When I started my journey over a year ago, one of the things I was really worried about was the certainty that I would experience cravings and that this would lead me to quit very early into my healthy eating regime. The same thought was also a constant as I neared the point of starting to eat healthily again this time, despite all my experience. Over the last year I have been told that my cravings are not cravings, they are simply thirst, hunger, the psychological impact of telling myself I can't have the things I crave, a lack of willpower...the list goes on.
However, as I am now beginning to find myself craving food again, I have noticed a subtle change in my attitude to it, and it was all down to something a friend of mine on www.healthunlocked.com, Jeff, said. We had been having a conversation about cravings (at least that is what I believe to the best of my recollection), although it was probably more of a moan about not being allowed to eat and feel full and cravings, when he said that the feeling of hunger that created my cravings was simply telling me that I was losing weight.
Now, as a diet tip, it is probably not good to be constantly hungry and I am sure that he didn't mean to stop eating and be hungry. Instead, what I took from his words were, that cravings mean that you are transitioning from eating absolute rubbish to eating healthily. Normally you eat until you are full or are overeating, so that craving or that little feeling of hunger because you can't have it, tells you that you are staying strong, staying on track, to eating healthily and to losing the weight.
Therefore today, and yesterday, and the day before that, when the cravings started or I felt a little hungry because I was eating less than I normally do and sticking to a set number of calories per day, I simply smiled and thought to myself, 'I'm losing weight' and it helped. I hadn't given in and I had thought of the feeling that, up until a few days ago, would have meant me raiding the cupboard or crisp bin and stuffing myself with anything I could get my hands on, and then going to the local shop to buy some beer. But not now.
Psychologically, it certainly has helped me doing this. I still feel hungry, but I know that that feeling can be quenched either with water, tea or by remembering why I am hungry (or feeling hungry). I can tell myself that or drink something AND tell myself that I am losing weight, so feeling hungry is fine at the moment. Eating things that are good for you and not overeating is, in a way, like exercising: when you first start out it is a huge task, but as you get into it and make it into a routine, it becomes something more enjoyable, it becomes something you are proud of. Yes, you have to get past the struggle first, but everything is a struggle until you practice and practice and practice so it becomes automatic.
Additionally, with my new determination to not put giving in on the table, I have also made sure that, if I do really want that mince pie or chocolate, that I set aside a time to have it so that I am eating it when I want to, not when my craving for it is at it's highest. This way I am always in control of the food I eat, it isn't in control of me.
So today. Today I will have walked about 10,000 steps before I go to bed, I have been into school to look after critical worker's children, read, researched how to encourage reading for pleasure in teenagers, exercised, stretched and have (or am) written my reflection. I had 3 rashers of turkey bacon, 2 eggs and baked beans for lunch, with two rounds of bread to make up for the fact that I didn't have breakfast. I still have had no alcohol and the only side affect of that is that I am actually sleeping!
Hopefully tomorrow will bring more good news on here, with me continuing to stick at it and then, fingers crossed, a good piece of weight will be shifted on Monday on my weigh in.
If you have any ideas on how to beat cravings, please feel free to comment or contact me on healthunlocked.
Unti tomorrow, stay safe and keep following your path!
Thanks for reading.
Sean.
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