G’morning!!

Breakfast: Another rainy morning breakfast. A big cup of coffee and whole wheat sunflower seed bread with homemade walnut butter and strawberry jam. I found the walnut butter hiding in the back of the fridge- I had totally forgotten about it. Hit the spot!

While sipping my coffee, I read yesterday’s Wall Street Journal article on “Colleagues Who Can Make You Fat.” It’s all about the food temptaions and peer pressure at the office.

Let me preface this by saying that this doesn’t happen at my office. I work with all women and everyone is very exercise/health conscious…..and no one really brings in any foods to share, so it’s not an issue.

BUT, I’ve def worked in offices where it has been, so can still relate a lot.

The article says there are many kinds of co-workers who “can make you fat” or just interfere with your healthy lifestyle. They include:

• The lady who guilts you into eating something she baked or brought in. “You MUST eat it, I baked it with my special recipe!” she says and then stands at your desk until you take a bite. Really you want to say, “Umm, sorry, but I’m not hungry!”
• The baked goods birthday/celebration treats where you feel like you “have to” partake or it’s rude. When I worked in a large office, this happened at least once a week. Sometimes it was fun to have a treat but other days, I just wasn’t hungry and would rather have had something healthier. A slice of cake at 2pm just makes me sleepy anyways.
• Office meetings that are surrounded around a meal aka, the lunch meeting “catered” by the greasy pizza place or the early breakfast meeting with nothing but danishes (and whoever is running the mtg always acts like they are so nice to have ordered greasy food for you as a “treat”). This wasn’t in the article, but just my thoughts.
• The person who comments on what you’re eating, “You’re eating salad again? How boring!” Or “Eww you like tofu? That’s disgusting.”

According to thethe article, “some 29% of people on diets say colleagues pressure them to eat more, make fun of their diets or order them restaurant food they know isn’t on their diets.” Geez, that’s annoying!

All my friends who work at Google, where’s there’s AMAZING free food all day long (pretty much everything you can think of to eat, it’s there) call it the “Google 15” and say that everyone gains 15 pounds within the first few months of work.  I’ve been to lunch there and I’m so not surprised people gain weight…..with free trail mix, candy, cereals, hot cocoa, pizza, etc, I would totally get used to several “work break” visits to the cafeteria everyday.

I’ve def had co-workers in the past who comment on my food and roll their eyes if I pull out a salad. It’s really obnoxious and frankly, none of their business. Work environments are such an interesting balance– you’re with these people 40+ hours per week…..yet, some of them you may not have ever chosen to have in your life.

I’m lucky now that I work in a small and friendly office where this isn’t really an issue. Otherwise, I really feel like it’s high school peer-pressure all grown up. I’m sure most of us can just roll our eyes at this silly comments, not take it personally, and get used to not eating every baked good that sits in the staff room unless we’re actually hungry, but this article still brings up something interesting. We’ve all indulged at the office, not necessarily because we’ve wanted to, but because we felt like we had to (or just because it was “there.”) At least noticing it can help before it makes you “fat.”

Afternoon snack: Plums! Ate this at my desk. No one commented, haha. Are plums back in season? Hope soo….

What’s it like in your office? Are there baked goods or treats all the time? Do you like it or do you feel like it makes eating healthy harder? Are your co-workers exercise/health conscious?