‘Food is your body’s fuel’: You’ve probably heard this thousands of times and deep inside you know it’s true but you keep asking yourself ‘Why do I procrastinate eating so much?’ In this post, you’ll find out why you skip meals and 9 unique strategies to finally overcome it!
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Why Do I Procrastinate Eating? [+ 9 Useful Tips To Overcome It!]
Most busy bees like you and me think that eating is a waste of time (let alone sleeping).
You know that it’s important yet you procrastinate when it comes to fueling your body with nutrients.
But why do you keep skipping meals?
There are different reasons why you procrastinate eating:
1. Lack of Organization
2. Hyperfocus
3. Anxiety
4. Anorexia Nervosa
5. ADHD
1. Lack Of Organization
Let’s admit it: sometimes, we lack the organization skills needed to manage our day!
A messy schedule and even a disorganized office affect our eating habits.
Without the right system and a set routine, you can easily forget that you have to eat and you allocate your time to more ‘important’ tasks.
You can even forget about buying groceries!
Messy schedule + no groceries = disaster.
Plus, when you are working on your tasks, eating seems too much of a hassle, so you end up deciding to postpone your meal or even ordering food delivery, which is more expensive.
2. Hyperfocus
I plead guilty on this one!
Has it ever happened to you that you are so focused on your tasks that you lose track of the real world?
This happens all the time to me and negatively affects my eating schedule.
If I feel that something is very very important, I work on it until I finish it, no matter if I’m hungry or not.
And, sometimes, I’m so deeply focused that I forget to eat for hours… So unhealthy!
Hyperfocus, as you can see, is another reason why you might be procrastinating eating.
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3. Anxiety
When you suffer from anxiety, your body is in a ‘fight-or-flight’ mode and it is not capable of resting or digesting properly.
Food, basically, is not key to your survival when you are anxious.
That’s where you start experiencing loss of appetite.
Even if you force yourself to eat, you hardly feel the taste of the food and it even can make you feel nauseous.
Your brain just can’t focus on other things but the source of your stress and your desire to eat vanishes.
Remember that you can always get professional support to get rid of your anxiety. I highly recommend ONLINE THERAPY for its outstanding service and warm-hearted professionals. Get 20% OFF your first month with my special link!
4. Anorexia Nervosa
If you keep asking yourself ‘Why do I procrastinate eating?’, your procrastination might be connected to the eating disorder called Anorexia Nervosa.
This life-threatening condition makes you feel obsessed about your body weight and you force yourself to reduce your calorie intake.
People with anorexia also experience an irrational fear of gaining weight, have a distorted image of their bodies, and do punishing physical exercises to keep losing weight, putting their lives at risk.
Anorexia Nervosa, fortunately, is treatable and involves different strategies, such as psychological therapy and hospitalization in the most severe cases.
5. ADHD
Did you know that skipping your meals might be a symptom of Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)?
This mental disorder causes the inability to focus, hyperactivity, and impulsiveness.
This ends up negatively affecting the sufferer’s self-esteem and daily functioning, which hinders their personal, academic, and professional development.
How is this connected to your procrastination?
Well, ADHD causes you to undereat or forget about eating.
It’s pretty common for people with this condition to focus on a stimulating task and lose track of hunger signals, favoring the habit of eating based on cravings.
If this sounds like you, consider receiving professional support. ADHD is treatable!
How Do I Break The Habit Of Skipping Meals?
If you want to stop procrastinating eating, you can apply the following strategies to break the habit of skipping meals:
1. Set Up an Eating Schedule
2. Start Your Day With A Big Meal
3. Cook Healthy Snacks
4. Use An Alarm
5. Remind Yourself Why You Should Eat
6. Try MealPrepping
1. Set Up an Eating Schedule
First things first, get organized!
You can never take your meals seriously if your day is a mess.
Start by setting up a routine and making a schedule for eating and your other tasks.
You can use a physical agenda or a digital one, even Google Calendar.
It doesn’t matter what you use really; what’s key here is allocating specific time slots to each activity of the day and sticking to your new routine.
It can be a little challenging at first, but this is all a matter of building discipline and respecting your schedule.
Having specific times of the day to eat will help you unplug and get your well-deserved nutrients and energy.
2. Start Your Day With A Big Meal
Having a big breakfast is a fantastic way of ingesting a great part of the calories needed for the day.
There are people who skip breakfast to get down to work fast, but what they are really doing is wasting the opportunity to get the energy needed to perform well and be able to focus.
What’s worse, they do not eat breakfast later, they just eliminate it and eat fewer meals per day.
Fix this by eating a delicious, nutrient-packed breakfast.
Here are some breakfast ideas to power up your mornings:
- Scrambled eggs + whole-wheat bread + Greek yogurt with blueberries
- Overnight oats with milk + banana slices + cacao nibs + coconut flakes
- Avocado toast + latte + fruit salad
- Banana hotcakes + peanut butter + matcha tea
- Crepes + sauteed spinach and cherry tomatoes + scrambled tofu with garlic
3. Cook Healthy Snacks
Instead of going hours without eating, try having healthy snacks near you to maintain your energy levels and ingest small portions of nutrients as the day goes by.
These are better if made beforehand.
That way you just need to grab them and enjoy them on the go.
Otherwise, you can end up skipping meals or eating sugar-packed snacks that do more harm than good.
Healthy snacks will help you feel full between meals and avoid starving yourself.
Here are some guilt-free snacks that you can cook to stop procrastinating eating:
- Apple slices with peanut butter
- Rice crackers with hummus
- Dried almonds and cashew nuts
- Dates
- Guacamole
- Protein muffins
- Smoothie
- Chia pudding
- Banana bread
- Oatmeal cookies
4. Use An Alarm
If you’re laser-focused on your tasks and you forget to eat, the go-to solution is using alarms.
No matter if you’re handling e-mails, tidying up your house, or working on an important assignment, an alarm is what you need to stop what you’re doing and eat your meal.
Respect your alarms.
If you set one for a specific hour, that means the next time slot is exclusively to take a break and replenish your energy with food.
No more forgetting about eating.
Just as using alarms to wake up, using them to eat is an effective way to stop skipping meals.
5. Remind Yourself Why You Should Eat
Although it’s tempting to finish your to-do list before eating, the reality is that in order to do that you have to spend hours working without food.
There are days that I even procrastinate drinking water because I’m hyperfocused.
But, if you think about it well, you realize that there’s no point in procrastinating eating.
Your performance decreases, exhaustion sinks in, and you suffer.
The sensation of hunger while trying to finish something is awful.
So, does it make sense to procrastinate eating?
Not at all.
Consciously remind yourself of this.
There’s no need to suffer.
When your brain tells you ‘Just one more task’, just reply ‘Shut up’ and go eat your meal.
6. Try Meal Prepping
The reason why I love meal prepping is that it allows you to make food in advance for the week.
This way, you have ready-made meals that you can take out of the fridge when needed.
Cooking food in advance not only saves time and money but also helps you stay on track and avoid procrastinating eating.
Think about it: you are busy, there’s no time to cook, and you don’t want to order food.
What’s better than going straight to the fridge and taking out nutrient-packed meals that you can eat right from the container?
It’s so convenient.
Choose one day of the week and dedicate two to three hours to meal prepping.
Think of easy and delicious food that you can make with a few ingredients.
You can even repurpose the leftovers!
For more info, you can check this post on how to save money with meal prepping (it includes some great meal-prepping ideas too!)
How Long Is It OK To Not Eat In A Day?
You can restrict your food intake for a few hours during the day, but not eating for more than eight hours while you are active leads to low blood sugar, dizziness, and exhaustion.
Ideally, you can fast for 8 to 12 hours during the night, after having all the meals of the day.
During your fasting, you are asleep and your body recovers for the next day.
Just try to avoid going more than 4 hours without eating: you need energy to perform well and exploit your brain’s full potential.
How Often Should I Eat Per Day?
You should eat three to five times per day to ingest the right amount of calories and nutrients your body needs to work properly.
This involves full meals and snacks in between every three hours to boost your metabolism and maintain your energy levels.
Now, it can’t be any type of food.
Make sure to eat meals containing a balanced amount of protein, good carbs, and healthy fats.
If you want to know how much food per meal you need, consult your nutritionist of trust.
These professionals will prepare a meal plan tailored to your specific needs after doing the relevant health checks.
Wrapping Up: Why Do I Procrastinate Eating?
So there you have it!
If you are there asking yourself ‘Why do I procrastinate eating?’, now you know that you skip your meals for different potential reasons, from lack of a set routine to health conditions.
Which one do you feel identified with?
I particularly identify with the one related to hyperfocus, but I’m working on it every day and it’s getting better!
Feel free to apply all the strategies to stop procrastinating eating featured here.
They really helped me avoid skipping my meals.
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