Eating Well When You Have a Chronic Health Condition

Eating well and staying hydrated are essential ingredients for health and wellbeing, providing energy to the body and helping to maintain healthy psychological function. A well-balanced diet with the right amount of nutrients (vitamins, protein, minerals, fiber, carbohydrates and fats) can also help protect against potential future health problems like type 2 diabetes and heart disease.

Cooking and eating falls under the category of basic self-care, which includes tasks like sleeping well, getting regular exercise and engaging in social activity. While all of the above contribute to staying fit and healthy, those with chronic health conditions may find that even tending to the basics is exhausting, resulting in a vicious cycle of poor self-care and poor health.

If you have a chronic health condition, unrealistic expectations can be a recipe for self-blame and guilt. While cooking from scratch is often viewed as “good” self care, methods such as using meal delivery services like Fitlife Foods can be invaluable when it comes to saving time and energy. There is no shame in taking steps to help make things easier.

Whether you experience physical health symptoms that make it difficult to get to a supermarket – or, if you find shopping overstimulating and stressful, you can check to see whether your store offers accommodations such as autism-friendly periods. Alternatively, you might consider ordering your shopping online instead.

You may find that in doing so you find it easier to plan and budget your meals. Ordering online can be especially useful for those who may be on reduced income due to a disability. Another good tip is to browse for voucher codes and offers online to help lower the cost of your shopping.

Spoon theory has become a widely-used metaphor to describe energy management among those with chronic illnesses. Originally coined by Christine Miserandino, it contrasts the number of “spoons” an average person has at the start of the day with the amount a person with chronic illness has.

For “spoonies”, the day may start with very low energy. These tips on how to manage the more difficult days may be more applicable on some days than others, and what works for one person might not be as helpful for another. Use discretion, and always be kind to yourself.

Try to anticipate “not-so-good” days ahead of time. One way to do this is to prepare and freeze meals, sauces and snacks to reheat in the microwave. Frozen food such as vegetables can also be especially handy on low-spoon days. You can even get frozen chopped onions and herbs to add to your meals.

Baking parchment can be useful when doing this in order to keep foods like patties separate. Avoid using tin foil, especially if you are susceptible to metal poisoning, and never put metal in a microwave. Investing in a good set of microwaveable tupperware can also be helpful when doing this.

Ordering from services offering ingredients you can then prepare (or ordering pre-packaged frozen meals) can help take the strain out of cooking on low-energy days. They’re also a healthy alternative to ordering unhealthy take-out food: when you need food fast, it doesn’t necessarily have to mean fast food.

Another way to make sure food is easily accessible when you need it is to have a snack plate or bento box on hand. You can fill these with a mix of healthy foods such as pre-cut veggies, fruit, crackers and high-protein snacks. Alternatively, on those days when anything is better than nothing, try “breakfast for dinner”; this can be oatmeal, or egg on toast.

If you can afford it, investing in a rice cooker, airfryer or crockpot can help to make food prep easier. These allow you to make “one-pot” meals (which also reduces the amount of washing up you need to do after). Leaving food to cook can sometimes lead to other potential hazards.

If you struggle with brain fog or focus, leaving food to boil over or burn can be a risk, so it’s important to try and cook with as few distractions as possible, set timers, and where possible, enlist help from others.

We all have good and not-so-good days. For a person with a chronic health condition, a good day might look like managing to get up and get dressed, while on an especially taxing day, they might find it difficult to do either of those things unaided. Everyone has differing levels of ability depending on their own health.

When flare-ups happen, give yourself grace and remember that just as you require accommodations to make life easy from others, you should also grant these to yourself. To show how chronic health conditions can affect eating and cooking, here are some examples:

• Some health conditions (and the medications used to treat them) can lead to nausea: small, light meals and snacks, ginger and refreshing drinks can help with this.
• Physical disabilities can affect a person’s capacity to prepare food for themselves or move around a kitchen safely (planning your kitchen layout can help with this).
• Cognitive disabilities like autism and ADHD can affect proprioception, the body’s ability to register sensations like hunger, or forgetting to eat or drink due to hyperfocus on an unrelated task (using timers or reminders on your phone can help).
• Fatigue-related illnesses like ME and CFS can make energy levels especially limited on some days. Some may even find chewing difficult to manage, which is where soaking foods, smoothies or soups can be useful.
• Some people with conditions such as Crohn’s disease may find food intake physically difficult. If this is the case, speaking to a doctor about support like feeding tubes and dietary changes can help.
• Difficulties with preparing or eating food can also be a sign of disordered eating. Conditions of this type are complex and highly subjective, often underpinned by emotional and mental health difficulties.

If you think you might be struggling with symptoms of an eating disorder, it’s important to try and be a good friend to yourself. While it might feel hard to acknowledge this now, you are worth the care you need – and seeking advice from a healthcare professional or charity can be a vital step on the way to recovery.