Is Your Job Making You Fat?

Gaining weight is a normal part of getting older, but you might be surprised at exactly what it is that is causing you to gain weight. Some people gain weight because they are depressed, others gain weight because they are happy. 

 
Others simply gain weight because they never get any exercise. However, there is a new group of people who are gaining weight simply because of their jobs. Does this sound like you?


I came to this realization after I was off work to recover from surgery. There was nothing wrong with my appetite, but I lost a whopping 5 pounds in 7 days off from work. I had little to no activity either, since the surgery I had was on my knee. So why was I losing weight instead of gaining?

As soon as I started back to work, I realized the answer. My job was making me fat! I started tracking exactly what I was eating every day. The result was neither healthy nor pretty. I started the day with a soda and a breakfast bar and by 10:00 I was hungry again, so I ate some cookies or whatever I could find in the break room.

By lunch time, everyone at work is stressed and wants to get out of the office and eat something completely unhealthy, like pasta or burgers. Then, at 3:00, there is usually even more food to snack on in the break room. I was eating as a form of stress relief! Since I wasn't under any stress when I was home, I was simply eating when I was hungry. What a way to lose weight! Now, I just had to figure out how to keep myself from stress eating at work.


I decided that eating a real breakfast would help me to get the day off to a good start. Even though that would mean getting up a little earlier, it would be worth it in the long run. Instead of having a soda and a breakfast bar, I would have a bowl of cereal, a banana and some juice. Now, I didn't get hungry at the 10:00 break.


The hardest part was making myself eat a healthy lunch. I decided to take baby steps. My goal was to eat something green at every lunch. Even if it was just a side of green beans. I would eat the green foods on my plate first, and then eat the other food. This actually made a huge difference.

 
By eating green foods that gave me more nutrients, I felt better during the afternoon and was not hungry at my 3:00 break. Just doing these 2 simple things has proven to show results. I started losing a pound or two immediately. ? If you need to lose a few pounds, take a long, hard look at what you are eating during your work day. You might just surprise yourself!