Hi Folks

Not sure if this is the right place to post this or not, so please forgive me if I am in the wrong spot.

I am having awful food cravings the last few days, and have given into many of them. I have been mostly sugar and wheat free now for about 9 months, eat mainly whole and Mediterranean foods, lift weights, practice yoga, and have lost about 35 lbs. Physically, I feel great. Since the weekend though, I have had brutal food cravings and have given into some of them. Sat I had birthday cake at work, either Sun or Mon I had a frosty, Tuesday I had birthday cake and chocolate, and today had some steamed dumplings. I just want to go off and gorge on ice cream and cake. It is the first time that food urges have really hit me since I started following a more healthy lifestyle.

I don't begrudge myself having something once in a while, but the level I am craving right now is huge and I am not sure what to do to deal with it. Have other folks gone through this? If so, what have you done to overcome the food urges? It feels the same way as when I first quit smoking, and used to want to go off and smoke. It is almost impossible to fend off. After I am done typing this in, I am going to go make a smoothie with protein, a banana, and cocoa powder to fight off the ice cream urge. It is just ridiculous.

BTW, my cycle just started on Tuesday so I am thinking that may have something to do with all this insane food cravings I am going through. Tell me this will pass please!!! I don't want to go back to being chubby and to undo all the hard work I have completed so far.

Thank you for all your help,

Lou

It will pass. I promise.

But it SUCKS to go through it, I know.

It could be your period, it could be a bit of kickback from Thanksgiving, especially if you ate really clean and passed over some treats or sweets that you wanted. Are you going through any particular stress right now that might trigger a craving?

The best thing, especially if it's a sweet/carb craving is to break yourself away from it as much as possible. It's my experience that giving in to a sugar/carb craving just makes it feed on itself - your blood sugar spikes, your insulin production goes into overtime, then your blood sugar level plunges, and you're hungry again ... and it's a big vicious cycle.

Hang in there and resist. As my mother used to say: This too shall pass.

.

TOM may well have a great deal to do with it. Also, cravings seem to feed cravings...particularly carb cravings. (As photochick said.)

Someone once told me to set a time limit, about 15-20 minutes, and tell yourself that if the craving really lasts you will have it then. In the time period get busy. Most cravings will apparently diminish in that period. (Although not necessarily disappear.)

The good news is that if you can get through this and break out of the carb cycle it may well go away.

Finally, try some complex carbs which take longer to trigger that sugar response. (Whole grains etc.) Some of the craving may well be the glucose spikes, this can lessen it.

Hang in there...you can do this.