Classes are back in full-swing and midterm exams are creeping up! School’s pressure often leads people to stress-eat, grab whatever’s convenient, or forget to eat. Easy and convenient foods tend to be fast and junky. While these foods are fine in moderation, healthy eating improves mental performance – an essential for school!
But you may be wondering how healthy eating could be convenient. After all, doesn’t produce go bad fast? And if you’re on the move, there aren’t really quick healthy options you can grab, right?
Not quite.
Whether you are in university, grade-school, or are a parent trying to make healthy habits for yourself and your children, here are some ways you can eat healthy while going to school.
Healthy Eating Habits To Cultivate In School
Drink Lots Of Water
Your body needs to stay hydrated, especially when you’re trying to focus in a class or on a test. Drinking enough water can help you stay alert in your studies. Our bodies are 70% water, after all. Part of making healthy choices is giving our bodies the hydration they need.
Eat Breakfast
Ensuring you have a nutritious breakfast can cut down on snacking during classes and improve mental performance. Things like eggs, oatmeal, and fruit are good healthy breakfasts to turn to.
Meal Prep
Planning out meals in advance allows for the chance to make overnight oats or other healthy options for breakfast. It also eliminates the unknown of what’s for lunch, because you can make it ahead of time. Especially if you usually find yourself running out the door in order to make it to your first class, meal prep makes it easy to just grab your lunch and go.
Pack Your Lunch
Going along with the above tip, if you pack your lunch, you’ll be less tempted to go to a fast-food restaurant because you brought food with you. You have the convenience of having it already on you, so when you are hungry, it’s ready. Packing your lunch also gives you the opportunity to make healthier choices! You can bring salads, smoothie bowls, rice bowls, sandwiches, veggies, fruit, and more.
Choose Healthier Options
Sometimes, you can’t bring a lunch, so you have to get something else while at school. With the increasing push for healthy options in schools, you aren’t limited to pizza. You can look for yogurts, smoothies, salads, or anything that looks like it will give a balance of protein, veggies, and carbs.
Make Little Switches
Eating healthy can often come down to all the little decisions we make throughout the day. If you’re craving something sweet, you can try switching out candy for fruit. If you want a crunchy, savory snack, you can try veggies, like bell peppers, with hummus. Want something carbonated? Sparkling water, while not ideal, is a better choice than soda and comes in an abundance of flavors.
Healthy Eating On The Go
Sometimes, the only time you have to eat is while getting from one place to another. Instead of swinging by a fast-food chain or opting for junk food, you can grab a smoothie or yogurt drink. Protein bars, lettuce wraps, trail mix, and dried fruit are some of the other healthy options available to you. If you can’t do that, choose somewhere with healthier options, like a sandwich place.
Listen To Your Body
If we eat stressed, we can often ignore our body’s signals that it’s full, and eat more than we should. Eating slowly and making sure to chew your food can prevent overeating.
Exercise
Physical activity alleviates stress, so if you find yourself stress-eating, carve out time in your day for physical activity. It doesn’t have to involve the gym, it can just be a walk around the block. Just enough to get you moving and give your brain something else to focus on.
Healthy eating improves mental and physical performance, making it all the more vital during school.
Ask A Professional About Healthy Eating In School
Ogden Chiropractic believes in the value of living the best life possible, and good nutrition as one of the ways to achieve that. For any questions about nutrition or any of the other services Ogden Chiropractic offers, please feel free to contact us today!
Leave a Reply