Tuesday Talk, February 5th

Happy Tuesday, friends!  Hope your Monday went well.  For this week’s “talk”, let’s talk about eating out.  I don’t know about you but when I was still firmly in the “diet” mentality, I struggled with eating out.  Honestly, I cringed at the thought of going out to eat, especially if I couldn’t plan ahead.  There are still some days that I feel that way.  I am learning more and more what I can have that keeps me within my daily points allowance, what might take me into my weekly points allowance.  For me, one of the biggest parts of this journey has been learning how to do this for a lifetime.  My sweet friend, Heather, reminded me that I am not benefiting myself if I’m overthinking things while I was in the midst of my bad food week.  I was eating out at two different restaurants in the last couple of weeks.  My primary focus was to make good choices for myself to stay within my daily points in order to get my blue dot.  I was able to make choices at both IHOP and at Cracker Barrel that did just that for me.  I was in a position where I could look at the menu and I could make the choices that I knew would make me feel satiated and keep me within my points AND give me a taste of “comfort” foods in order to not feel like I was missing out.  For me, growing up, biscuits were—and still are—one of my favorite breakfast foods.  I was able to have biscuits with both of my meals because I planned my other foods accordingly.  There are times when, quite honestly, I am going to choose the chicken fried steak because that’s what I want to eat.  The great thing about WW is that I can do that.  I can make that choice to have a chicken fried steak or a big salad with regular dressing and olives or avocado or a sandwich without making modifications, i.e. Muffaletta from Jason’s Deli.  

One of the great things about WW Freestyle is that I can eat foods that are on the Zero-Point foods list for my other meals or mix those Zero-Point Foods in with the comfort foods I would like to eat.  For instance, I can have poached eggs (0 SP) and hash browns (depending on the restaurant and the serving differs at Cracker Barrel, it was 6 SP and at IHOP a serving was 9 SP) and a biscuit (general 6SP).  With the Zero-Point Foods, I could still eat something satisfying to get me through the rest of the day without feeling like I should just give up.  The long and short of this is that it is about choices.  Each day I wake up and I make the decision whether I’m going to eat a donut, drink a smoothie or have eggs and biscuits.  The decision is mine.  If I continue to make point friendly choices, I will have a better chance at hitting my weight goal this year.  How do you handle eating out?  When given the option, do you peruse the menu and make choices that help you stick to your plan?  Or do you just go with whatever you are feeling to eat in that moment?