Eventually, to maintain a healthy diet, you must cook. Two years after moving to Mexico part-time, I began writing a cookbook, The Lazy Expat: Healthy Recipes That Translate in Mexico. It’s for travelers, snowbirds and expats trying to cook “their food” in Mexico and Latin America, a compilation of healthy dishes that can be made from the simplest of kitchens with the easiest-to-find ingredients.

The cookbook however has a dark secret: I’m never hungry.

Not Eating Can Be Just as Bad as Overeating

I do, however, wish to stay alive. In a society where so many people have problems controlling their weight, you don’t get much sympathy if you complain about lacking an appetite (Cry me a river! they laugh).

You rarely find anything written on what to do when you’re never hungry, when you have to drag yourself to the kitchen to prepare every meal. (“Why can’t we just have a pill!” I’d whine.)

Not eating leads to consequences just as serious as overeating. At 48, I came a hair’s breadth from colon cancer after months of not eating following a divorce. The mere thought of food made me nauseous. My joy in life came back. Oddly, my appetite never did.

When I moved to Mexico in 2014, the cultural challenges of cooking in a different culture compounded the problem. Obstacles to cooking abounded: language barrier, the metric system, differences in availability and different tastes of staple foods (due to processing).

Many native recipes were designed to appeal to another palate. For the first three months, I lived on bottled pasta sauce and smoothies. It took three months to recognize spinach at the grocery store.

In great part, I developed the cookbook to have a slate of healthy meals I could prepare anywhere. In addition to having great-tasting, reliable dishes to cook, there are other hacks I’ve discovered that can help when you totally lack an interest in food.

Hacks for Stimulating Your Appetite

#1 Buy Only Perishable Fruits and Vegetables, Nothing Frozen 

Most people hate to throw away food. Fresh fruits and vegetables are fairly expensive. I used to think having easy-to-prepare frozen vegetables would help me eat more. But I needed the guilt. Many a night I cooked rather than throw money away. (Waste is one of the 7 Deadly Sins. Don’t give up your soul.)

#2 Plan Your Meals in Advance 

Seven p.m. at night is not the time to decide what you’ll make for dinner. Create a weekly menu containing a wide variety of fresh fruits and vegetables. Schedule the meals by perishable item. For example, schedule a dish with greens (which don’t keep as well) on a Sunday, one with carrots on Saturday.

#3 Think in Terms of Cups Not Servings

Our whole lives we’ve been indoctrinated by the rule of five: 5 fruits and vegetables a day. I find this sounds like an unrealistic goal to achieve day after day if you like to think about things other than your diet.

Instead, think in terms of cups. Two and a half cups a day of fruits and vegetables of a wide variety through the course of the week might play in your head better.

#4 Dinnerware Makes a Difference 

You eat with your eyes first. You will be more likely to reach for oatmeal layered with blueberries in a parfait glass than eat from a ceramic bowl. Another type of dishware I recommend is large shallow bowls for the presentation of pasta dishes and dinner salads. Keep healthy leftovers in clear containers so you don’t forget about them.

#5 A Glass of Wine or Aperitif After You Have Finished the Meal Prep 

For a year or two, the only thing that got me in the kitchen was the reward of a glass of wine, which I permitted myself only after I’d cut, sauteed, and prepped the meal. Many meals have a 15-minute lull toward the end, when a stew is simmering or the dinner salad just needs tossing. And aperitif can stimulate appetite and be a reward for getting yourself to the kitchen. 

#6 Include Brightly Colored Foods 

Avoid monochromic meals. One of the most colorful dishes in my book, Beet and Red Pepper Soup, is bright fuscia in color. I value the dish for both its simplicity and the pop of color it gives to an otherwise pale meal. Even foods that might not be your favorite, like peas, serve an important visual function on a plate. 

#7 Don’t Overestimate Yourself 

Acknowledge any lack of enthusiasm by building a library of the simplest healthy dishes you can prepare. If there’s one thing I learned in developing this cookbook it’s that simple dishes can be just as delicious as complex ones. Have fallback dishes. Keep baggies of cut vegetables you can stir-fry to accompany a take-out meal. 

#8 Invite Others Over for Dinner and Cook for Them 

My Mexican friends love to come over and try dishes that aren’t common in Mexico. (It’s fun when guests don’t know how to make lasagna.) The pleasure others take in your cooking for them will increase your own pleasure in doing it. 

#9 Take Note to Include a Wide Variety of Superfoods from Week to Week

Keep a written list of superfoods and ask yourself, when was the last time I had a sweet potato? Sweet Red Bell Peppers? Walnuts? (Fortunately, a benevolent god created chocolate as a Superfood.) Variety in superfoods is important too.

In The Lazy Expat index, I list superfoods, their properties, and which dishes in the book contain them. Some weeks I simply scroll through the list and cherry-pick recipes that include ingredients I hadn’t used the week before.

Create your own list from your existing cookbooks. You could create an index card for “Sweet Potatoes” on which you list all sweet potato recipes you like. Shuffle the cards and create menu plans that vary from week to week.

#10 Limit Ingredients You Use to the Most Common, Healthy Ones 

I will elaborate on this point in another blog. Basically, the idea is that it’s much easier to put together meals on the fly when you become intimately familiar with the most common healthy ingredients.

You can cook for years and never develop the ability to improvise if you’ve always had the luxury of ivory bell peppers and Kaffir lime leaves. Limited availability of many flavoring ingredients in Mexico (although most of the produce is available) has made me a better, more instinctive cook.

Many cookbooks are written by people who suddenly and urgently needed to fix their eating habits. I freely admit that my cookbook sprang from the need to fix mine. And after four years it’s still a cookbook I use almost every day, no matter where I am.

What is your appetite like? Do you have a tendency to not eat? What triggers your lack of appetite? Do you have any tips to help stimulate appetite? Please share them with the community and let’s help each other!

If you’re on Beauty TikTok even a little, chances are you’ve seen the viral Tom Ford lip balm that costs a whopping $58. It’s so popular, it sold out on the brand’s website and at Sephora. That’s why fans are looking for a Tom Ford Soleil Balm Frost Lip Balm dupe — and they think they found one. Oh, and it’s $51 cheaper and in stock. For now, anyway.

First, let’s see why Tom Ford’s lip balm is so popular. The hydrating formula feels luxe going on and leaves a pink-gold shimmer behind. It’s not glittery and rough but instead, you can’t even feel the shimmer. It’s gorgeous alone but especially pretty as a high-shine lipstick topper. It’s also free of sulfates SLS and SLES, parabens, formaldehydes, phthalates and mineral oil. If you can find it and it’s in your budget, fans say it’s definitely worth the price.

Tom Ford.

TikTokers @mekaelafarris and @itsnanacastro both have the $58 Tom Ford lipstick but shared with their followers an affordable dupe they say is seriously similar. The Hard Candy Glitteratzi Crystal Lip Duo, Shimmering Champagne has a bit more color (Tom Ford’s is sheerer) but a similar sheen when applied. There’s a glitter lipstick on one side and a gloss on the other to increase the shine. Is it as luxe and hydrating as Soleil Balm Frost Lip Balm? Of course not. But it’s less than $7 and is available now.

The shade Dream Queen is a best seller too but that one has a lot more pink in it.

Hard Candy.

This is the most affordable dupe TikTokers have found and is sure to sell out just like Tom Ford’s lipstick did. But it’s not the only option. Pat McGrath Labs’ Lip Fetish Astral Lip Balm came out in 2018 and features six shimmery, high-shine shades, though only four are available right now. It’s also seriously hydrating. Which one you absolutely need in your life is your choice — they’re all great options for a shimmery winter lip.

The colonial furniture had made its way from my childhood bedroom to my first apartment and my next four places of residence, but now that I was downsizing and leaving my home of 36 years, it was time to say goodbye. In Marie Kondo fashion, I thanked the furniture for its service and put pictures of the set on Facebook Marketplace, offering all the pieces for free.

Sentimental Value

I had no takers for weeks, and then a man messaged me that he was interested. He asked to get on a phone call to explain.

“I’m 65,” George told me when we chatted, “and I had this exact furniture when I was a kid. I kept it for many years, but my brothers made so much fun of me for it that they finally talked me into getting rid of it. Now seeing your photos, I miss that furniture.”

George rented a van and drove three hours each way to claim my Ethan Allen desk, dresser, hutch and cabinet as his own. He brought along a buddy to help him with the lifting, and both of them were already laughing when they arrived.

We all knew that there was no reasonable justification for this level of sentimentality, but what a win/win for him to recapture a slice of his childhood and for me to know that my long-loved pieces would be appreciated in their new space.

Sell, Donate, Discard

Not everything that came out of my now former house met as happy a fate. My husband and I found ourselves using that 1-800-got-junk number more than we’d hoped, especially at the end of this journey when our home buyers unexpectedly asked to push up the closing date, giving us only a week to finish clearing out the house.

Into the dump truck went wonky-switch lamps and random cords and cables, while outdated softback textbooks got tossed into the recycle bin.

“You will sell, give away or throw away more than you want to,” a friend who had recently downsized informed me when I started the process of moving to Florida. “The sooner you accept that, the better.”

I knew she was right, but it was painful. Of the three – sell, donate or discard – I thought the middle one was the best fit for me. Just by word of mouth, we did score some cash for easy-to-sell items like our snow blower, but I had neither the physical energy nor emotional stamina to hold a big house sale and haggle over whether some cherished object was really worth $3. I’d rather just give it away.

Places That Take Your Stuff

Facebook Marketplace proved effective not only for my childhood furniture but for a range of other possessions. For small household items, we took advantage of a local Salvation Army Dropoff box. There’s also Craigslist, Freecycle and some other organizations listed here.

Late in the game, a friend told me about a “Pass It On” Facebook page restricted to the handful of Chicago suburbs around my house. As you might guess from the name, all items you post on Pass It On must be offered at no charge.

Urgency is built into the group, because it’s first come, first served. The person parting with the item is supposed to give the first responder top priority and so on down the line. Each successive requester simply comments “next” to indicate dibs on being next in line if no earlier responders end up taking the offering.

The Joy of Giving

I had responses just seconds after I posted my coffee maker and coffee bean grinder on Pass It On: North Shore Families. It was as if the members of the page kept a constant lookout for free things they could use, and within the hour someone I’d identify as a young mom – apparently a prominent demographic on the page – arrived to pick up the grinder.

I convinced her to also grab some coffee cups I’d been using as cereal bowls since they were the last remaining receptacles of any kind in the house. Soon after, the coffee maker, too, found a good home.

“This is so great,” the night nurse on staff at a large local hospital said when she showed up on my doorstep. “Our coffee maker broke, and our nurses are buying coffee. Nurses shouldn’t have to buy their own coffee!” I had to agree.

Next came the white metal Elfa drawers I’d bought at the Container Store when my kids were young. They’re so versatile for toys, cleaning supplies, clothes or anything really, and I figured they’d go fast. In no time a mother of 3-year-old twins was piling them into her SUV.

A Goodwill bin at a nearby 7-Eleven sat ready to accept multiple carloads of our no-longer-needed winter clothing, and I found an organization to take in some toys that were still in good shape.

Residing on a well-traveled street was convenient at this point – we could just stack stuff on the parkway, and people driving by would stop to select items to take home. A woman sifting through my bags of discards told me she did a lot of craft projects and was always looking for fabric and small objects she could use in a decorative way.

One person’s trash is indeed another’s treasure. Anything I could keep out of a landfill made me smile as I paid it forward, turning a painful process into a joyous one.

What item could you never part with when downsizing? Have you used donation services when moving to a smaller living space? Which websites or Facebook groups have been the most helpful for finding a new home for the stuff you no longer need?

My husband has memory loss. It is more advanced lately, so we finally went to see a neurologist.

It started out with memory lapses. Sometimes, Chuck asked the same question, like “Where is the rake?” It would be where it always was, but I would tell him anyway. Then a few minutes later, after getting distracted for a moment, he would ask, “Where’s the rake?”

These memory lapses came more frequently, and then they got quite unsettling. I tried to joke about it, as I did when I wrote about this a few years ago. At the time, I thought one lapse was just bad driving. Now I know it was problems with paying attention – with staying in the moment. You can read about it here.

About three weeks ago, my husband visited a neurologist, as suggested by our doctor. I tagged along because it was important both of us hear what the doctor had to say. This was apparent by the time we got home because all Chuck heard was that he was fine.

His doctor asked him a series of verbal questions, designed to help him determine and diagnose Chuck’s situation. Afterward, the doctor had good news. He said it is not Alzheimer’s or dementia, but to rule out anything else like a brain tumor he ordered an MRI (which came back clear).

He also thought that Chuck doesn’t get enough quality sleep.

When to See Your Doctor About Your Memory Loss Fears

If you’re concerned about memory loss, see your doctor. He or she can conduct tests to judge the degree of memory impairment and diagnose the cause.

He or she will have many questions for you, and it is important to have a family member or friend along to answer some questions based on his or her observations. Questions such as:

• How long have you had memory problems?
• What medications do you take, including prescriptions, over the counter, and vitamins?
• Have you recently been ill lately?
• What medicine did you take?
• What is your daily routine? How has your routine changed lately?
• What tasks are difficult to perform?
• What have you done for your memory problems? Have these helped?
• Have you ever fallen and injured your head?
• If you drink alcohol, how much do you drink daily?
• Have you felt sad, depressed or anxious lately?
• Have you experienced a major loss, change or stressful event in your life?

The questions are designed to help your doctor test your memory and other thinking skills. He or she may also order blood tests and brain-imaging tests, like Chuck’s MRI, that can help identify reversible causes of memory problems.

Your general practitioner may refer you to a specialist in diagnosing dementia or memory disorders, such as a neurologist, psychiatrist, psychologist or geriatrician. This specialist will try to identify any reversible cause of memory impairment so that you get appropriate treatment.

Stress, anxiety or depression can cause memory loss and make a person more forgetful. Also, dealing with life changes can leave a person confused or forgetful.

Retraining the Brain

Chuck’s doctor made suggestions as to how to retrain the brain and how to help the brain retain new information. Below are a few of the suggestions:

Practice doing only one thing at a time and avoid distractions. Try to fully concentrate on whatever you do, practice staying in the moment and try not to think about what you need to do in the future or what you did in the past.

Say something out loud several times if you really need to remember it. Practice this, for example, by trying to remember the grocery list; but take it with you just in case.

Does anyone in your family suffer from memory loss? Would retraining the brain help or is it something more serious? What have you discovered from consulting with your doctor? Please share your experience in the comments.