When someone you live with bring junk into the house...
I know no matter what junk is brought into the house, its my responsibility not to eat it. But I'm still annoyed at my husband for constantly bringing junk into the house. Last night he went to the store to "get ice cream"...but today I see that he also bought a bag of cheetos, and about 5 bags of M&Ms...and that just what I saw today, knowing his track record there is likely more junk in higher cabinets.
I've been a bit down, mostly bored from being stuck in with the baby, even though I enjoy caring for him, it does keep me in, and I have 2 other kids.
And I went way over my cals today with ice cream and m&ms...my fault but it would be much easier if it wasnt there .
Smetimes I'm ok. But when I'm feeling weak, boredom and feeling down are my triggers to eat, its harder to say no. Those are the times when I will eat if its in the house.
Any suggestions? Remember I have a newborn, 3 year old and special needs 5 year old, so I cant just up and leave the house. Also i'm BFing and he's been eating about every hour sometimes more frequent, so i'm often sitting and BFing. This is another reason i dont want to eat crap. Aside from the ice cream and m&ms i am eating very healthy and staying within cals.
Forgive typos at the little i's...typing w/ one hand
First a !! It's good to see you again on the forums
My fiance is notorious for getting food that I can't/shouldn't eat...a lot of times I have the willpower to just say no, but sometimes I see that bag of doritos in the pantry and I just wanna cry because all I want is to eat that bag of doritos, even though I may not be hungry. All I want is the flavor, gosh darn it! (If I could mimick dorito flavor onto something healthy, I'd be set!)
It's hard to do with fridge/freezer food, but with pantry food I have cleared the cupboard above the stove and told him to stash his goodies up there. I don't have a reason to go into that cupboard (unless I want hard alcohol, which is rarely), so I don't see them. To top it off, I can hardly reach it without a stepping stool, so it's more work on me if I want to get something from there.
I also buy a few things that are mine. All mine. Like the Weight Watchers ice cream bars. I like the dulce de leche and the divine triple chocolate, and at 130 calories, they are a yummy treat! He cannot have any of them, and I keep track! If he eats one, he has to buy me a box next time. Same thing with Skinny Cow chocolate treats. I keep my treats on a shelf in the pantry, and inventory it like a store manager It's not that I don't want him to have any (if he asks, I'll gladly let him have one), it's that I know he won't just eat one...he'll eat 3-4 of something, and then I won't have any for myself when I need them.
I know our situations are different (I don't have kids...unless you count my fiance, who has the mentality of a child sometimes ), so maybe you could have your husband put the junk food he buys into a bin and not tell you where it is? Or put the food in an inconvenient location? Or maybe set a shelf just for your go-to snacks/goodies that no one else can get into?
Oh my gosh! I'm right there with ya sister! So what I have found...is that if I get up in the morning and do my workout video EARLY in the morning and get it done and over with before my day "starts" *AND* have a breakfast with LOTS of protein...then I am LESS likely to eat the crap my husband sneaks into the house.
The times that I have caved and decided to snack on something sugary...I have limited myself to ONE. It also helps to have single serving items available so that you are less likely to overeat.
I agree with buying yourself certain items! I could not agree more! There are so many products on the market now days that can satisfy our sweet tooth without breaking the calorie bank. Try to get a day to grocery shop alone at least every week 1/2 or so (may hubby can watch the kids?) so that you can browse the shelves and actually take time to look and read nutrition labels and feel GOOD about your choices. I have found this especially helps me :-)
At my office there is a communal refrigerator where everyone can put their lunches, snacks, or anything else they want to keep in there.
No matter how appetizing anything in that refrigerator looks, it isn't mine. I can't just up and eat it because it belongs to someone else.
Can you try on that mindset with your partner's stuff? If you can't prevail on him to store them safely out of your sight, then when you see them just tell yourself "not mine!" He bought them for himself, right? So look at them as the property of someone else. They are not there for you. They belong to him.
Thank you all.
Buffinluvin- I do have some of my own snacks in the big freezer in the garage. But only a few servings. I unfortunately have always had an issue w/ binge eating. While I was in the hospital having the baby I was eating those individual gram cracker packs. Like 60 cals a serving, and I'd only eat like 2 because I didnt want the staff to se me eating like 4000 servings lol. But I thought, coming home, "oh here's a food I can control myself with"...nope after a few days, I ate almost a whole box in one sitting. So no more gram crackers. I have tried many times over the years to have a box of something like sinny cow ice cream or what not and eventually one night comes along and I eat the whole box in one shot. So my treats have to be out side of the house, like if I go to a party I'll have a slice of cake, or if we go out to eat, dessert...or if I really want something, I have to buy ONE serving of it for home. Like a single pack of cookies from 7-11...
tadaponce = when I was thinner and running, I absolutely noticed that getting up early and going for a run really helped me stay on track the rest of the day. Even years ago when i did the gym thing, going to the gym early in the day helped ward off bad eating. Actually its nice to know someone else is the same way! lol but i cant really do that now with the baby though i will hopefully once he baby has a better sleep schedule.
Vex - i'm going to have to ask him to do that. He keeps his junk food in the same spot. I knew ther ewee m&ms, and going into that cabinet i saw the cheetos... The cabinet is high enough that he has had snacks up ther for some time before i realized they were there.
Carter - this would be most effective. If i know something is his i wont eat it but he goes and buys like a bunch of bags of m&ms and offers it to me...
*****
while i was typing this dh came home and we talked. He was very understnding. I said i just dont have the will power right now to not eat the junk. He said he would take it to work tomorrow and agreed to buy one serving instead of stocking up on junk food.
i was actually surprised and happy how understanding he was,
GlamourGirl wow your hubby sounds like a very understanding person, I am glad he is supporting you and doing what he can with compromises to make your journey a bit easier. kudos to good men!
We have a garage refrigerator (not solely a freezer) where we store mostly overflow water bottles and sports drinks. I have requested all soda be stored out there as well as straight up candy bars because those things are very hard to resist. My husband for some reason likes to keep his chocolate type bars in the freezer, so it works out great. It's only about 20 feet away, but sometimes the minor hassle with locating my flip flops and traipsing out into the hot garage in various stages of dress is JUST enough of an inconvenience to help me with will power. It also helps that I do not know about or see the kit kats, snickers, etc.
Just think of it as exercising your will power just like you are exercising your body. I remember I had a roommate like that and now that I live alone I realize the positive affects that negative experience had on me.
Nobody in my house eats this way but me. I'm surrounded by this sort of thing every day.
You're right - some days are easier than others to ignore it. On those hard days, I either ask my husband to move the worst of it where I cannot see, or I just take a deep sniff of it, enjoy the smell and the memory of eating it, and move on. Oftentimes it isn't the taste of the food I really want, but how I *remember* it, and the things surrounding that memory. Re-experiencing that and then giving it a little time without giving into eating it takes away the desire MOST of the time. Not all of the time (for example, last night I ended up eating half a cup of peanut butter when my original intent was a tablespoon. Whoops!), but enough that it should give you reasonably good control of your eating, regardless of environment, so you can get the weight off.
Even with the aforementioned peanut butter fest and countless other less-than-ideal meals on the past few years, I'm still below my original goal and haven't regained weight. It's not a matter of perfection, or zero temptation, but managing your habits and environment in such a way that you do well most of the time and respond properly the occasions you don't do as well as you'd like. Life is full of people not on a diet - learning to make peace with that and thrive in tandem with their food choices is really key to lifetime weight maintenance, for me.
My husband and i have an agreement whereby he buys one of whatever he wants. There are still times when a tub of ice cream ends up in the freezer but i explained how difficult it is for me to abstain and how i'm not trying to stop him from eating anything but the extra weight makes me feel a bit down and its a little thing he could help me out with. Luckily on the whole hes been pretty supportive and has actually switched his daily ice cream to fruit (mostly). I buy stuff too but we usually pick one thing each when we do our weekly shopping and the rest of the week we tend to be pretty steady. As your husbands already mentioned keeping it away from you thats a good sign!!
Its got easier as times gone on to not eat anything that does come into the house once you've got into hour own stride and out of sight really does work!!! As arctic mam pointed out theres always going to be temptation around, i'm at home at the moment too but i find distraction works as well as simply visualising what i want to look like, it helps my resolve a bit. We all have bumps along the road, i just put on a bunch of weight on a visit home but you just pick yourself up and keep going! Am sure you'll work it out!
Don't you hate that, my husband has every single junk food you can think of in our bar. He says they are for the grandchildren.
Our grandchildren don't even live in our town, he eats them everyday. I have asked him not to bring them home.
I allow myself 2 snacks, popcorn, lite ice cream, air popped chips, a nut bar which they are all low calorie. That way I feel I'm not missing out. He knows how hard I try and he will offer me a drumstick or chocolates.
I have to constantly fight myself to stay on track, he decided to eat some of my things I brought for me, which he can have if he wants and thinks they are delicious and eats more.
I have resorted to hiding my things, we are talking about food here. I've tried to talk to him about eating healthy but he is not interested, I think he is unhappy about his weight, but not prepared to do the work at it and jokes
Thank you all for your replies.
So DH never took the cheetos to work. They are still there. Lucky for me my weakness is sweet stuff. I like cheetos, a lot, but I can seem to say no to salty foods. The M&Ms are gone, parlty because of me :/
Anyway I weighed in today (Tuesday is my day) and same weight, no loss no gain so I guess I'm at least happy no gain.
I asked DH not to bring junk (sweets) into the house or only one serving for him.
I'll see if he does that. We had this talk before. I just dont see why he has to buy so much food at once. Whats he stocking up for??? We live practically behind a 7-11. I could walk there in like 1 minute, why buy days worth of crap??
When someone you live with bring junk into the house...
!! It's good to see you again on the forums 
It's not that I don't want him to have any (if he asks, I'll gladly let him have one), it's that I know he won't just eat one...he'll eat 3-4 of something, and then I won't have any for myself when I need them.
