Go You Nutrition Counseling

09/05/2026

One type of hunger I wish more people knew about is practical hunger.

Practical hunger is when you eat because it makes sense to eat now, even if your stomach is not dramatically announcing itself.

Like when you have back-to-back meetings.

Or school pickup.

Or a long commute.

Or a weird lunch break that is somehow both too early and too late, because apparently time is fake now.

Practical hunger says:

“If I don’t eat now, I’m going to be shaky and annoyed by 3pm.”

“If I wait until I’m starving, dinner is going to become a pantry scavenger hunt.”

“If I don’t pack something, I’m going to end up living on coffee and (bad) vibes.”

This matters because a lot of people were taught that eating “counts” only if they are physically hungry.

But hunger is not always that clear, especially when you’re busy, stressed, anxious, tired, distracted, or used to ignoring your body’s cues.

Eating before the wheels come off is not cheating.

It is planning like someone who has met a Tuesday before.

I wrote more about the 4 types of hunger here:

Which situation makes practical hunger most obvious for you: workdays, school schedules, errands, travel, or evenings?

Hunger is not always just an empty stomach. Learn the 4 types of hunger, physical, practical, emotional, and sensory, plus how to understand hunger cues without turning food into another rule.

09/02/2026

For chaotic weeks, I like the idea of having 3 “anchor meals.”

Not a Sunday meal prep situation that requires 17 containers and a personality transplant.

Just three meals you can come back to when the week gets weird.

An anchor meal is something that is:

Easy enough to repeat
Filling enough to be useful
Flexible enough that you can change it a little (Why did I want THAT for dinner?!)
Realistic for your budget, schedule, and energy

Examples might be:

A breakfast you can make half-asleep
A lunch you can pack or assemble without much thinking
A dinner that can happen even if everyone is tired and the kitchen feels personally offensive

The point is to reduce the number of decisions you have to make when your brain is already tired.

For a lot of people, three dependable meals can do more than a complicated plan. Because once a few decisions are handled, the rest of the week has a little more room to breathe.

What is one meal you could make an “anchor” this week?

08/30/2026

You do not need a post-vacation reset.

You may just need lunch.

I know. Deeply unglamorous. Hard to sell in a 7-day challenge. Terrible font-on-a-beige-background content.

But after a trip, a long weekend, a weird schedule, or a stretch of eating differently than usual, the answer is usually not punishment.

It’s not skipping meals.
It’s not “getting back on track” by eating as little as possible.
It’s not declaring that you’re only having grilled chicken and regret for the next four days.

Often, the most helpful next step is much more boring:

Eat a meal.
Drink some water.
Get groceries when you need them.
Choose something with enough staying power to get you through the next few hours.
Let your body settle back into a rhythm without turning it into a full moral event.

Different food on vacation is not a failure.
Eating out more than usual is not a crisis.
Enjoying food is not something you have to correct.

Your body does not need you to panic.

It probably needs regular meals, a little patience, and maybe something green eventually. Not because you were bad. Because vegetables are useful little weirdos and most of us feel better when they show up regularly.

What is the first food thing that actually helps you feel more settled after travel or a chaotic week?

08/18/2026

Working with a dietitian should not feel like being called to the front of the class to explain your lunch.

You do not need to show up with a perfect food log.

You do not need to apologize for what you ate.

You do not need to prove that you “tried hard enough” before the appointment.

And you definitely do not need to hide the convenience foods like I’m going to leap through the screen and confiscate them.

When I work with clients, we look at what is happening around food with curiosity, not a red pen.

If something worked, we talk about why.

If something did not work, we talk about why.

Nutrition counseling is supposed to help you understand yourself better and build a way of eating that supports your mood, energy, and day-to-day life.

What would make working with a dietitian feel less intimidating to you?

08/16/2026

Tiny food decisions all day long add up.

Usually, the hardest part of eating is not the actual food. It’s the deciding.

What’s for lunch?
What can I make that everyone will eat?
Should I pack a snack?
What sounds good but will also keep me full?
Do I need groceries or am I just avoiding the pantry because it contains ingredients instead of food?

Very rude of the pantry, honestly.

So I’m curious:

What food decision feels harder than it should right now?

Breakfast?
Lunch?
Dinner?
Snacks?
Grocery shopping?
Figuring out what to eat when you’re stressed?
Deciding what counts as “enough”?

No judgment. I’m asking because this is often where the actual work starts.

08/13/2026

Food decisions can feel weirdly hard when your brain is already tired.

Not because you're lazy or don't care

And not because you need someone on the internet to tell you to “just meal prep,” as if your Sunday has been sitting around, untouched, waiting for a casserole project.

When you’re stressed, overwhelmed, anxious, low-energy, or just managing too much, food becomes one more decision in a day that already has too many.

What should sound simple can feel like a lot in the moment:

What should I eat?
Do we have anything?
Will this bother my stomach?
Is this “healthy enough”?
Will anyone else eat it?
Do I have the energy to make it?
Am I even hungry, or just done with the day?

That’s a lot of noise for one meal; 1 decision in a sea of many.

Food stress is often a sign that your plan requires more mental energy than you actually have available.

Usually the most effective goal is not "perfection."
It’s making the next food decision less exhausting, while still something you can feel good about.

What food decision tends to feel hardest when you’re already tired?

08/02/2026

Emotional hunger is not necessarily a problem.

Food can be comfort. Or memory. Food can be culture, routine, celebration, and relief.
Sometimes you want something warm and familiar because the day was frustrating and unpredictable.
That’s not wrong. That’s human.

Where emotional eating becomes worth exploring is when it feels distressing, shame-filled, compulsive, or your only method to self-soothe.

Don't try to strip food of all emotional meaning.

What a deeply joyless way to live, and wellness culture has already contributed enough harm there.

The goal is to understand what kind of comfort you need and give yourself more than one way to get it.
I wrote about emotional hunger, practical hunger, physical hunger, and sensory hunger here:

Hunger is not always just an empty stomach. Learn the 4 types of hunger, physical, practical, emotional, and sensory, plus how to understand hunger cues without turning food into another rule.

07/22/2026

Nutrition counseling can be helpful for a lot of people, but probably not in the way many picture it.

It’s not just for someone who wants a meal plan.

It can be helpful if food is louder than you want it to be.
If you’re tired of second-guessing every meal.
If your mood, energy, stress, symptoms, or schedule make eating consistently harder than it “should” be.

If you’ve been told to “just eat less” or “avoid white foods” and somehow that did not magically create a peaceful, functional relationship with food.

Shocking, I know.

It can also be helpful if you want structure, but you do not want more rules. Or if you want support alongside therapy, medication, or medical care, without making nutrition all you think about.

It may not be the right fit if you’re looking for someone to police your food, hand you a strict reset, promise a cure, or give you a list of good and bad foods.

You don’t have to have everything figured out before reaching out. That’s kind of the point of getting support.

What would you hope nutrition support would feel like, if it actually felt helpful?

07/18/2026

Nutrition does not need more pressure.

Most people have had plenty of that already.

Pressure to eat less.
Pressure to “be good.”
Pressure to avoid the “wrong” foods.
Pressure to fix the thing immediately, preferably by next Tuesday, with a cheerful attitude and a fridge full of chopped vegetables.

And honestly? If fear and pressure worked that well, no one would be struggling.

If one paragraph on a doctor’s handout about eating more vegetables solved everything, I would have a very different job.

Compassion does not mean ignoring health concerns. It does not mean “anything goes” or “nothing matters.” It means we stop treating shame like it’s a useful starting point.

Because most people are already harder on themselves than they would ever be on someone they care about.

A more compassionate approach might sound like:

“What made this hard?”
“What would make eating feel less complicated?”
“What can we adjust so I'll actually follow through?”
“What would support your mood, energy, and day-to-day functioning without turning food into another source of stress?”

Where or when has pressure stopped helping you and started being the problem?

07/14/2026

Caffeine check-in. Which of these feels familiar?

✅ caffeine on an empty stomach makes you feel edgy
✅ you feel better for an hour, then worse later
✅ you’re “tired but wired”
✅ sleep is lighter (even if you fall asleep fine)

If you checked a few, you don’t need to panic or quit cold turkey.
You just need a plan.
Start with this: 3-day experiment (food + water, same caffeine).
Full instructions here:

Caffeine is one of those things that stops feeling like a choice pretty quickly. It’s just there. All. The. Time. […]