Here are some great tips especially for this time since many of us are stuck at home. Many of you are overeating due to boredom or stress. Read this post to get some ideas and tips to help keep you on your way to reach your goals.
Overeating is easy to do if you're eating a delicious meal. It's also easy due to other factors such as boredom, stress or eating too fast.
There are many strategies you can learn to help with overeating, such as slowing down while you eat to learn your hunger cues. Use these tips to help to get your eating on track, feel fueled for your workouts.
Prepare
If you are surrounded by unhealthy food all day long, it can be very tempting to indulge and eat all day long, whether you are hungry or not. Here's one way to avoid this temptation: think about how you feel after you eat too much. Like when you are full, but still want to eat the food.
Another tactic is thinking about how you feel when you DON’T eat the food. In almost every case you feel proud and happy that you didn't indulge unnecessarily.
Strategy: Before you decide to grab a pastry or cookie in the kitchen, especially if you’ve already had you breakfast or lunch. Think to yourself: How will i feel if i eat this? How will I feel if I walk away? If you make this a habit you’ll want to indulge and that's okay, but you may find that you say “no” more than you say “yes”
Eat Slower
It takes time for your stomach to tell your mind that you are full because the process of feeling full takes time. This process can take anywhere from 5-10 minutes, which is why it is important to eat slowly. Eating too quickly is an easy way to overeat, because we get the full cue well after we've already eaten too much.
Strategy: The next time you eat, set a timer for 20 minutes and see how long it takes for you to feel full. Pay attention to the cues your body is telling you. Doing this will allow you to learn how long it takes your body to feel full, which you can use to help with overeating in the future. Also drinking water while you eat can help you slow down your eating.
Eating mindfully
In our society right now it's all go, go, go. You may be quickly eating your breakfast driving to work, rushing through your lunch at your desk, eating dinner while watching your favorite shows. In all these situations, your focus is on everything but eating, which can lead to overeating. When you're not paying attention to your body you're missing its cues.
Strategy: Make a goal to eat at least one meal a day without doing anything else. See if you notice the difference in recognizing your full feeling. Try and increase these meals until you eventually get to three. Also you could try putting a serving size of each food, or appropriate amount of food to reach your caloric needs on your plate and not any more than that.
Stress
It seems as though there is always something to be stressed about, whether its work or family. This stress wreaks havoc on your body physically and mentally. I can cause anything from chronic high blood pressure, headaches, chest pain and more, it's causing you to overeat.
When you stress your body releases cortisol, which also happens to increase appetite. Whether you're hungry or not, your body is craving food to satisfy that “hunger” feeling. In many cases that's when you eat high fat, sugary food, which makes over-eating even worse.
Strategy: If you can’t reduce the amount of stress in your life, the next step is to recognize the potential for overeating to help stop it before it starts. When you are stressed try to rely on portioning your food when you go out to eat. You can get half your meal put in a box to eat later, before you even start eating. If you're hungry for a snack, when you normally aren’t, take a check in with yourself: Am i really hungry or is this stress?
Eat before you get hungry
If you wait until you are hungry to eat, you might start to get too hungry. You may be so hungry that you may experience nausea, or even a headache. But you may even eat unhealthy foods, because you are more likely to eat the first thing you find.
Strategy: Most people tend to eat around the same time everyday. Try setting an alarm on your phone 30min to an hour before you’d normally eat your meal. You’ll quickly see that you are more likely to make a rational health food choice with what you're eating and how much.
Give yourself time
How often have you been eating your meal, but feel full and finish your plate anyways. Then when you're done you feel very full and mad at yourself. You think “why did i eat that? Now i feel like crap” It's hard to resist food in the moment, but giving yourself time to decide whether or not you should finish may be what you need.
Strategy: The next time you're in a moment where you would normally eat more, but know you should, stop and give yourself a 10 minute break. You should give yourself some time to decide if you want to eat the rest of the food on your plate. Just about everything you'll be happy to toss or save your food for later.
Pay attention to your hunger cues.
If you are waiting for your stomach to grumble you may be setting yourself up to overeat. Not everyone has the same hunger cues. Sometimes it shows up as a headache, bad mood or comes on suddenly. Knowing you hunger cues is key so you know you're hungry before it gets too late and you're starving. Other potential hunger cues are:
Growling stomach
Nausea
Headache
Low energy
“Hangry” irritable
Strategy: Take note of your body's hunger cues. When you discover what it means when “Im hungry” for your body, allowing you to eat right away rather than waiting until its too late. Then you are more likely to overeat.
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