What was your menu like before getting healthy?


typical example of mine (varied)
B: toast and jelly
L: ham and cheese bagel, milk, fruit cup
D: pasta with cream sauce
snacks: crackers, cereal, yogurt, fruits, low fat cookies/cakes

weekends were random: Italian subs, spaghetti, potato salad, Chinese fried rice, big quantities of everything

Full portions of everything. Pasta for dinner and soda and juice and stuff. Very few vegetables.

2 slices of toast for breakfast.

At least 2 large lattes throughout the day.

Orange juice for lunch with sushi, chips and a cake.

Dinner would be something like pasta or two sandwiches with cheese and ham.

Followed by chips and chocolate in front of the television.

The bread, chips and candy did it. Combined with occassional double portions.

But it was slow go. Perhaps just five pounds gain a year, but over two decades that was 100lbs!

Anything quick (usually prepackaged, processed, fast food, etc.) I'm away from my house from 630am-10pm during the week which doesn't leave a lot of time for meal prep!

A lot of junk food. Salt, salt, salt

No breakfast, or one of cereal or egg sandwich or leftovers.

Lunch almost always a sandwich, like roast beef and mayo on white bread. Sometimes a huge ham sub. Always chips with a sandwich. Chips or Doritos. Sometimes fast food if out with the kids (usually a QP value meal at McDs).

Some snacks... whatever I wanted.

Dinner was a huge bowl of pasta. Or chicken gravy over mashed potatoes. Or Chinese takeout. Or pizza.

Sometimes dessert, sometimes a big bowl of popcorn.

I ate huge portions. HUGE.

I'm not a featherweight but I'd love to jump in...

I used to go to Wawa 2-4 times a week for breakfast and/or lunch (Wawa is a gas station + quick service food). I'd get the "low cal" breakfast of bagel, turkey sausage, egg whites & low cal cheese. I'd get a pretzel. I'd get a sub for lunch with a bag of chips.

For dinner I ate a lot of pasta, probably 2-3 times a week. The rest of the time I ate "healthy" but I used a TON of oil in my cooking. And I drank a LOT of beer.

No wonder...

Eating out almost every day. Soda every day. Big portions. Boredom eating. Cakes and cookies and chips because I felt entitled to whatever looked good at the grocery store.

I basically ate whatever gave me pleasure at that moment and suffered for it (weight-wise, gastrointestinally) later.

When I was a child, I scrounged around for money and snuck off to buy whatever food I could get because any hint of preparing food, I was punished. So food was typically what I could carry - quart of ice cream, packs of cookies, Chinese takeout. My parents only came home a couple times a week and had some food, but the frozen rice was so smelly and it only came with one sausage - I had to find a way to make up for that. School lunch was where I had some nutrition - canned peaches for fruit, burgers and pizza day and Guida chocolate milk.


I kept up the same habits as an adult - Hunger Games survival mode - go to store, carry what I can and eat it all. This time it was a 750gram jar of Nutella (4000 calories) and a loaf and a half of bread (2k calories) every evening, stopped when I nearly had a root canal. Had to fight not to eat a whole quart of ice cream in 1 sitting, because my stomach capacity had grown so much over time, but failed every time - always ate the whole thing. Turkey Hill Party cake and Moose Tracks.

Its kinda interesting to see that some people can survive off of ANYTHING, I would go for long stretches of time eating nothing but cheap oils/colorings and chemicals. It sorta keeps me grounded when I make some unhealthy choices here and there.

Anything edible my money could afford; in no specific order. At any time of the day and night.

anything fast food, multiple times a day mcdonalds, chinese food, etc. eating twice for dinner or two servings was not uncommon for me

Not eating badly during the day, but at night it was a free-for-all! All the frustrations of the day would be eaten up in the form of pasta, bread, cheese, candy.

I never ate outrageous amounts of food. I just ate whatever (and whenever) struck my fancy. Lunch was often fast food--a heavy value meal with sugary soda. If I saw something I wanted, I didn't deprive myself. My weight just slowly and subtly crept up over the years.

Hot chips and hot cheese curls, Chinese buffets, hot chips and hot cheese curls, candy bars, ice cream, cookies, patty melts & fries, oh...did I mention hot chips and hot cheese curls? I am surprised I'm still alive. My diet was ALL junk food. Horrible.

I'm with Olivia - my diet was pretty much 100% junky snack food. The only time I ate proper meals was when I went out to nice restaurants with friends, or got fast food from time to time. Otherwise it was just snacking on hot chips, cookies, cupcakes, toffee peanuts, cheese, sugary granola bars, m&ms, etc all day. No real "meal" food whatsoever. Oh, and LOTS of Coke and Starbucks!