10 'Naturally Thin' Eating Habits | My ‘Naturally Thin’ Roommate’s Eating Habits that I Noticed as a Plus-Size Girl

I moved in with my ‘naturally thin’ roommate/best friend a little over three years ago, and it didn’t take long for me to notice just how differently she and I ate.

            As a curvy girl, I’ve spent the majority of my teenage years and pretty much my entire adulthood thinking about every single thing I eat in a day. I’ve lost countless hours counting calories, planning what I’m going to order on a night out, trying to burn off the extra cookies I ate, and tracking, tracking, tracking. And no matter how much I try, or how much weight I lose, I have never had a body anywhere close to my ‘naturally thin’ roommate.

            I put ‘naturally thin’ in quotation marks because I’m not sure if the difference in our bodies is truly due to how her natural body is, or if it is due to her lifelong eating habits that have created the body she has. And I’ve gathered the ten eating habits of hers that stand out the most to me as a curvy girl.

1.     She Doesn’t Think About Food Unless She’s Hungry

This isn’t as much of a habit as it is a characteristic. She truly goes through her day and will only begin thinking about food when her body starts to give her hunger signals. And even then, she doesn’t run straight to the pantry to grab a snack. Other than that, she just goes through her day thinking about whatever it is that’s on her mind.

This was mind blowing to me as someone who spends the majority of the day thinking about what I’m going to eat, what I wish I could eat, and when my next meal is going to be. I wonder what it would be like to go through a day where your mind isn’t constantly flashing to food and what I can eat next or wonder what the food will be like in any situation.

2.     She Says No If She’s Not Hungry

This one was always crazy to me. She has the power to say no to food if she’s not hungry or if she simply doesn’t want it. Whether it’s when I’m ordering something to eat and ask her if she wants anything too, if we were on a road trip and taking a stop, if I’m grabbing snacks from the pantry, or even when we go out for drinks at a bar or restaurant. She will simply say no if she isn’t hungry. Whereas I will always say yes if food is offered to me. I will always find something to order that sounds good. I always want a little snack while I’m grabbing drinks with friends. If food is an option, it’s a yes for me.

There have been multiple times when we will go out in a group of friends where there are appetizers ordered to share that she will ignore the food right in front of her if she’s not hungry for them while I’m on the other side of the table eating them until they’re gone or until I’ve eaten my share.

3.     She Genuinely Likes Lower Calorie Food More Than Higher Calorie Alternatives

She actually prefers lower calorie options compared to foods that might have a higher calorie content.   If we’re looking at a list of appetizers, she would rather get edamame than fried dumplings or zucchini over mozzarella sticks or bruschetta over mac & cheese bites. When we go out for coffee, she opts for unsweetened iced coffee over a flavored latte.

Don’t get me wrong, she will definitely eat all of the things I’ve listed from time to time. But I’m just trying to say that she naturally leans towards wanting more healthy options as her default order and the other things once in a while. Having that preference for healthier options over her entire lifetime has no doubt contributed to her smaller size.

4.     She Rarely Finishes Her Dinner

Not because she chooses to stop before she’s done, but because she stops when she is full. I cook pretty much all the dinners that we have together, and I’ve noticed that time and time again, there is always food left on her plate. Because when she’s full, no matter how good the food is, she always stops eating once she has eaten enough.

Whereas, for me to not finish my plate, I have to be so, so, unquestionably full to the point that I’m uncomfortable. She is able to eat slowly, listen to her body, and stop eating when her body tells her it’s enough. While I blow through my fullness signals and eat until I’m either done with my plate, or extremely and undeniably full.

5.     She Always Keeps Snacks Around

This might go against the picture I’ve painted of her eating habits to this point, but one thing she does not mess around about is snacks. Especially potato chips. She will always have a bag of chips close. Whether it’s in her desk, in her car, or next to her bed, there’s always something to munch on around her.

She doesn’t think of snacking as a bad thing or potato chips as a ‘bad food’. She just knows that she loves potato chips, and she likes to have a little snack when she’s hungry, and she likes to have them close by when she wants them. She honestly has the healthiest relationship with snacking I have ever seen.

6.     But Never Finishes a Bag

I shouldn’t say never, but she very rarely ever finishes a bag of snacks. More bags of chips go stale in our pantry than end up empty in our garbage can. So, when she has a bag of chips sitting on the floor next to her bed, she will only pick it up when she’s hungry for a snack, eat for a few minutes, and then put it down when the craving or hunger is satisfied. The bag will also sit there, untouched, for days before she goes back to it.

I truly do not understand this behavior. Snacking, especially on chips, has been the biggest roadblock whenever I try to lose weight. If I buy a bag of chips, even a family/party size bag, they will be gone in less than three days. Because once I start snacking, I simply cannot stop. I’ve always wondered how she got to have so much control over her snacking.

7.     She Only Orders What She’s Hungry For

When we go out for dinner, she will look at the menu, think about how hungry she is, and only order what she is hungry for at that moment. Whereas I want to order anything that sounds good. Even if I’m really just hungry for a small entrée, those two appetizers that sound delicious will definitely be ordered and eaten. And the stop for a sweet treat on the way home, yes please. She is the queen of listening to her body, knowing how much she’s hungry for, and only eating what she needs to eat to meet her level of hunger.

8.     Breakfast and Lunch Are Both Very Light

Breakfast, if anything, is always very light. She will only eat breakfast if she’s hungry for it that day. But typically, she will sip on a large ice coffee all morning and not be hungry to eat until lunch. She also keeps this pretty light. She tends to meal prep things for lunch like a dressing-free pasta salad with one serving of pasta and lots of veggies. Or she’ll meal prep mini deli meat sliders with veggies as a side. Or her version of a chicken cesar wrap. All her lunches are always loaded with protein and a lot of vegetables.

And what’s more is that she doesn’t do any of this on purpose, or in an effort to manage her weight. She has a light or no breakfast because she’s truly not very hungry in the morning. She has a light lunch, because those foods are what appeal to her.

9.     Carbs Are Her Favorite Food Group

Bread, potato chips, pasta, potatoes, anything that’s carbs, she wants. A pasta dinner and something with potatoes every week is a must in our household. And going further, she eats carbs in just about every single meal. That girl loves her bread, loves her pasta, and definitely loves loves loves her potatoes.

She is proof that carbs are not the enemy, because she is their number one fan. She is not worried at all about cutting down her carbs or moderating her intake. She just knows she loves them, and she wants to eat them whenever she can.

Whereas I’m always worried about how much pasta I’m eating and wondering whether or not I should try taking refined carbs out of my diet to live a healthier lifestyle.

10.  She’s Not Concerned About Food at All

She truly does not worry about or think about food at all. She doesn’t have a running list of good foods or bad foods in her head. It’s just food that she likes and food that she doesn’t. She eats food that sounds good to her and says no to food that doesn’t. And she eats however much of it or however little of it she wants.

She’s free from constantly worrying about that she’s putting in her body and thinking about how she can keep herself small. She just doesn’t care. She doesn’t think about it. She listens to her body, eats, and moves on.

In Conclusion

I wanted to compile this list because I, and maybe you, always find myself wondering what the difference is between me, a curvy girl who is always trying to diet, and people like my roommate who are thin but seem like they can eat whatever they want.

Living with her for so long gave me a level of insight that I would never have had without living with her. Because her ‘naturally thin’ body has nothing to do with her naturally being small and being able to eat whatever she wants without a care in the world. Her ‘naturally thin’ body is a result of a lifetime of healthy habits and balance between downing a bowl of her favorite pasta and choosing healthy foods that her body likes and making her feel good.

  If I’ve learned anything from her and the way she eats, it’s not about being constantly consumed by what I’m eating and trying to make the best choices when it comes to food. It’s about balance and eating what I enjoy while also making healthy decisions. There can be both. I don’t have to force myself to eat foods that I hate just because they’re healthy. And I can eat the foods that I love even if they’re not. I can also find healthier alternatives that I still like and enjoy my food.

  All this just goes back to the importance of having a healthy relationship with food. No restriction that leads to binge eating. No overthinking and overtracking. No shame about a bowl of pasta one night. Just eating good food that makes us feel good too.