@PreciousMissy
Couldn't find anything regarding "overfead" but I changed the spelling and found the pdf. Thanks!

Congratulations, great accomplishment surgergirl. While I've been able to have that accomplishment with some things, but not with chips. I thought about buying the small bags, but I don't think I'm ready for that. Happy for you.

Hi all. My name is Georgia and I think I want to join in on this discussion. Years ago I succeeded with a form of intuitive eating, but then I got pregnant and life just overwhelmed me from that point on.

My sons are 21 and 15 now and fairly low-maintenance, I'm divorced from the king of drama and life is pretty good now. I've managed to lose 40 lbs but have a long way to go. I actually lost nearly 70 lbs but then I went on vacation to Scotland and discovered the joys of shortbread and Edinburgh Raspberry Gin. (Dip shortbread in the raspberry gin...mmmmm!) I have finally stopped the weight gain and slowly inched back down the scale.

I have health issues and I've been following advice on how to eat for those issues, but frankly, that's a huge cause of my stress over the last year. My body simply did not want to lose weight when eating like medical professionals and other dieting "experts" were telling me I had to eat. Several small meals a day were making me nuts! I tried intermittent fasting, and it worked great for a year, but then the doctor talked me out of doing it, despite the great results. And when I tried to go back on it, I struggled.

So I'm here, because this week I've just been eating on a loose plan (I prefer to stick to a Paleolithic food plan) and eating only when hungry, eating a few bites, then waiting to see when I'm hungry again. And I'm already down 6 lbs. And it was fairly effortless! I LOVE THAT!

I found value in what has been shared on this thread, specifically that some days one is hungrier than others. I'm having one of those days today. So it's okay to get hungry. I'm good with that! It's okay to take care of it appropriately.

I'll probably still track what and how much I eat. I just want to be careful until I learn to trust myself to make the right choices.

So, see ya 'round here!

Georgia Hi, I remember you from other threads and have wondered how you were doing. Wellcome. My doctor didn't want me to do IF either, but I read an article telling all the health benefits that they believe it will do to the point that there is a university in the UK who are doing a study to see if it will reverse diabetes as well as prevent heart and circulatory diseases. I met a lady who does talks for Heart to Heart Association here in town and she said doctors don't really don't know how to treat women. Her cardiologist didn't know how or didn't treat her as she should have been treted before she had her heart attack. So my feeling is, this is my body and I am the one who has to take care of it. I don't want to wait until the UK proves it and then we have to wait for the FDA to approve of it. So I'm doing it, but I'm also doing it a healthy way. Actually, I'm finding that it is the normal way of eating for me. Actually, my doc once told me that any diet would work... the key is finding one you can live with. Well, I believe I have found mine.

I have met a lady online on a different website that is doing a combo of a form of Carbohydrate Addicts Diet with Intuitive Eating and Intermittent Fasting. This is kind of the way I like to eat and I do well on because of me dealing with diabetes. I started eating this way Sunday. Although I don't follow the diet plan exactly because I do it Intuitively. I eat my starchy type carbs once a day and I eat low carb no starchy carbs the rest of the time. They call the carby meal a Reward Meal. I don't like using the name Reward, so I just call it my Carby meal. Unlike the diet plan, my carby meal is not at the same time everyday. Sundays I have it for breakfast. Most days it is the noon meal but I can move it to evening meal when I need it. The amazing thing is that I ended up eating only 2 meals a day by the 3rd day. I'm just not hungry. I am finally back to eating the way I was when I did IE a few yrs ago and got messed up when I listened to someone on another IE website who told me I could not go more than 5 or 6 hrs at the most without eating. Now that I've learned so much about Intermittent Fasting and the wonderful benefits of it, I know that nothing is going to go wrong if I fast more than 5 or 6 hrs or more. My final meal last night was my lowcarb meal at 7:30 pm and I didn't get hungry to eat again until about 5 pm today. I ate what I wanted and I was satisfied when I quit eating. I'm not losing weight at this point. CAD says weigh daily and average weight loss or gain at the end of 7 days. My blood pressure is normal, my fasting blood sugar has been coming down steadily. I believe the weight has slowed down and my body is adjusting and stabilizing before it starts losing weight. This is how I ate as a child and almost everytime I lost weight so I am very pleased to be eating the way that is normal for me again and the way things are going.

Good afternoon all!

I'm still listening to my body, and it's telling me amazing things! My lunch didn't quite cut it today so I went "shopping" at the vending machine down the hall. As I was walking down the hall I decided I wanted something sweet and cake-y.

When I got to the vending machine I stared for a bit, mulling over my choices. Eventually I settled on something salty and savory. So much for sweet and cake-y!

When I looked at the calendar I realized why I've been craving salt all week long. I suspect next week I'll be craving hamburgers and steak. I love not having to follow rules that make me, and my body, unhappy.

I hope everyone has a glorious weekend!

Trish!!! So nice to hear from you again! Fancy meeting you here!

Yes, the very low carb diet with carefully placed carbs, the intermittent fasting in a way that I can handle it (I definitely can go about 7 hours between meals when I stick to my Paleo eating with good protein and healthy fats plus veggies), and the intuitive eating feels right for me. So much less stress over food! And I can go out with friends and make the right choices and not stress over that as well.

Yesterday I had breakfast early, at 6. I was very busy all morning and didn't start feeling hungry till around noon, but couldn't stop to eat till 2. I was SUPER hungry, so I did a drive-thru at Carl's Jr. for one of their low carb burgers and a bottle of water. I inhaled it! And I thought that I was going to be fine with that, but an hour later, I was hungry again! It was really surprising to me. I tried to let it pass, but it wouldn't go away. I made a pastrami and avocado lettuce wrap with a bit of garlic dressing. Dang, it was good! Stomach finally settled down. I didn't feel like eating again till just before bed time. There was a little soup left from my son's dinner, so I ate that. There was ground chicken, brown rice and veggies in it. I topped it with a little Romano cheese. Yum!

So this morning I weighed myself. Up a pound. Really? I think it was the salt from the burger and the pastrami. I'm not stressed. I think I killed that extra pound this morning with my workout.

Tomorrow we're going to visit my boys' grandparents. Grandpa wants to eat at Black Bear Diner. I've never eaten there before. I have heard the portions are huge. Must order carefully! There's a menu online that I can look at so I can plan ahead.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

My day was busy. DH had docs appt so we didn't eat until 3:30 and I ate again around 6pm. So followig my IF part of eating, I only ate within a 4 hr window... not on purpose, but just didn't get hungry. I'm finding that I'm not getting hungry as often, or eat as much as I used to. So glad to say that by combining IE with IF and CAD, is working for me. Although I have to say that today was more of an IE/IF. Really didn't include CAD today.

Carolr I forgot to thank you for the article you posted by Skwigg. I agree with so much of what she says she's learned and it amazes me that I have learned some of the things that she has. So glad to find someone else who has made IE more a personalized thing by doing things a little differently so that they can make IE work for them.

Hope everyone has a great weekend.

Hi everyone - I know I haven't been around much, but I just wanted to say that I hope everyone has a great holiday weekend.

Welcome Georgia and BigSky! So glad to have you join us.

Things are about the same for me - just eating when I'm hungry, stopping when I'm full. My clothes are fitting about the same as well, so I don't think I've lost any more weight, but that's fine with me. I haven't gained any either, so that's a plus.

This weekend is going to be a little stressful as my daughter and SIL are moving into a new house and not only am I having to baby-sit their two cats (Cady and Sophie) my husband and I are also going to help transport some furniture my brother has been storing for them. So it will be a busy afternoon-evening today. They have professional movers for the bulk of the move (moving from a 2-bedroom apt to a 4 bedroom house about 5 miles apart) but the furniture we're moving is in our neck of the woods and it's about a 45 minute drive over to their new house. Got up about 5 am to get over to the apt to pick up the cats so I'm pretty tired already - and it's only 10:00 am! Right now I'm too tired to even think about food!

Amazing things happen when no foods are off limits, right? I think over the last couple of weeks I've been able to get all the cravings I didn't meet over the last two years of dieting. Lots of healthy fats which I had been under eating. Delicious fruits that I wouldn't eat because they were not low GI. And I also stopped eating things that I ate daily out of habit but were not bringing me pleasure (like by daily dose of baby carrots). In short, I am eating for nourishment but not only if my body by my spirit and emotions as well. I am eating for pleasure not punishment. If I am still hungry I will just eat some more. And guess what? I am more at peace. I am eating a variety of foods all in moderation. I've gone back to some of my staples because I DO enjoy them (oatmeal and egg whites in the morning) but I won't eat them on remote control, I ask myself if that's what I want that morning. I went to the supermarket and bought things I had been thinking about and you know what? I didn't have to eat them right when I got home because I realized there is NO RUSH. I can eat them whenever!!! FREEDOM around food. I pray this continues. I need a sane way to maintain my weight loss. I like the element of trust in our bodies on IE. I lived in fear I would one day snap and eat myself back to obesity but I know realized I need to trust myself to eat how I need to eat for nourishment, health and fitness. Sorry if this seems like rambling. I am just do excited. Thanks to all for sharing your journey through this thread.

I went to bed late last night (I have sleep issues), but was delightfully blessed with sleeping in quite late. 9.5 hours! I really needed it!

My sons wanted pizza for dinner last night. They had friends over and I was happy to not have to cook anything. I only ordered enough pizza for them. I know that if I have one piece, it multiplies to several pieces. So they chowed down and what was left was a single piece of pizza. And I got it! Satisfaction!

My weigh-in this morning was satisfying. I didn't lose anything since two days ago. I'm fine with that because I have eaten a little more over the last two days. So I think I know what level of eating equals maintenance for me (I've been trying to figure that out for a while).

This morning, I'm not hungry at all. Having my coffee with cream now, and I really don't want to eat till an early dinner tonight with Grandpa and Grandma. I looked at the Black Bear Diner menu. Yeesh! I could easily eat all my day's calories at one meal! Planning for the smaller portion of top sirloin steak, plus a salad with lemon (and I'm packing my own olive oil) and double portion of the sautéed veggies. No dessert. Maybe I'll bring along a bit of my dark French chocolate stash. 'Cuz that's what I really like!

That is great that you are learning to do this to maintain. Wish I had learned this when I lost so much weight yrs ago and I wouldn't be having to do it now. At least this time when I lose the weight, I will know how to stay there. It is a wonderful feeling to be at peace with food and the freedom to eat what you want is great. I think the reason it took me so long to really do IE 100% was that I didn't trust my body. I went through that time of eating all the foods I had not been allowed to eat when dieting. Then there came the day when I suddenly realized that some of those foods weren't as good as I thought they were because now I could have them. I never even notice them in the store any more. I also learned that some of the healthy foods I was supposed to eat or was allowed on a diet that I had convinced myself that I liked and were my favorites... suddenly I found that I didn't really like them at all. I remember in the IE book when they told a client to find out what she really liked and she learned there were only 10 foods that she really liked and they taught her to make her meals around those food. So that is what I've done and now that I know the foods that I really like I plan my meals around those foods. Eating is much more pleasurable these days. Happy for you.

SouthernMaven Good to hear from you. I hate moving so I understand the stress as just the thought is stressful to me. Good luck and take breaks when you need them.

Georgia Great plan for the pizza and eating out with the Grandparents. I like planning in advance. I try to eat my starchy carbs one a day. We have company coming to town Friday... DH cousin he hasn't seen in 20 yrs. We are taking them to Outback. We will all share the blooming onion and I'll have steak, salad and veggies at the restaurant. Then when we come to our house, I plan to have a salad tray and cheesecake and drinks. That way my carby food will be my piece of cheesecake. I do love how I can eat healthy and lowcarb and do it eating exactly what I want.

My weekly average loss is 1.4 lbs this week. My weight loss will be slow this way, but the nice thing is that my blood pressure is normal again and my fasting blood glucose reading was down to 133. That is down from around 202 when I started eating this way. So I am very pleased.

Hi Trish, I hear you! I've lost and gained weight SEVERAL times in my life! This time MUST be the last time! But like you, I wish I had discovered IE before or that at least I wouldn't have such an "all or nothing" attitude. Drastic diet/deprivation or "I blew it so I will eat it all". Now I realize I was punishing myself and my body which would just end up backfiring.

So I am new to this thread and am curious. I am trying to fix my disordered eating as well as my irrational thinking with food. This IE is interesting to me because I never used to be one to eat breakfast, but in the dieting world....you MUST eat breakfast.!! I have been overweight since I was a kid, yo yo dieting since likely 18 or so. My irrational thinking with food is that I really prefer crap junk food. I feel deprived even if I am not dieting at the time because I want to eat takeout for 3 meals a day sometimes....and not salad and have brownies and cookies on top of that. I need to change my thoughts about food and why I eat. I feel like crap when I eat the carby food, but doesn't stop me. I need to change my way of thinking to fuelling my body in a healthy way and not feel deprived. I think about food constantly, worse since loosing 50 lbs on a low carb diet.....then quickly gaining 20ish due to ridiculous binging. I have always been a bit of a binger, elementary school like grade 5 + I would buy 5 chocolate bars a day and eat them throughout the day along with gummys, hamburgers.....(hid from my parents) I have always eaten a row or 2 of cookies in a sitting.....yes since elementary school.....but since this last restrictive diet (I stuck to it faithfully for 24 weeks no cheating) my binging is way worse. The is the longest I have stuck to anything, with WW I would do it for a week, weigh in then take the night off and eat a lot and get back on the next day. Currently I am doing that same low carb diet trying to lose again what I gained, but in the mean time trying to get a plan in place to try and let go of this disordered eating. I am reading books on binging, I am actually starting on an antidepressant, because I have hit a super low and can't get out.....hoping that will help to level out my head a bit and make this situation of my food issues not seem so grim.

Wow sorry for the long story lol. Just curious about this way of eating, I will look for the book mentioned earlier and see what I find. Thanks everyone, and good luck with all of you!

I did really well at the restaurant last night. While there, we explored the menu but I stuck with my plan. I even asked my sons to remind me to stick to my plan if it looked like I was going to stray. While looking at the menu, I decided this was probably going to be the only time I would ever go to this restaurant. The calorie counts were horrible! They served a "bear claw" that was around 2400 calories!

I did come home a little hungry, so I ate a handful of almonds and was fine for the night. I slept in and woke you to another loss on the scale (down 9 lbs. of my regain!). I was feeling particularly hypoglycemic so I opted for a homemade sprouted wheat buttermilk waffle (and I stopped at one!) plus two eggs and a bit of cream in my coffee. I ate it pretty quickly, but managed to wait it out for 20 minutes to hit my blood stream. That's when I discovered I was completely satisfied and was free to go about my day!

This is awesome! I feel free!