It's a little hard to get the kinds of vegetables that help me meet this challenge. So I'm going to make things a little easier for myself and count legumes as vegetables. This is in line with some expert opinions. I'd wanted to go beyond that and have five servings of fruit + veg and legumes. But it's just too hard right now with limited access to groceries. 8/14
Restricting the amount of your sugar consumption on grams seems at least as difficult as a no sugar rule. How do you do it @Philosophical_Dad ?
Good question! I looked up a few standard desserts (medium-sized chocolate chip cookie, slice of cake, glass of wine, etc.). If I'm eating a pastry, say, I'll just assume it has about as much sugar as a chocolate chip cookie of the same size. When eating stuff with sugar added at home, I check the nutritional information. For example, my wife and I often eat cereal while watching TV after getting our daughter to bed. Most of the cereals we eat have 6-10g of sugar. This approach is imprecise, but I think it helps me keep my sugar consumption down to a level I want.
I think the biggest benefits for me are social. I can eat with people who aren't trying to eat healthy without my eating preferences being "a thing." It's also part of the "flexible" diet thing. That's how it seems to me. I bet there's research on it, but I haven't looked into that, so for all I know it's a terrible idea...
Didn't get my data in for the week-end but probably got 1/3 days. So I'll say 16/31. I'm happy with that, though I can do better. Tomorrow, I start from 0.
Thank you @Philosophical_Dad! I'll try that and I hope accountability will help. Do you have a fixed treat day or is it a flexible day during one week? I had a good run with "no sugar" but since 14th of April I started to eat lots of sugar again. Now I have a sport goal and that should motivate me to eat very healthy. I think I'll see good results quickly if I do both (a lot of training and healthy diet) My plan: - tomorrow and the day after tomorrow NO SUGAR - 1th of May is a treat day - 2th and 3th of May NO SUGAR From there on: one treat day per week. Treat day: no alcohol or drugs, but coffee and some sugar is allowed and also fast food Standard day: no alcohol or drugs, no coffee, no milk, no fast food and no sugar "Some sugar" means there's no defined limit but of course I mustn't binge on a treat day. For the time being I'll set no excact measures. Also I don't want to be very strict with "no sugar": if I eat "just a little bit", like one piece of chocolate it is ok and won't be a "fail", but I need to report it. Honey and dates are always allowed. Also things like pickles which unfortunately contain some free sugars. My goal is to make this work. Then my next goal will be to fast for some days (no food at all) which I had in mind for some time now. After that I should continue with the diet. Next week I'll review this and I'm allowed to change rules.