Eating well and feeling well

Eating well is not about strict dietary limitations, staying unrealistically thin, or depriving yourself of the foods you love.

Eating well is about feeling well, enjoying things you love and and optimising your overall health and wellbeing – both mentally and physically.

Healthy eating resources

There is a lot of conflicting nutrition and diet advice, even from experts. You’ve probably heard that healthy eating is about balance and much of the evidence supports this. If overall you choose healthy foods most of the time with plenty of variety, you are probably getting it right.

See The Australian Guide to Healthy eating.

To help you make the healthy choices most of the time, here are some tips from the Heart Foundation:

8 tips for healthier living:

1. Include vegetables, wholegrains, fruit, nuts and seeds every day
2. Make good fat choices with nuts, seeds, avocadoes, olives and cook with their oils
3. Aim for fish or seafood 2-3 times a week
4. Include beans and legumes in at least 2 meals a week, and up to 6 eggs a week
5. Keep ‘sometimes’ foods to only sometimes
6. Choose reduced fat milk, cheese and yoghurg
7. Choose herbs and spices to flavour foods, instead of adding salt
8. Drink water.

Providing support

Your Employee Assistance Plan (EAP) can help enhance the balance in your life. If you find it hard to cut down on food you should be eating only occasionally, or if finding the time to prepare nutritious meals is difficult, call the EAP on 1800 629 277.

References:

1. Eat for Health

2. The National Heart Foundation of Australia.