Trigger foods, overeating and what works for me

Trigger Food

Those delicious things that cause you to overeat, binge and lose control. MANY people struggle with this! For some its ice cream, cookies or chocolate. For others it’s pasta, or bread. In my case its chips. So, what’s helped me? And what treat do I buy instead??
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My Do’s and Don’ts:
❌ don’t keep chips at home
✅leave the house to buy a small bag of chips if I crave them

❌don’t avoid buying treats
✅ buy treats that I can enjoy without going overboard ?

❌stop and think – am I eating out of boredom, emotion, habit or am I actually hungry?
✅eat if I’m hungry, find something to do if I’m not

My current favourite treat? I buy a bar of 85% dark chocolate once or twice a month. I can have one square once or twice a week and not need anymore. I completely believe in balance and not depriving myself, I do find keeping chips out of the house as opposed to out of my diet a more sustainable approach.

A lot of people end up overeating because:

❌ they want to be social, so they eat with friends even if they aren’t hungry

❌ they’re bored – the number of times I’ve grabbed snacks I don’t need while watching TV is unreal and it can become habitual really quickly too!

❌ they use food as a depressor and way to decompress despite their actual hunger levels

❌ we get into the habit of mindlessly eating when we multitask at meal time. Being on our phones, watching tv or while multitasking has us dissasociated from the actual act of eating and we sometimes don’t even realize how much we eat

❌ we’re so focused on our schedule that we often eat because “it’s breakfast” or “lunch time” which means we aren’t eating when we are hungry which only makes us more out of tune with our bodies

❌ we eat so quickly our body doesn’t have time to realize that it’s full until it’s too late!

I’ve spent the last 6 months being more MINDFUL when eating. For me this means:
?Eating only when I’m hungry
?Eating slowly and chewing my food
?Eating till I’m full or almost full

These ? might seem ridiculous BUT the reality is that a lot of us associate food with routine (eating because it’s lunch time), emotions ?? + combined with a lack of time, eating can become an unnatural process ?.

BENEFITS of mindfulness:

?I haven’t had to work too hard to maintain my weight despite 9 weeks of traveling + way more eating out than usual.
?I’ve avoided a lot of unnecessary calories by not eating out of boredom!
?Calorie counting and macro tracking alone can lead some people focus more on the numbers and cause them to lose touch with hunger levels. I remember counting calories and thinking I’ve got 500 calories left at 9pm, what should I eat..despite my lack of hunger.
?Less guilt about eating more. The truth is some days I need 3000 calories and some days I’m perfectly full and content with 1500.

It takes TIME to become more mindful. After 6 months I still have to be conscious of old habits..especially late at night.

Check out this interesting article on Food Addiction that talks about dependence, what makes food addictive, how to deal with this, emotions and dieting.