Confessions of a Food Blogger and a Real Person, Too

Chocolate and kale and lentils are lovely, but they're not always my reality.

pumpkin pie smoothie with spinach, Vega protein, and cacao nibs

In the first episode of Confessions of a Food Blogger, I told you that your nice comments make my day, my month, my year. That has never been more true.

I try to perpetually smile when I write my blog posts. Your heartfelt comments really do help. The sweet potatoes may be burning, the post may not be funny, the pictures may suck, and Alchemy may be out of chickpeas, but life will go on. It all happens. More often than you'd think. I try to keep the smile on. For you! And for me, too.

There's a time and a place for negativity, and it is not this blog. That said, you are all my friends, and when I feel so inclined to speak my mind, I know I can do so comfortably here. I think that's important.

I am not a jar of almond butter. I am a real person with real feelings living a very real life. I have good times and I have bad times. I remind myself that it's okay to cry.

curried chickpea salad + kale and quinoa salad + apple with cinnamon

Posting every morsel of food I put in my mouth throughout the course of a day is...a lot of things.

It's eye-opening. It's funny. It's sometimes a little annoying. It's inspiring. It's engaging. It's exhausting. It's entertaining. It's encouraging. It's positive. It's educational.

It's also very, very personal. Have you ever thought what it would be like to post on the internet everything you eat in a day and invite hundreds of thousands of people to scrutinize it?

Most bloggers participate in "What I Ate Wednesday" (WIAW) to show readers what their typical diet consists of. But we also do it to let you in. To give you perspective and to illustrate via food pictures that we are far from perfect. To show you that some days we eat a lot of kale and no cookies, and some days we eat a lot of cookies and no kale. So is life. So is life for you as a normal person, and so is life for me as a crazy food blogger.

pumpkin bars + pumpkin cookies

What WIAW is not is a place for judgement.

It is not a place for you to critique how I choose to fuel myself.

It is not a place to demoralize me for eating lobster and it is most certainly not a place to call me anorexic.

As a dietitian, I work with people who suffer from eating disorders on a regular basis. I can tell you from experience that calling anyone scrawny, a skeleton, or anorexic is incredibly offensive, not to mention rude, disrespectful, and hurtful. I strive to paint a realistic picture of balance because if you know me at all, you know that balance is what my life is all about. Balance with healthy food and treat food. Balance with Green Glow juice and vodka sodas. Balance with my career and my social life. The list goes on. I know I'm not perfect.

roasted sweet potatoes

Negative comments such as these really make me second-guess myself. At the end of the day, I don't honestly care that a reader called me anorexic. The issue here is that I would NEVER, EVER want to set a poor example for healthy eating. And when I say healthy, I mean balanced. I would never want you to read what I eat in a day and think a stroke of anything negative or discouraging.

spinach and artichoke pasta + roasted broccoli

Many bloggers have stopped posting their daily eats for these exact reasons and I don't blame them for a second. Readers were judging their choices and falling into the comparison trap, the exact opposite of what these seemingly inspirational posts were intended to do. I have kept posting because more often than not, I get very positive feedback. I know you all enjoy these posts and are I pray that they inspire you, not discourage you.

scrambled eggs, salsa, sweet potatoes + another pumpkin cookie 

Remember that bloggers are not robots behind a screen. While starting Hummusapien was one of the best decisions I ever made, don't think that for a second it's easy. I promise that it is always worth it but never easy.

Let's all respect our differences and learn to grow from them. I promise to love you no matter what you eat.