Gone are the days of the traditional 9 to 5 sitting at the same desk on repeat 5 days per week! These days, the new norm is flexible working arrangements including freelancing, having a part-time side hustle, or working a few days from home.
Understandably, a change to our work routine means a change to our lifestyle and therefore eating habits. In fact, working from home can present a few traps when it comes to weight management, and here I touch on exactly how and what to do instead.
4 Steps: How To Get Rid Of Weight Gain From Working At Home
1. Procrastination Eating
Without having your work wife by your side or water cooler chats to entertain you at work, food can become a source of entertainment and procrastination. For instance, if you are putting off sending an uncomfortable email or starting research for a report, checking the fridge or cupboard and taking a snack break is likely to appeal more. However, if you do this regularly you may find yourself grazing throughout the entire day and eating unnecessarily.
Instead:
Activate your Apple watch and create designated breaks, stand up and stretch, go for a short walk or simply listen to a 10min motivating podcast when restlessness sets in. This will give you a good opportunity to clear your mind and regroup before getting back into work.
2. Lack of routine
A lack of routine in life can negatively impact our eating regime because it can lead to grazing, skipping meals, and then binging or turning to unhealthy food choices due to poor planning. When working in an office, our daily schedule can be pretty concrete and this helps to give structure to our eating habits. Since working from home, if you have found yourself waking up at random times, skipping breakfast or turning breakfast into a mid-morning snack, and then unsure where lunch fits in and this is not working for you, its time to make a change.
Instead:
Have a set wake up time, have a morning routine such as some exercise or meditation followed by breakfast. Aim to have a set lunchtime during which you stop and eat away from the screen. This should be enough structure to allow everything else to fall into place!
3. Inactivity
When we swap the daily commute, coffee runs, walking to meetings, and out to get lunch to everything being within arms reach at home, its quite likely, step count will significantly decrease. This can make weight management a tad bit harder especially if your food intake has increased.
Instead:
If you haven’t already, schedule in a daily walk to make up for the loss of steps, walk around the house during phone meetings, get a standing desk and try to get up from the desk regularly throughout the day.
4. Free reign on food
When going into work, it’s pretty common to pack a meal for lunch and a few snacks with the mindset, this is my food for the day – the lure of Uber Eats aside. At home, this is no longer the case because generally speaking, we have greater access to food and this may lead to eating more then we need.
Instead:
Set some general guidelines on how much you would like to eat (based on hunger and satiety) and loosely base your meals and snacks on this amount. If you are really struggling, temporarily pack your lunch as though you are leaving for work and eat this during your workday until you can get into a good pattern and choose food on the spot. Meal prep is also equally as important when working from home, so if you have given this up thinking you have more time to prepare food, go back to at least preparing a few meals to see you through the start of the week and always have healthy ingredients and snacks on hand to create meals from. Finally, if you really need some structure and to reset old habits, sign up for a healthy meal plan and meal delivery program such as Dietlicious 4 Week Body Reset Program.
Photo by Ella Jardim on Unsplash
