My Journey From Fast Food to Frozen Meals to Fresh Food

I tried many times to go cold turkey with dieting.

Before dieting or eating in a way to lose unwanted pounds, my eating habits were full of fast food, processed food, restaurant food, junk food, and healthy foods.  All told I would say maybe 20% of what I ate was healthy. Naturally I was gaining weight. Then after I could not take being fat anymore, I would go all in on some diet plan. My commitment to my diet would last roughly three weeks before I would slowly slip into cheating one day a week, then two days  a week and so on. Before I knew it I was completely off of my diet.

I knew my failed attempts were my fault. But of course I would blame the diet.  It took 20+ years of yo-yo dieting to realize that I could not go from a diet that was 20% healthy to a diet that was 100% healthy.

I also knew that I could not go from heat and serve meals or restaurant meals to cooking all of my meals all of the time.

I needed a compromised approached. 

My Fast Food Diet
So I started with a 1320 calorie diet soles made up of food from fast food restaurants. For instance, my meal plan consisted of a donut for breakfast (300 calories); two fast food tacos for lunch (340), an entire personal pan pizza (600 calories), and 1 cup of unsweetened apple sauce (50 calories). Oddly enough only after two weeks I was craving salads, fruits and vegetables. I guess that’s the contrarian in me.  

My Frozen Food Diet
Next, I slowly started to exchange fast food with frozen entrees where I eventually created a my own frozen food “Jenny Craig-ish” diet with the frozen entrees I bought at the grocery story.

My Fresh Food Diet
Then finally, I created a food plan where breakfast and lunch were made up of fruits, vegetables, yogurt, plant-based protein, hot & cold cereals, and every once in a while a donut. My dinner still had to be a frozen entry because I am impatient around dinner time and my meal needs to be prepared quickly.

The good news is that after nine months of being on my Fast to Frozen to Fresh food plan 90% of my diet consisted of healthy meals which in turn brought me to a weight that brings me joy! Nine months may sound long, but I had been fighting the weight battle for over 20 years so nine months was nothing.