I started my food stamp challenge on a Friday. The Thursday before I spent all but 7 cents at Walmart to get my food for the week ahead. My purchase consisted of a loaf of whole wheat bread, peanut butter, 6 bananas, a gallon of skim milk, a bag of off-brand frosted mini-wheats, 3 large potatoes, 2% shredded cheese, a small bag of carrot chips, and a head of broccoli. I became a little frustrated during my shopping when I realized that fat free shredded cheese cost over a dollar more than the 2%! This may not sound like a lot of food to most people for one week, but I made it through the challenge on these foods and didn't cheat once!
The hardest part of my challenge was the beginning. Since I began on a Friday, I had the whole weekend ahead of me, and I couldn't go out to eat! Going out to eat on the weekends was always a treat that I no longer had. It was also hard to turn my friends down when they invited me out to eat, and I had to say no because I couldn't afford it. In this aspect, the challenge made me feel less sociable, and if I were on food stamps more permantly, it would no doubt make it harder for me to fit in.
Once I made it through the weekend though, it was much easier. The only challenge I really noticed after that was that I couldn't snack and there wasn't much variety in what I was eating. I did change the amount I exercised also. I know this is less healthy for me, but I knew I would get more hungry if I worked out every day. I only worked out one day of the entire week. Normally I work out 4 days of the week.
I ended up with enough food left over to last me about one more day, and I even shared several cups of my milk. The amount of food this challenge allowed wasn't that difficult to make last, but it didn't allow me to be as healthy as I should be. One serving of fruits and one serving of vegetables a day isn't what the food guide pyramid calls for, and unfortunately these are the quite a bit more pricey than junk foods. This challenge gave me a different perspective on why people aren't always able to eat healthy, and I hope after experiencing this people do more to help others.
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2 comments:
Congrats on making through the week without cheating kelly, you did better than I did :)
I thought your comment about not exercising as much was interesting, because you're right, you really don't have a lot of energy to waste when your diet is so restricted. So really, it's not just your nutritional health that's affected, but your overall physical well-being that's hurt. It's scary.
Thanks for taking the challenge!
Hi Kelly,
Thanks for your taking the challenge and posting what you did,
''This challenge gave me a different perspective on why people aren't always able to eat healthy, and I hope after experiencing this people do more to help others. ''
It is good that there are people like yall out there that understand how hard it is to be so poor, and do things to make others aware of the problem.
Thanks to all of you for what you do.
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