So the last 24 hours or so I've been having cravings for chocolate, and there's still quite a lot of Christmas candy and goodies laying about for me to indulge upon.
So that brings a question to mind for all my successful and healthy peeps: how do you "punish" yourself for eating badly? This is something I've always struggled with and can't seem to come up with a good plan as to what I should do if and when I do go over my calorie limit (which I did a little last night, but not drastically). Not sure if the best plan is to borrow calories from the next day or to just ignore the transgression and encourage myself not to let it happen again.
Also: a related question about cheat days. Do you give yourself days where you just go max out at a restaurant or a party or does trying to lose weight really mean that you can't cheat ever? I'm wondering again if it's possible to have successful cheat days ever where I indulge a little, and if so, how often they should be permitted.
To give context to everything that follows: I'm not a lady with a hard set plan. I don't count calories/fat/salt/etc/etc. I look up calorie counts for restaurants when possible simply because I don't know what is happening to my food there, but at home, where I know what the things I buy/make are made of, I'm not concerned with counts but simply focusing on increasing the number of vegetables, fruits, and whole grains I eat, and decreasing the meat and sugar. While I love to try new things, I don't keep anything in my home I don't enjoy eating. If you're more a, I need a plan and a count and all of that, more power to you, as none of it worked for me (all I could think about was food!), but my advice may not be the best for your goals :)
ReplyDeletePersonally, I think the best way to deal with eating too much or something unhealthy is forgiveness, not punishment. You're human, and its important not to lose sight of that, because perfection is not possible. You're not going to accomplish everything you set out to do, and all you can ask of yourself is to try to do all that you can do. Whatever you "punish" yourself with, be it exercise or lettuce, that thing is now a punishment and something you're not going to want in your life. Your food and exercise should invigorate and drive your life, not make it worse! To me, forgiveness lets me stop after the 15th or whatever candy, rather than killing the bag because I'm already "bad". Forgiveness means each day is new. Forgiveness means I'm not unhealthy because of a bad day, because it's just a day in the vast amount of days, and it doesn't need to define my life.
In terms of picking out the less healthy food I do eat? I always think--how much pleasure will I get from this? Is it like, fresh cookies from an oven pleasure or more like, meh stale cookies from a bag? Basically, I decide to indulge when I can really say, man, that was awesome and so very satisfying.
Enough of my rambling! Good luck on your adventure :)
Thanks for the comment, Katy! I like to count calories just because it forces me to stop eating at some point, and provides a way for me to be more conscious. Although I've been finding that once I run out of calories I still want to eat something - so I've been allowing myself little things like pistachios and plain popcorn. I suppose it's not the end of the world if I have some fruit after I've used up all my calories.
ReplyDeleteI think your point of view on forgiveness is very useful. If I am going to be successful at making this a lifestyle, I can't make it torture. I wonder if I've been making this too hard on myself and I need to be a little less psycho about counting calories and what not.
You're so hard on yourself! I don't punish myself for eating badly. My logic is that I've already punished myself enough by partaking in the indulgence. I think there's something wrong with your diet when you are feeling hungry so often. It's hard to have motivation when you're hungry all the time...
ReplyDeleteThere's two things going on here. The first is that psychologically, you want all the food that you are trying to deprive yourself. Try changing your mindset. Focus on all the bad things that that food brings with it. The second is that you are physically are limiting yourself a lot, so you are hungry and wanting it even more. If you are going for a lifestyle change, you can't be fighting such a battle everyday.
I think you should give rabbit food a little more of chance...
I also recently have tried to lose weight and change my diet. This came about after a terrible mishap with nutella (I was eating about one container every 3-5 days). I was thinking that every other part of the way I ate was okay, so why not? Anyways, I got terrible acne and fatigued. Since then I've been reading about diets, nutrition, and experimenting in my own life. Right now, I'm focusing on only eating fruits, vegetables, and nuts. I didn't believe that it was possible to get full off of fruits and veggies, but somehow it is. The motivation for me is that I know once I've filled up on these healthy foods, I don't crave any of the other foods that I wanted beforehand. Limiting access to these foods is a helpful step. Not seeing junk food or any other food on my bad list helps a lot. Salads with salt, pepper, vinegar, and olive oil are really amazing. I've ditched all other salad dressings for these 4 ingredients.
Oh, and if you want chocolate....only give in to the really good expensive stuff - the kind that has been processed at lower temperatures. That way, it's still remotely healthy, and you won't pig out on it when you think about how much you spent on it.
Keep striving! Maybe adjust your calorie intake, but if you go above what it is now, only let yourself go above with fresh fruits and vegetables.
I saw these chocolate rice cakes (hear me out first...) that are decently low cal (something like 50 cal for a palm-sized piece) and don't look completely disgusting, even by Cindy standards. Nothing beats a piece of chocolate when you really want it, but if you are not feeling super indulgent, maybe you could try those? Not sure what they taste like though...
ReplyDeleteIn addition to what everyone else said, I read something about cravings in the past and it has really stuck with me...
ReplyDeleteIf you are craving something (like, really craving not "hey, that sounds kinda good right now) then go ahead and have some of it. But make sure that it is only a small amount. Say, one serving size if you have the nutrition facts handy. If you just continue to deprive yourself of something you are craving you will either end up overindulging elsewhere or getting to the point where you give in and overindulge on the craving.
A couple of other things: cravings are usually for something that contains some sort of nutrient that your body is lacking (even if it's just the feel-good endorphins from chocolate). And whenever you are feeling a craving for something, drink a glass of water and wait twenty minutes...if you still want it, have a little!
Completely depriving yourself is just going to make you hate the process of developing a healthier lifestyle.
@Beth - Generally, I'm not actually "hungry" in that my stomach is rumbling, but hungry in that I want to eat something and I crave eating like a fatass like I normally would and I just want to shove things in my mouth without paying attention to what they are. I really think starting a diet is a difficult task that takes some time to get used to. It's more of a mental thing than being physically hungry. I generally don't attempt to deprive myself if I know I'm legitimately hungry - in that case, I'd rather go over my calorie limit and have a little snack than be a complete psycho about it.
ReplyDeleteI feel like I'm not "fighting a battle" every day, but just some days, and obviously so when I wrote this post. I was just having mad chocolate cravings and obviously any diet shouldn't allow for eating 85 items of chocolate in 1 day. Some days I just feel like nothing I'm eating is exciting and then other times I really enjoy my salad with chicken or whatever it may be. The biggest battle for me is going to be not overdoing it. Not going to taco bell and eating 6 different fatty items. Not eating 5 brownies. Stuff like that - probably stuff that most normal people don't even do - and definitely not as often as I'm used to. I do think that my goal is that if I have to have a later snack and I know I've maxed out on calories, I should only eat fruit or veggies. The last week or so I've indulged in pistachios as an over the top snack, but eh whatever, baby steps, right?
@Emily - I've heard that too. I've been trying to let my cravings subside, but sometimes you get those legitimate cravings, so I figured I'm better off using my calories on some chocolate than on something I'm not interested in eating. I also do wonder about that nutrient deprivation aspect because I LOVE salty foods - it makes me wonder if maybe a higher sodium diet is just something that my body is meant to have? Maybe that's not the same as craving them... I don't know.