What do you do when.....

[melbel]

healthy snacks: any nuts but not peannts and cashews. So macadamias, brazil, almonds etc. make up a mix and pop it in a container in the fridge....all those nuts are excellents sources of good protein. Looking at your meal plan I see that you could do with some more good protein foods and maybe a bit less on the higher GI carbs. Potato, rice and most white flour pastas are high gi and so absorbed way too quickly into the bloodstream for your body to deal with. If you want potato try waxy potatoes and if you want rice try basmati or doongara rice as these are all lower GI foods. Wholegrain pastas are okay too. Yoghurt is a great snack as long as it is not too high in refined sugars.... you sound like you are from OS with your talk of pounds so I am not sure what nutrition info is on food labels where you are. Here you can check on the label the total carb value of a food but also how much of that is made up of sugar. The less sugar is in the total carb value the better.

If you want to make vegies more appealing or hide them even, make a stir fry, or pastry less pie (you know just the pastry on top not all round it to cut down the carb content), clear soups of all varieties (try and avoid soups that need cream added), creative pizzas using pita bread for the base. I do a pita bread pizza with a sauce made from a tin of diced organic tomatoes and chopped up basil (throw in other spices if you want). Then it has red onion, chopped up spinach, mushroom, cherry tomato, bocconcini and fetta cheese, avocado and mozarella cheese on top. somewhere in there i add salt and pepper and some peppered seasoning mix for a bit of oomph. You can also add some cut up grilled chicken as well.
Oh and three meals a day is not enough...... it may sound strange but eating a healthy snack in between all those meals will actually help you lose weight because it stimulates your metabolism to work faster.

[Cricket]

Thanks melbel! Yes, getting my head around the snacking thing is a bit of a challenge. I really feel like I shouldn't eat! But I will try eating a little more, and choosing carefully. BTW - I got the waxy red potatoes in my groceries today, not the usual yellow ones. I have to learn more about cooking brown rice, I think, but I should try it too.

[anney]

Cricket,
when dd was going through a time I found challenging, I got into the habit of giving myself a reward as soon as she went to sleep during the day. I would grab a cup of tea and have 2 squares of chocolate. I found looking forward to that reward and just having a little bit of chocolate kept the cravings at bay and gave me something to look forward to when I was stressed.
I think it is really difficult to be too hard on yourself with food when you have lots of stress going on and as long as you eat well the rest of the time, a little reward occasionally is not going to hurt.

good luck.