SARAH DI LORENZO: How to feed the family when on a diet and avoid being sabotaged

Cooking the family dinner can make or break some of us when trying to get to a healthy weight.

It is that time of day when our defences are down, it’s possibly been a long day at work, you have stuck to your program all day but balancing different dinners for you and the family can just be overwhelming.

As parents we put our kids first when cooking the family dinner, their chicken schnitzel or spaghetti bolognese comes first and you can end up eating for many reasons ranging from time poor and tired to being disorganised.

But this does not have to be the case, with some organisation, communication and strategies in place you can stay on track and stick to your health goals.

For starters let your family know you are wanting to get to a health goal so they understand your twists on their meals or you are possibly eating something completely different.

In my experience I see many family members even joining in on the health journey and other members being completely supportive. Communication is key to avoid any resistance.

When it comes to meal prep try and work out meals you can cook for the entire family. I call them the Three Part Meals. You cook for the family a source of protein, salad and or vegetables and then make carbohydrates on the side.

For example you could cook some chicken skewers with a greek salad and roasted potato wedges for them, or if you were cooking tacos you could have your meat and salad in lettuce leaf.

Another good idea is to have dinners that are a build your own health bowl, you have the ingredients out and every one helps themselves. This also doubles up for a packed lunch the next day.

This way everyone is getting meals they can enjoy that are also nutritious and delicious.

When it comes to being organised this also covers all your snacks. Make sure you have nuts to snack on, the fruit bowl full, vegetable sticks cut up or boiled eggs in the fridge door.

Put all the lunch box snacks or treats in storage containers and put away. Remove the foods from the house that really tempt you, or put them out of easy reach.

You may find some family members not so happy with the changes. As I mentioned earlier some will jump on board with you while others may try and tempt you.

My advice is to always be kind but set firm boundaries and remember the reason why you started this in the first place — to be your best self.

In my time as a clinician I have seen partners try to sabotage and this is about them not you. This can be linked to a fear of change, insecurity, feeling jealous, feeling left out or they don’t like drinking the wine or eating the dessert on their own and need you to be an enabler.

Just take the high road, communicate that your health goals are your personal journey and have no impact on the relationship, understand that the partner may need some reassurance.

When it comes to family time, birthdays or anniversaries, just times when the family is eating together to celebrate my advice is to enjoy it with the family as family and food are a part of life and culture for so many of us.

I know my kids love it when I eat, love, laugh and enjoy with them.

The next day I always will eat light to balance it out and I do all this with confidence that I am still living my healthy best life.

While you are on this journey and improving your health, sleep, weight, mood, stress, energy or while treating a disease talk to your family about it.

Share with them how happy this is making you, ask them to celebrate with you with a family outing, when your loved ones see you happy they will be more supportive, they just need to adapt to the change.

Getting to your health goal is achievable while feeding a family, you just need to do some planning, communication, organisation, be a little flexible and all on the same page.

Where there is a will there is a way.