Is it actually healthier for me? I do believe so. I can certainly tell a difference now in foods that are less processed/lower sodium/lower sugar/no HFCS and foods that have those things. The ice cream we bought tasted funny the other night, and so I checked the label, and sure enough, HFCS. Same thing with the new brand of yogurt we tried. The damn stuff is everywhere. So frustrating. But it’s encouraging that my palate has developed to be able to detect this stuff.

By making these choices, I’m simultaneously removing lots of transfats and chemicals (most of which are in all probability neutral in affecting my health, but as long as the bad ones are eliminated, I can live with eliminating the neutral ones as well) from my diet, AND have vastly increased my fiber and low-glycemic carbs intake and decreased my overall sugar and fat intake. And I don’t want to say that I’ve lost 20 pounds by changing my eating habits alone, but it has certainly helped.

Lots of foods and snacks that I used to get cravings for—-well, now when I get a craving for one, I also get this niggling feeling that I’m not going to like how it will taste if I give in. Then I do give in and I totally don’t enjoy it and never buy it again. So in effect, I’ve ‘grown out’ of a lot of the unhealthy foods that I used to have as treats. It’s not that I have to resist eating Butterscotch Krimpets, it’s that I try to eat one and wonder how I ever could have enjoyed it as much I remember I did (and I enjoyed them quite a bit, every day for years!)

So while everything I’m eating isn’t organic, by making the effort, developing a consistent label-checking habit, and buying LESS food (b/c organic stuff is expensive, yanno, and I ain’t rich), I’m basically changing the whole way I eat. And the change has been universally in favor of my health.

Thus, although there’s more I want to do in this area, such as finding a source for humanely raised meat, I’ve changed my lifestyle and I’m satisfied enough with the progress I’ve made to mark this off the list. Work will continue, but the lion’s share of developing the habit has been done.