Disclaimer: If you are dealing with any type of eating disorders or disordered eating, please, seek the help of a registered dietician.
I was approached by one of our subscribers on YouTube, who was on a liquid diet. For the sake of this article, we are calling her Natalie. Natalie was on a liquid diet and asked me if I had a few tips that would help her transition to a solid diet. She also mentioned the fact that she was not hungry most of the time, which told me that she could possibly be skipping meals because of that as well. Now, that sounded familiar because I, myself, am dealing with some disordered eating, something that I opened up about on the Beasts Train Mean YouTube channel on Thanksgiving 2019. And because of the disorder, I used to skip meals. If you are in the same situation as Natalie, here are three tips to help you transition from a liquid to a solid diet.
1. TRANSITION SLOWLY
Replace some of your liquid meals with soft meals. Soft foods are foods that are easy to chew and swallow, and they include purees and moist foods.
For instance, if you pick cereals for breakfast, you can warm your milk and then pour the cereals in. Then let the bowl sit for a few minutes. This would give the cereals time to soften in the warm milk. Depending on the brands, you would not even have to chew the cereals before swallowing. But you can still savor them by keeping them longer in your mouth before you swallow. Savoring your food is part of enjoying it.
Ground meat, fish, and tender meat are some examples of soft foods, and these are high in protein. And for snacks or desserts, applesauce, pudding, custard, and gelatin are good choices.
At first, you could substitute one liquid meal with a soft meal, then when you are comfortable to substitute more, do so, until you feel comfortable being on a full soft diet. Then, you will do the same substitutions for solid meals, and so on.
2. SET ALARMS TO REMIND YOURSELF TO EAT
In my case, I tend to forget to eat and would only eat when I am hungry, whenever that is. The problem with this is that it can be 48 hours after my last meal, for instance. Relying on eating only when you are hungry with this type of disordered eating means that you would skip most if not all of your meals.
Setting alarms for times to have a meal trains your body to get used to have meals more often daily. Therefore, schedule your meals and divide them into various small quantities. Why? Because eating can be exhaustive when you deal with some types of disordered eating. So, in order to not overwhelm yourself yet still ensure that you do eat, have multiple smaller meals throughout the day. I still set alarms for my own meals.
3. BE PATIENT AND KIND TO YOURSELF
This is a lengthy process, so give yourself time to get where you’d like to be. Find support through this journey, schedule eating time with friends and family who maybe living remotely. One way to do that would be through video calling, where you would be eating at the same time and together. This creates accountability. This is also something that you can do with someone that you know is suffering with disordered eating. The more you can eat together, the more you will be accountable, and will take pleasure in eating. As you do so, keep in mind that this is by no mean a competition or a way to shame yourself. Rather it is a way to encourage to your journey.
Natalie wrote to me a few weeks after I published a video answering her question on the YouTube channel, and she was grateful for the video as it helped her transition from a liquid to a solid diet. We both were very happy when she told me that at the time, her diet was almost completely solid.
These tips helped Natalie tremendously and I hope that they will do the same for you if you are in the same situation!