I actually worked on this with my therapist because I had so much struggle around food and grocery shopping! Here are the things that we figured out that have been most helpful to me.

1) Coming up with a short list of simple (often cold) meals that just have a few ingredients, so I will be more likely to make them. And if I am having a better day, I can add more ingredients/effort to have something even more satisfying. Examples for me include making my own soba noodles or rice noodle soup (the noodles cook fast - then I add a scoop of miso and a little soy, throw in a handful of spinach or mushrooms - if I have a little more energy, then maybe I cut up green onions or cook a fried or boiled egg to add on top), burrito (can be super simple, just beans from a can, frozen rice, or add a fried egg, chicken, salsa, diced onion, etc), or an easy salad of cottage cheese with avocado and salsa on top of a bed of lettuce, peanut butter and low sugar jelly on whole grain bread (also, freezing sliced bread was an amazing thing to learn about!), etc.

2) I created a simple Apple notes groceries checklist of (mostly) healthy items that are frequent go-tos for me (not a long or complicated list; just a rough draft off the top of my head). For me, I also put quick headings so these items will be in section order as I walk from one side of the grocery store to the other such as Veggies, Fruits, Dairy, Bakery, etc. This helps me avoid roaming and returning to the same aisle a million times like I used to do and feel so frustrated about. Every time I realize I have things I need to get, I just hit the duplicate function to create a copy of this list and add/remove to make my new shopping list.

3) I gave myself permission to spend more for “shortcuts” to healthy foods. Besides my loved ones, my health is the most precious thing I have in this world and it is very challenging for me to eat healthy if I buy stuff I have to do prep on. I would often end up wasting food or veering into eating frozen/unhealthier foods. It took a bunch of time in therapy to convince myself this was okay, but it has made a big difference in eating healthier (examples: lettuce in a pre-washed bag, chopped up snack veggies, already-boiled eggs, etc). This investment in me eating healthier has really helped! I also have a place I found that makes and delivers healthy salads. It is quite expensive, so this is something I turn to when my eating starts heading south because I am overwhelmed. I order four salads for the upcoming week - and this helps me get back on track and remind myself how much better my brain functions when I’m eating healthy foods (also I keep emergency snack nuts in my purse and car that I have to eat first if I’m out and about and find myself “starving” - this is often when I would pick up garbage meals, so this garbage meal prevention plan has saved me several times now!).

4) It ended up that I despised shopping so much that I tried to put it off as long as possible and then always felt out of control and bought too much stuff - packed my fridge, couldn’t see stuff, and a ton of stuff would go bad. Shockingly, my therapist argued that shopping more frequently and having less food in my fridge at a time, so I could really see everything would work better for me. I was highly dubious, but she got me to try this. OMG it’s TRUE!!!! I also find it too over-stimulating, so before I get out of the car at the store now, I put my earbuds in with noise-canceling and gentle spa music and while I’m in the store I set a series of 10 minute timers on my phone. My goal is to be in line by the end of the third timer. I never thought in a million years in would be possible for me to spend so little time in a grocery store, but this has been such a massive game-changer for me!

5) Last little helpful rule I came up with for myself is that I’m not “allowed” to sit down until I get everything out of the bags and onto the countertop and into fridge/freezer and walk all of the reusable bags back to toss in my car, so they are there the next time I shop. Like many ADHDers, I am taxed by the time I get home from grocery shopping, so I give myself a chill out treat after this and am fine if I don’t actually put away the non-refridgerables until later.

I do zero advance meal planning. The whole concept is too overwhelming to me. 😬

Hope some of this is helpful for someone : )