohol, but hey, I'm really loving it, and so all this is just an idea of kind of going. Have you ever stopped to think about how much you drink, how often you drink and why you drink? If you haven't, maybe you could just take a little hiatus, just a month off, to reset your habits, to think about how it makes you feel. Or maybe you just half the amount you drink or whatever it is, but just reassessing your relationship with alcohol, because there's such a clear interplay between what we eat and when we drink, and so many people write to me saying every time I drink alcohol I can't stop eating, or the next week you are feeling insecure and bad about yourself due to the way that alcohol impacts your brain chemistry and this can have a huge interplay in body image and how you eat and how often you exercise.

Lyndi Cohen: 18:36

It cannot be understated how much alcohol can have an influence. And so just taking a moment to go this is alcohol thing is the way I'm doing, it working for me right now. And if you haven't checked out booze break, this is the thing that I'm doing at the moment, called my booze break dot com. You can go check it out and I'll leave a link to it if the show notes below, so you can find my booze break if you kind of want to go. Let's reassess alcohol.

Jenna D'Apice: 19:03

Yeah, I think it's all about with all of these habits. It's just like kind of bringing them from the subconscious mind back into the conscious mind of like is this serving me, do I like this, and not just living life on autopilot, doing all these things that maybe it's like this isn't overly great for me, which is another thing. Bringing us on to tip number 10, which is the tracking of macros, calories points in an app or even just in your mind.

Lyndi Cohen: 19:28

In your mind counts too. So if you're lying in bed at night going, hmm, that was 20 calories, 100 calories, you know that mental arithmetic.

Lyndi Cohen: 19:36

If you've ever been on a diet, you probably still do a bit of it or even just thinking was today good or was today bad? That you might not be explicitly tracking points, calories or macros, but you still are doing that mental assessment at the end of the night. And why is this as sabotaging? Why is this bad for us?

Lyndi Cohen: 19:54

There are so many ways I've noticed when people, when you start tracking something like calories, one of the things it does is it actually you end up eating a whole bunch more processed foods because these are safe foods, because if you read the back of the pack, it's going to tell you how many calories it has, how much protein. And so I find that typically people end up becoming very limited with the types of foods, types of meals and recipes they feel comfortable eating. So you might only go oh, I can only cook that recipe if an influencer shared it and they told me exactly how many calories, points, macros are in it. And, as a result, we know this kind of brings us closer on that disordered eating, closer to an eating disorder, where we get to the point where we go I feel scared to eat other foods. And not only that if you are constantly doing this mental arithmetic, it is taking up so much headspace in your brain.

Lyndi Cohen: 20:42

Any time I have gotten anywhere successful with my health, I've had to have a really soft approach to health. It hasn't occupied every essence of my day, it has just been something I've been aiming to do as a sideline effort. I'm still pursuing all the other things in my life and as a result, I actually find I'm so much more consistent when it's not my absolute everything. So many people say they get really obsessed with food. They feel like food controls them. Now this is a habit that is a surefire way to start becoming quite obsessed and controlled by by food.

Jenna D'Apice: 21:18

And I think calories macros points can also impact your relationships and social connections, because so many times it would affect me when you're at a restaurant or a cafe, when things are unknown and you don't have the numbers and you don't know what you're eating. So you kind of fixated on what you're eating and what you should be eating and how you're eating it, instead of Connecting with the people that you're at the restaurant or cafe chatting to. I always found it kind of spittles into other areas of your life when you are trying to so focused on Having to know the calories macros points of everything you're eating.

Lyndi Cohen: 21:55

We always say this don't give up 95% of your life to a 5% less, and I think a surefire way to give up 95% of your life is to track everything that goes into your mouth.

Jenna D'Apice: 22:04

And also it goes on to number 11, which is following a meal plan. Instead of listening to your hunger, just a reminder you've been in built weight management system.

Lyndi Cohen: 22:14

This is your appetite. It's all purpose. I mean, the only reason you have an appetite is to help your body eat the right amount of fuel for your body. Thus, you do not need to eat a prescriptive meal plan, and typically what happens on a meal plan is we end up eating the exact same thing every single week and, I guess, incredibly monotonous. We feel scared and we deviate. We feel guilty when we're here, of course, and this can lead to that all or nothing thinking. So if you keep trying to go right, just you know what, when I ate on that meal plan I did so well, I just want you to know. Maybe it's not your willpower that's the problem, maybe it's the meal plan itself. If you haven't read my book, your weight is not the problem. Or listen to it. I would highly recommend it. It spells out in detail why we shouldn't be following this approach, what to do instead. It's going to give you a really nice roadmap to moving forward.

Jenna D'Apice: 22:58

Tip number 12 also links back to tip number 11, which can happen a lot when you are following a meal plan and that is not eating enough during the day. If you are following a meal plan that someone else is set for you, they might not have given you enough food to get yourself through the day 1200 calories is how much food a toddler needs.

Lyndi Cohen: 23:19

Let's just remind ourselves of that. The number of people who under eat during the day, only to binge or emotional eat at night when they come home is out of control. So if you go, hey, listen, I think I eat pretty healthily, but at night time I can't stop snacking. It's uncontrollable, it's like an avalanche. I want to tell you that maybe the problem is not night time the problem. The problem is during the day. You're not eating enough during the day, not eating enough satisfying food during the day, and if you went and added a few more snacks, more satiating lunch so maybe a sandwich instead of a salad you might find magically that that eating takes care of itself because your body feels like it's getting what it needs during the day and that's so, so important. Another one that I think is a real sabotaging thing that we do is we set these health goals instead of identity shifts, and I want to explain that for a sec. So when I decided to have a baby, I didn't. I wasn't like, oh, I'm going to have a baby. I decided I was going to become a mother and yes, having a baby was an important part about becoming a mother, but what I wanted was to become a mother, not to have a baby.

Lyndi Cohen: 24:22

A lot of people they go. I'm going to run a marathon not to say there's anything wrong with setting a very clear fitness goal like that but I think the thing I'd really like us to do is set an identity shift. I want to become a runner, I want to become someone who really enjoys the process of running and I want to run a marathon in the process of that. That's an accomplishment I want to achieve. We need to apply the same thing when it comes to healthy eating. So often we're going I want to lose this matter of weight, I want to follow this diet, I want to fit into this dress by this date. That is flawed thinking and what we need to start going is I, you need to go. I am someone who enjoys eating healthily. I am someone who wants to feel more energy and I want to feel energized. I want to play beach volleyball or become an ocean swimmer or whatever it is. You have to try and think about what identity shift do you want instead of what short term goal you're trying to chase.

Jenna D'Apice: 25:17

I like that one. I haven't really thought about that before, because you always think it's kind of more like, instead of like the short term weight loss goals and like that is like what are the general parts of how I live my day to day life that I need to shift, as opposed to a specific tiny little goal, that then if you fail that, then you've your big failure instead of working towards tiny little steps in your life.

Lyndi Cohen: 25:43

Indeed, and it could be something as simple as going on. You might have an internal dialogue that says I'm really lazy, I'm just a lazy person and so anytime you kind of try and do something and it doesn't work, you come back to this idea I'm just a lazy person and it is that identity that you have adopted that is a limiting factor. Maybe you're in a, you know, an energized person who does lazy things and I think it's more. It's more about that. No, going on, you know what? I've? Actually an energized person. I don't think you can underestimate how big an impact all these things can have.

Jenna D'Apice: 26:14

Number 14, and that is healthifying every little single thing you eat.

Lyndi Cohen: 26:20

Now, I'm not opposed to some level of healthifying, but she gets out of control when people think I got to help find my chocolate and then I got to help find my pasta and the next thing you know they're basically just eating air and ice cubes, and I just can't handle it. It's okay if you want to add in more vegetables, add in more legumes, make some swaps here and there, more about that, that's totally cool. But when all the foods that you previously love have to get fixed or you fear eating them, that's incredibly problematic for me and in fact it can be a sign of a developing eating disorder. So it's something to be mindful of.

Jenna D'Apice: 26:52

Because it's still very much going back to the classifying every food as good or bad, because it's. These are the bad foods and I have to healthify them so that they therefore become the good food and we don't really need to be thinking about any food like that we certainly do not.

Lyndi Cohen: 27:08

Now let's talk about other people in our lives, because I think this is a big ease allowing people in your life to make comments on what you eat or way. Now this is especially true if you had someone maybe it's a mother or partner who you've recruited to help you diet in the past. I think those comments can be incredibly sabotaging and triggering and it's very tricky to have those conversations. We actually do have a podcast episode where we talk about my mom would start criticizing my weight. We'll leave a link to it in the show notes so you can find that easily, because I think this is a really important one to make sure that we don't have those comments, because they can really derail us.

Jenna D'Apice: 27:45

And you do have to keep reminding people again and again and again, but it definitely gets easier every time that you tell people I don't need those comments. And I actually had a really good example of it actually works, because I have been telling my dad for so long like I don't need those comments about losing weight. I'm fine the way I am. And the other day I was talking to him about how I'm really enjoying swimming right now and I thought he was going to say my brain was preempting that it was going to say something about weight loss. And he said wow, if you keep swimming, you're going to become so fit. And I was like oh, my goodness, whoa, yeah, I was so shocked that he said that because I was just prepping myself that he's going to say wow, you'll lose a lot of weight if you keep swimming. And he said fit. And I was like yeah, I know, maybe I'll be able to swim so long without stopping. And I was like so it works.

Lyndi Cohen: 29:07

And Jenna, just just for everyone else's benefit.

Jenna D'Apice: 29:09

you have had quite a few chats before and little reminders along the way, like for multiple, multiple years, but I had my first breakthrough of me not having to prompt and I'm like, oh, amazing, it is worth it.

Lyndi Cohen: 29:20

I am sorry that takes so long, that setting those boundaries does take so long, but it is worth it.

Jenna D'Apice: 29:27

I think number 16 kind of leads into helping you with number 15, and that's you yourself commenting on other people's food, weight or eating.

Lyndi Cohen: 29:34

Yeah, I know someone earlier this week I saw they were like, oh, lindy, you've lost weight. I didn't know what to do with that. I was like, hey, listen, we don't actually make those comments anymore and they were very apologetic for it. But I think it's very rare that you could ever comment on what someone looks like, what they're eating or their weight, without it being triggering to them and to yourself. So if you feel like you notice that urge to go oh my goodness, marisa, you've lost so much weight, just notice it. How to have those thoughts? But then just decide you're not going to verbalize it and then change the radio channel in your brain to switch off those thoughts.

Jenna D'Apice: 30:09

Because I always think, even if someone says something to me about oh, look how much this person's gained weight or lost weight or anything like that Then my brain still the thing is like oh, would anyone say that about me and people commenting about me? And it just puts, it, just brings it further up in the brain of something that really doesn't even need to be Chatted about in the first place number 17 100% clean eating.

Lyndi Cohen: 30:33

And I know clean eating has its moments and maybe it's less prevalent these days. What we mean by clean eating here is if you feel like you've just applied all these food rules and you might have all of these diet rules over many years. It's like carbs are fattening, sugar is bad for me. I can't have gluten. Maybe you've had a diagnosis and someone's like you should follow this diet for the best results, and the problem is that you might be noticing that having all these rules is actually making it very hard for you to listen to your body, to Eat in a relaxed way, and it's making you feel very stressed around food and, ironically, for a lot of these health conditions, stress is certainly not a thing we need in our bodies. You can lead us to binge eat on the very foods we're trying to avoid, and I think this whole clean eating movement is very much grounded in Fearing food, judging food.

Lyndi Cohen: 31:20

To just notice if you go, I shouldn't have eaten that, that was bad. Just notice that voice. It's okay to have those thoughts because this is how you've been programmed to think. Just notice those thoughts and go. You know what? That's not a helpful way of thinking. We're gonna turn off that brain and distract yourself. You might need to change the channel on that station again and again, but keep doing it because it's so worth it.

Jenna D'Apice: 31:41

And it can also be very limiting, and I know like making your own food and cooking is great, but that you should never feel scared to eat something if you haven't made it, because you don't know every single ingredient that it has gone in it.

Lyndi Cohen: 31:55

Yeah, Number 18 is online shopping. Now, this is just like a throw me, a bit of a random one, but this idea if you feel like you're compulsively buying clothes and stuff online, I think online shopping, similar to emotional eating or over exercising, is another way that we can numb or deal with hard emotions. It certainly also plays into this feeling of I have nothing to wear. It's. I'm always trying to fix how I look, because how I look is the most important thing about me. You end up spending a lot of money, especially in this climate. Money can be tight for almost everyone at the moment. So just noticing if there's boxes constantly arriving your house, noticing that actually that could be a sign that you are Having a hard time dealing with something and they might be going oh, you know, use a hard jump to go up from online shopping and eat, go and speak to a psychologist.

Jenna D'Apice: 32:42

But I actually think it's probably a clue that there is something that you need to address that isn't quite feeling quite right for you number 19 on the topic of shopping, but this one backed food, and that's just buying more Unhealthy foods for the house than you would like to eat.

Lyndi Cohen: 32:59

Yeah, and you might go all. You know what happens if I've got like 40 people just randomly stopped by my house and I need to entertain them all. I've heard that a lot and there is something that you can do, especially if you grew up in a household where there wasn't a steady supply of food, where maybe things were really tight and you had a ration how much you're eating. Your parents told you to finish everything on your plate. If you grew up like this, if there could be a real idea of not hoarding but really wanting to have a plentiful supply of food and this is your curry, where I think I love a well-stocked pantry, don't get me wrong, but I also think that monkey, see, monkey eat, and I know for myself if I ever go. Oh, you know, I'd like to be a bit healthier this week. I surround my environment with foods that I want to eat and that's, as a result, that's what I ends up eating.

Lyndi Cohen: 33:42

Now, I'm not saying clear out your cupboards of anything that's unhealthy, that's certainly not what I'm saying, but it's. It's not to the point of going all right, I'll just buy a cake because it's fun and I'm allowed to eat cake. You are, but we don't need to buy an entire cake and bring it home. And so there's certain ways you go. Am I doing this to support myself? Am I doing this to you know? Prove that I can eat everything. Is there a way that I can still prove that I can have everything without making it? Putting it right in front of my face all the time and then having the whole to self-defeated language around it when you don't end up not eating it?

Jenna D'Apice: 34:15

And I think something that helps you with that is, if you are out with a friend at a cafe, like there's the time to get your piece of cake, eat it there, love it, enjoy it. You don't need to then be like I can have cake anytime I want, because then when you want to go buy the cake for the house, you're like I had a cake bit of cake yesterday. I don't need to buy a whole cake for my house. I love this.

Lyndi Cohen: 34:33

I had this huge breakthrough today. I was thinking about this idea. When you're an emotional eater, you use food as the reward at the end of the thing that you've accomplished. So you might go oh, I'm gonna eat really healthy when I'm with my friend, at the end of the day, I'll reward myself with food. Now, when you start to think of Food as fuel, you go no, food is the thing that gets me the progress. So then you go on the cake while with the friends and the treat of the end of the day will be going to sleep. So just thinking about that, what we want to be doing is eating those less healthy foods, socializing with them, enjoying them, and not just holding them for when we secret eating with them. So if you notice that secret eating happening, it might be a clue that there is a bit of this, this relationship, going on for you.

Jenna D'Apice: 35:16

I love that so much. Tip number 20 I don't have kids that I'm sure, linda, you would have more advice on this than I. That is spending more time prepping your kids food than you do for yourself. What could be a?

Lyndi Cohen: 35:29

dog food, your partner's food, or you know. You know you're feeling like you don't have time to prep your own food but you're spending a lot of time on social media. It goes back to this idea of going I don't have time to prep my own food or I'm happy to take care of my kids by making this extravagant bento box or prepping them meals from scratch because they, they say they don't want to eat the food that I'm eating. It could just be a clue if you feel like I don't feel it have. I don't have the foods that I need. I'm not putting in the time I'm not having you know the things planned out. It's just a clue that this could actually be a sabotaging behavior.

Lyndi Cohen: 36:06

I have an idea that you should make your lunch first. I make my lunch first, it's the whole. Put your air mask on first thing, for as a mother, we always tend to put ourselves last, bottom of the hierarchy, and what I want you to do is the opposite. So first make your lunch and only after your lunch is prepared. Then you can make your kids lunch or, you know better yet, make your partner do it. That's what I've done to my family number 21, and this is the last habit we're going to talk about that is could be sabotaging your health is not writing out a shopping list Now, especially if you are trying to stick within a budget. It can mean that you end up making impulse decisions based on whatever is on on sale, and we want to be doing a bit of that because we want to pick what's on special and discounted and absolutely adjust your what you're going to cook.

Lyndi Cohen: 36:49

That we can be flexible, but I think what this can do is not only blow out your budget. That makes you, with that environment, you end up buying stuff Probably don't want to eat during the week. So that's a really important one, and I will just read at the moment this idea that back to basics my app is not only would save you time and money on your groceries people keep saying how much they're saving when they're using back to basics on the grocery bills but with a click of a button you can add different recipes to your online shopping cart and click a button and get it delivered to your doorstep, or you can then take that shopping list and go shop and online shop at in store, and so I just think it's the real pain point I was trying to solve there is taking the guesswork out of planning, shopping and cooking for your food, just to make it a little bit simpler, because, honestly, who has time for it? I certainly don't most times, and that's one way to make it easier I think.

Jenna D'Apice: 37:39

another little tidbit on shopping lists is don't make it a huge task for yourself when you know that you need something, you see that it's run out right down straight away, and then at the end of the week when you've gone through your food, you have to make your shopping list when you've already got 10 items on there that you know you need. It's not such a daunting task. It's not about I got to go through the kitchen and remember all the things that I've run out of, like it's already started and on the way it's delicious.

Lyndi Cohen: 38:08

I do endorse that. In fact, les and I my husband we have a collaborative note on iPhone. You know the notes out. Yes, you can create collaborations there so that he adds items to the shopping list. I add items so soon as we know we've run out of it gets added to it. There are other apps you can use, but that's a very simple one to do and that way we always have a shopping list. We never have to go, oh, what are we gonna buy from the grocery store this week? It's there and ready for us. So, as much as you can, taking out these things that are sabotaging your health, putting a new, healthier habits, and remembering none of the things we've talked about today is about eating less. It's about cutting out whole food groups. What we're talking about is healthy things you can do that will have a whole bunch of flow on effects to other aspects of your life, whether it's sleep, mental health, how much energy you have. Remembering health is not about the size of your pants. In fact, I'd recommend you getting a size bigger.

Jenna D'Apice: 38:58

And, as always, we're in no way saying from tomorrow you are doing no more of those 21 habits. Remember them all and action them all. What's the one habit that I feel like connect to the most, that I feel like I could work on like one habit? And trying to work on that until it is concrete and rock solid is so much better than trying to do 21 habits for 21 habits and then forgetting about it completely.

Lyndi Cohen: 39:25

Yeah, let's not do that everyone. Thank you for listening to today's episode. We hope you found that useful. All the details that we talked about will be in the show notes and, of course, the thing that helps to motivate Jenna and I to keep making this podcast is you leaving lovely reviews. So we go yeah, people like this, they're listening. So if you could please leave a review for no one is when you were ever you listen to your podcast and tell your friends, tell your family, and maybe they'll get benefit from no one's when create