Healthy eating when working from home as a University student with online courses
Since a lot of students are having online courses this fall semester and are working from home, here is some simple healthy eating behaviors that may help during this time. Simple little nutrition behaviors are often underestimated but can really help you feel better and be more productive every day!
Plan time to eat and use it to eat!
When you plan your routine with your online courses schedule, time to study and other activities, don’t forget to plan time to eat and even more importantly, dedicate this time fully to eating. Even though it might be tempting to continue working while eating, taking the time to eat and disconnect from work is important. It will help you to enjoy your meal more, pay attention to feelings of hunger and fullness as avoiding distractions when eating. Also, doing this will get you to be more productive the rest of the day, because real breaks are part of the strategy of a productive day!
If you can, prepare and cook your food!
Preparing and cooking our own food rather than eating out often results in a lower consumption of fat, salt, sugar and processed food. It is also an activity that can allow yourself to have quality time off screen as a student with online courses and onscreen work to do. Furthermore, you can take this as an opportunity to acquire food skills for your future adult life. Basic food skills have been proven to improved food choices and eating behaviors. Although cooking and preparing food is great, try to minimize trips to the supermarket during the pandemic. For that, you can plan your recipes, use effective preservation techniques and use substitutes in recipes when missing an ingredient.
Make sure to eat enough through the day and drink enough water.
When spending most or all day at home, we have easy access to food all day, which can lead to overconsumption. In order to prevent that, there is many things you can do. Amongst them, you can have specific time to eat and take the time to eat like said earlier. You can eat enough through the day in particularly enough proteins through the day, which will help you stay satisfy, concentrate and will help to prevent you from overeating in the afternoon or at the end of the day. In addition, it is proven that having a breakfast improves academic performance and this even when eaten within two hours of waking up. Also, sometimes we might feel like we are hungry, but we are just thirsty. Therefore, make sure to drink enough water. If you are not a fan of drinking plain water, you can drink lemon water for example, which add flavor without adding sugar, or a hot herbal tea when it is cooler outside. In the end, this will help drink enough water in your day.