stop eating before I'm full/only eat when hungry

Such great recipes. Fried peanut-butter & banana sandwich. Potato and cheese bake. Pot aux chocolate. Orange zest ice cream. Omelettes with crisp bacon.

Damn, now I’m hungry again.

I started off good this week. It’s been 3 or 4 days since I’ve overeaten. But the temptation is much harder when I’m exercizing, because my body craves food much more after a workout. I’ve started drinking protein shakes - soy/whey protein blended with milk - and that helps a bit.

I also thew away all the snack food in the house. That makes it easier, too. I do much better when the temptation is removed from my sight and mind.

I guess I hadn’t hit bottom. I started off with a good breakfast. It was downhill from there. Snacks. Sodas. Big meals (I ate 2 big pork chops for dinner and was still hungry). I even opened up the gift-wrapped tin of caramels that I bought as a present for my Dad, and when I had a chocoloate craving I ate several spoonfuls of cocoa powder.

I think I need to go back to having an empty fridge and no snacks in the house. When I barely had any food in the house, it seemed easier. The only reason I bought the snacks was for the Open Houses, to offer guests that I’m trying to sell my house to. Maybe I’ll have to wait until the house sells and then go back to having a bare kitchen.

What I really need is to learn some self-control!

I let myself go for a few weeks. Now I’m re-committing myself to accomplishing this goal. I bought lots of healthful foods, plenty of water, and chewing gum to get through the hard times. I’m running 5km and working out more, so I hope that will keep me motivated too. (Although working out always makes me crazy hungry the next day.)

OK, here’s a new rule for me. No cookies. No snacks. Only get them as a treat when I go out. But for inside the house… it’s too much of a temptation. I work from home, so the food is always there, calling me, especially when I’m stressed from work. Once the cookies were all gone, I went back to eating small again. Never again.

Also, don’t shop while hungry. I had a craving and I bought a pound of fried chicken drummettes from the deli. Delicious, but I felt like a greaseball the next day.

I’ve stopped traveling for work this month, and I came home to a blissfully empty refridgerator and freezer. A fresh start! So I went out for a bite to eat, and then I went grocery shopping.

I forgot where I heard the tip “don’t shop hungry” but it works! I was able to focus on the food I needed, not what I wanted. Vegetables, fruit, juice, milk, wheat bread, and some lean meats. I stopped at half a shopping cart. That should be enough food for the week. I’ll wait until I’m almost completely out of food before I shop again.

Now that I have no food in the house, it’s easy to eat small. Snacks are fruits or veggies, or maybe a slice of bread with peanut butter or cheese. And coffee with a good creamer as dessert.

We’ll see how it goes for the week.

I’ve done it a few times. Only eating a small portion and then stopping. But mostly, I’m a pig. I’ve been under a lot of stress and I’ve been on the road for 3 weeks, traveling away from home, so that makes it really hard. Restaurants serve huge portions. I’ll keep trying.

“Clean your plate.” If I’m ever a parent, I promise that I will never say this. I don’t know if this is part of the cause of my problem, but it sure feels that way. If you put a plate of food in front of me, I eat it. If it’s a big portion, like in most restaurants, I’m in trouble. Even at home, i have “eyes that are bigger than my stomach” and tend to serve big plate-fulls of food.

A few years ago, I thought I had solved the problem. I did a simple thing… whatever was on my plate, I cut in half, and I only ate that half. The rest was thrown away or wrapped up for later. After a week or two it became second nature. I cut everything in half – sandwiches, meats, I’d even throw away an apple after eating half of it.

I think it did 2 things: break the need to “clean my plate” and learn that it’s okay to stop eating even when there’s food left over, and it made my stomach feel smaller. I didn’t feel as hungry as before.

But over time, it stopped working. I’d start nibbling on the 2nd half, and eventually I was eating the whole thing. Today, I usually start by eating half. But if the plate stays in front of me, like when I’m talking with friends at lunch or dinner, I’ll slowly start picking at the 2nd half and by the time we’re done it’s all gone.

I’m going to try it again. This time when i’m done with the first half, I’ll send the plate away. I’ll push it away from me, or throw it away, or whatever, but I won’t let it sit in front of me to tempt me.