Thursday 22 April 2010

DIARY: Boredom, Moods and Robert Pattinson: My Reasons For Over Eating

So it's as little as 10 weeks until my holiday. Ahhh! Like most people, I'm really struggling to stay on track, but after receiving so many lovely emails from my amazing followers and lots of kind tweets on Twitter I've given myself a kick up the bum and I'm getting right back into it!

I've been so so desperate to eat pretty much anything in my house today, so I've decided to sit down and write a post about the reasons why. Lighterlife really focus on these reasons within their counseling sessions and it really helped me at the time, so I shall readdress them in an effort to revive them!

BOREDOM
I reckon this is my main reason for weight gain; I get bored very easily. Usually when I have too much to do I choose to do nothing and make myself unnecessarily bored (excellent time management skills I know, I blame my dad for that). I'll then stuff my face with anything I can get my hands on and before I know it, a whole tub of Ben and Jerry's has disappeared. Bring on the guilt!
I've been trying really hard to find alternative ways to cure my boredom in an attempt to stop eating unnecessarily. Firstly, I think its really important to understand the difference between actual hunger and fake hunger caused by boredom. I've been trying to reason with myself by using questions (yes, talking to myself - this dieting business has finally driven me MENTAL) like "how long ago did i last eat? Could I seriously be hungry yet?". At this point, I'll have a glass of water. Apparently hunger and thirst signals are easy to mix up, so by having a glass of water, you can elliminate any pesky thirst signals in disguise. Now it's time to find something to do. There's always some work that needs to be done, just make yourself do it. You'll feel miles better after, I promise. Then next time, try something a little different. Today I took my rather chunky dog Max, for an extra extra long walkies. The sun was shining and it was all very pleasant, plus lets face it, poor Maxi needs the exercise just as much as i do!

EMOTIONAL EATING
I am 100% guilty of using food as an emotional crutch. I eat when I'm happy, sad, angry, lonely, celebrating - you name it and I'll eat because of it. It really is a terrible habit and what makes it worse is that I know I do it. Emotional eating is such a huge issue and affects the majority of people who have foody problems. According to the people who know what they're talking about, the first step to breaking the nasty habit is to identify the triggers for your over eating. If you're stuffing your face because you've had an argument with your bezzie, think twice before you head to the biscuit tin. Is that really going to make it better? Wouldn't it be better to go and chill out in a bubble bath with a copy of Cosmo and calm yourself down rather than adding guilt to your list of reasons to be down? A vicious cycle I say.

IT JUST TASTES NICE
I seriously think I over eat because I just love food. BUT recently I've discovered that real food can be just as tasty as crap food (I'm not going to say nicer - yet, but it's getting there). Since LighterLife, my taste buds have a new lease of life. I've learned to absolutely love nuts, salsa, pesto, wholegrain bread, porridge… I've even made a bezzie in salad. I'm finally not eating like a kid anymore!

YOU WANT WHAT YOU CAN'T HAVE
Food is just like Johnny Depp or RPatz - you can't always get what you want. In fact, I've just had this conversation with my sister; why do we always want what we can't have? She said she got into bed last night and could only think about a Thornton's chocolate champagne bottle that was lurking in the fridge. She was willing to creep out from under her cosy duvet to dash downstairs and get it. A little bit mental? I think the idea of eating forbidden food makes it so much more alluring, but it never tastes as good as it was supposed to. Or is that just me?

If you are hungry (believe it or not, it does happen sometimes!) choose a sensible snack. Here's a list of sensible 100 calorie snacks for sin-free grazing:

  • One slice of brown toast with low-fat spread or jam
  • One Muller Light yogurt - check the calorie content, but most are 100 calories or less
  • A whole punnet of blueberries (a new love of mine) and a tablespoon of fat-free yogurt
  • One Special K bar
  • One meringue nest with 6 strawberries
  • One toasted crumpet with a teaspoon of low-fat grated cheese.
  • One pack of Walkers Baked crisps
There's loads of chocolate bars out there for less than 100 calories, but I try to stay away from them unless I really deserve a treat. They're just empty calories - you'll have a hunger pang 30 minutes after you've scoffed it and end up eating more. So I try to stop my cravings by cutting it out pretty much altogether.

There's also foods that are virtually calorie-less, like sugar free jelly. You could eat a bucketful and not put on an ounce. Some diets encourage you to eat these types of food, but don't you want to curb your mindless eating? I've fallen into that trap so many times. Mindless jelly eating turns into mindless crisps/chocolate/take-away eating once all the jelly's in your belly!

How does everyone else feel about their reasons for over eating? Do you know what they are? It would be lovely to hear from some of you! Feel free to keep it confidential or email me at ladygluttony@gmail.com.

Lots of foodless love,
LG xx

3 comments:

  1. Hi! I'm Katie, I'm 23 and in my first week of lighterlife. I'm looking forward to finding out what my reasons for overeating are, I'm quite sure it'll be emotional eating though! I'm sad, I grab the crisps. Happy, celebrating, cheerful, annoyed etc, out they come again!

    I'm loving your blog as a new lighterlife member, finding it very inspiring :)

    Katie xx

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  2. Hiya Katie,
    How are you finding LighterLife? You're at the really exciting stage, have you had your first weigh in yet?
    It's really interesting to find out your reasons for overeating and even better if you can overcome them!
    Thanks for your lovely comment, keep in touch and let me know how you're doing!

    xx

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  3. Great post - I am very guilty of emotional and bordom eating - I know I snack at work because I'm stressed and at home in the evenings because I'm bored. It is a tough cycle to break, but on the evenings I am busy I don't get hungry so I need to ask myself that question (am I really hungry?) a bit more often!

    Love the list of the 100 cal snacks- some I wouldn't have even realised were just 100 calories! xx

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