Fat

[madrun]

As I said in the last post, I've gained 20 pounds since I quit smoking. I have a very good diet. We eat tons of vegetables, healthy meat, and almost all of our treats are homemade and loaded with good fats, fruit, and whole grains. I just eat too much. My "full" sensation seems to be broken. I overeat to the point of discomfort at almost every meal

Comments

[thewronghands]

Finding exercise that you actually like doing definitely helps, and/or people to go do it with. I hope the hot yoga turns out to be awesome!

Regarding food, I have had some success using small sweet things at the end of a meal to shut up the sugar craving. So if the whole meal is healthy, but paleo-ish, I can use portion control to make sure I eat the right amount and then have, like, half a granola bar or something late that night/before bed to shut up the sweets-craving part of my brain. There are a bunch of 100-calorie-ish granola bars and the like that work well for this, are on stupid diet, and are not calorie/sugar overkill.

[happygoth]

The overeating thing is admittedly not something I have had to deal with a lot in my life, but when it does come around (because it does, pretty much for everyone), I try very hard to do two things

[bunnyjadwiga]

Have you had any luck with something like South Beach? I'm considering going back on it this fall.

[mlpolson]

Dave struggled with this a lot after he quit smoking. His theory was that the oral fixation he had satisfied with a smoking was not being met and his brain was trying to satisfy it with food. He did several things to fight it. One was to eat off smaller plates, which really did help him reduce what he ate. Particularly since we never put the serving dishes on the table, so he would have to stand up to go get more food. This cut what he was eating a giving sitting by about one third to a half.

He also used the small treat idea mentioned by others. For him hard candy that he could suck on what worked best. Hard to find healthy ones of those unless you do fake sugar, but it was transition fix that worked for him. Part of his theory was that the oral sensation needed to last something similar to the time the cigaret had. He also used toothpicks, pens in his mouth etc. Even five years after he quit smoking if he is really stressed he will put a emptied Bic type pen housing and/or straw in him mouth so he can suck on it.

[mlpolson]

It is also important to remember that nicotine is a very powerful chemical appetite suppressant. Your body is having to re-learn how to actually judge when it is hungry and full, which it has not done without nicotine in your system for 20 years. So of course you feel hungry all the time.

[baronessv]

I'm wicked touchy about anyone evangelizing about diet or weight loss or anything, so I'm going to write this very firmly from the camp of "I have noticed my body does this, and this thing is working for me. If any of this sounds familiar, please feel free to explore these options/ask me more questions." And if not, just take it as my own musings on my relationship with food

[jonaskaite]

I've been thinking about this all weekend, and I have many conflicting thoughts. Trying to sort them out...

I think your acupuncturist is a little right, and Margaret is onto the same thread, but I think that the whole idea of "using food to fulfill unmet needs" is far too often framed in a nasty, judgmental way, that's tied up in a lot of shame imagery - not that your acupuncturist is necessarily doing so, but there's a societal/media message there that that phrasing resonates with. I think that you might find some value in this discussion of emotional eating. Michelle also has an excellent post on different types of hunger, how to recognize and differentiate them, and there's quite a lot of discussion in the comments about what to do when hunger/satiation signals aren't working