There’s no doubt about it, feeding a family is a huge task, just ask any mum. As a working mum, pre-illness, I had a pretty slick system of meal planning and on-line grocery shopping. We also had a weekly box of local organic vegetables and a milkman; we ate pretty well.
For the first month or two just after my crash my husband had to take charge of all the meals and shopping. This drove us both crazy, as he chose convenience over healthy food, and I was aware that eating unhealthily would not help me recover. He also hardly ever cooked vegetables to accompany meals. We were still getting our veg box delivered and were throwing a lot of it away. I’ve always tried really hard to feed my family healthily and this really annoyed me. I therefore used some of my minuscule energy reserves to comment on the types of food he was choosing, which he did not appreciate.
As soon as I was vaguely able I wanted to take charge of planning our meals, even if I couldn’t cook them. Partly so I had more control over what we were eating, and partly to lesson the strain my husband was under (remember he hadn’t just taken on the cooking, but all the other tasks involved in running a home).
I switched to Ocado for my shopping as a couple of friends had told me their app. was really easy to use. They were right. I found this much easier than the supermarket I used before I was ill. I used their delivery pass system that automatically books the same delivery time each week and fills your trolley with an “instant shop” which you can then edit. This meant that most of the items I buy regularly were already in the trolley and I just deleted the ones I didn’t need that week.
My brain fog and fatigue meant meal planning and grocery shopping was a huge task and I had to split it up and spread it over 3 days and rest after each step. Here are my steps
Day 1. Plan meals – I’ll write a separate post about this soon (it’s tough with brainfog).
Day 2. Go through the instant shop and add and delete items that we use regularly.
Day 3. Check what we need for each planned meal and ensure it’s included.
On each day I would do a little bit, then have to go and rest (generally lie down and listen to guided meditation), then later in the day I would do a bit more.
It sounds so simple, and yet it was sooo hard for such a long time, and although it’s easier now I still don’t do it all in one go.
There have been many, many times where I’ve forgotten a couple of crucial items. Since I was too weak to just “pop” to the shop and also found it really hard to adapt my meal plan due to brain fog my husband has often had to dash to the supermarket on his way home.
I have also frequently not managed to check the cupboards to see if we already have something. At one point we had 5 bottles of ketchup because I couldn’t remember whether we had any and did not have the energy to check.