How do you know whether to stick with it or change it?
If you keep "falling off the wagon," how do you know if you should change the way you're eating, or just try harder to stick with the original plan?
Looking back, i remember at least one time where i was successful at losing weight, but after a few weeks, i fell off the wagon and binged for a couple of days. So then i decided it wasn't working if i couldn't stay on it, and completely changed everything (went from limiting calories to limiting carbs). In retrospect, i think my body just needed a refeed, and the original diet wasn't necessarily not working. But, i'm not sure.
Now, again, i'm doing well but every week or so i fall off the wagon and binge. I ONLY binge when i'm dieting. Dieting causes me to binge, no question (of course i realize there is lack of willpower too). I keep thinking eventually i will overcome this, but i haven't yet (it's been 5-6 weeks since i started this diet).
Not sure if i could do anything different to stop the desire to binge, other than increase my calories (2000 a day). Because i know i'm eating the right things (meat, vegetables, cheese, yogurt, beans. When i binge it's on nuts...massive amounts of nuts).
Try harder to stick with it? or try something new?
Carbs set some people up for binges, as well as other trigger foods. Have you noticed that if you eat a certain food, that night or even the next day you want to binge?
If its not certain foods setting you off, do not feel bad. There are lots of people who take a day off every week in order to keep them motivated to keep going on not burn out. I used to binge every weekend (hubby was home, had no schedule so I could eat whatever whenever I wanted!). I was calorie counting then and still am because its working. Even if I binged that weekend, I would still have the will power and motivation to fix it by Monday and keep on going! It took me about 2 months to slowly ween myself off my dependency to sweet things. I still have a cookie or some treat at least once a day, I just only eat 1-2, not half the row and then a piece of cake or something.
My body has slowly stopped NEEDING these things but it took time. If you are eating a balanced diet (carbs, proteins and fats), then its just your bodies learned dependence on certain foods. If you have emotional attachments "O I did really good today, I deserve to eat this box of cookies as a reward"... then you can slowly start trying to reward yourself in other aspects.
Are you able to lock foods away or make them difficult to get? Another thing I was told was to make yourself have to work for any food that was not in your daily plan. Lock it away and have to dig for it. Make yourself have to do 30 sit ups, 20 jumping jacks and 10 push ups before you eat the food. It gives you time to REALLY think 'Holy, is this really worth all that damn effort"!. Another way is to put how much exercise you would have to do to burn off that extra food RIGHT ON THE PACKAGE. Even if its healthy nuts, stick a label on there that says "If I eat 1/4 cup, I will have to do 2000 jumping jacks or fun for 15 minutes to burn it off"
If your diet plan works for you most days of the week, then I think its a success. Any diet will be hard and always come with bumps in the road. I just try to stick with the diets that are sustainable for the rest of my life (like calorie counting)
Yes, i gave up sugar for that reason. The last couple times i've binged, it's been on cashews. So i guess i have to stop buying cashews. I've been buying nuts because i just don't want to be too restrictive...i know i could get soooo sick of meat and vegetables if that's all i ate all day, and i'd surely fall off the wagon. But maybe i should look for more variety in the meats i eat (i eat pretty much anything, i.e. seafood eggs whatever so it's not a problem), and stop buying nuts. I think i am safe with peanuts and maybe almonds (i buy raw, unsalted). Definitely NO MORE CASHEWS though.
If it were me? I'd note the trigger foods in a list. Also the times. And experiment with calorie level and your personality.
Nuts are on my list if I can perceive them as "sweet." Plain roasted almonds, that's usually fine. Almond cluster things -- cross my sweet threshold. But my bigger triggers are grains -- cracker, cereal, bread.
It's easy and obvious to avoid cake, cookies, and brownies right? I thought I could do the healthier whole grain foods in moderation but came to find... noooo. I cannot. And just have to suck it up that I cannot! It's easier not to buy than to resist a million times at home. If I buy a sub it's to eat then and there. I'm not buying a bag o bread to have laying around at home tempting me to go to town.
If the trigger foods turn out to be too diverse and there's no unifying theme like their texture (soft food? childhood food? Crunchy things?) or type (fruits? Grains?)... consider the time of day. Are your meals spaced too far apart? Is that the set up? Maybe rework the times then so you don't go that long a stretch? Even if you aren't at prediabetic or diabetic level bad -- people can still feel low blood sugar bad!
If it is just overall calories in general... jack it up a bit so you can stand it better. "Slower and can stick with it" is way better than "faster and keep screwing up and starting over" rollercoaster. Certainly better for your mental health in the process of dieting!
My personality is very organized and likes it but I can't do it 7 days a week. So I take a day off on the weekend. No formal exercise though I might take the kid to play in the park. We eat out. I don't food log it. Only log my meds.
I figure it's practice for maintaining and it gives my head a break so that I can run it tighter the rest of the time with food log, formal exercise, etc. I need this built in so I can keep on doing it. I'd go nuts otherwise.
I have one day a week that I don't mind going over my calories and that's saturday's. So set yourself ONE day during the week you can have your nuts. and wait for it
Yeah...it's definitely the nuts. I even posted here a few weeks ago that the next time i feel like binging, i'm allowed to eat HEALTHY (i.e. non-binge) foods in any amount i want, but NO nuts. That seemed like a great plan, but somehow i forget about it every time i decide to binge. I think it IS actually a good plan because i really don't have any desire to binge on steak or yogurt. Those taste things great but not when you eat them in excess (for me anyway). I need to try harder to go with that idea: next time i feel super hungry, then i will feed my body with meat and vegetables, not a pound of cashews.
I've already eliminated all previous trigger foods...pretty much anything that comes in a box/package (except nuts). Now everything i eat comes out of the refrigerator.
i avoid foods that make me feel gross - starches and sugars do that: they are soooooooooooooooo good (esp fresh bread... mmm...) but seriously, it's not worth it to buy fresh bread because i'll open up the bag at one end and not stop until i see daylight through the other, but then about 15min later i'm so tired and groggy, even dizzy and disoriented sometimes.
but anything else is good to go - i just make room for it in my diet.
i get 750cal/day plus unlimited salad. 100gr of steak is about 200cal. so fine: i can have a pan-roasted steak and salad. voila: 200cal within my budget and i get yummy red meat.
last night, for some wierd reason, i wanted chocolate. i mean, i was lying wide awake in bed and all i could think about was chocolate. i'm not a chocolate person - dad worked at nestle for 38yrs, i worked at laura secord for a year, you kinda lose interest, y'know? - but that's all i wanted. and DARK chocolate, too, which is just ... ugh.
thankfully, i found my daughter's pocky sticks hadn't been opened (she doesn't like dark chocolate either) - 200cal for one pack, dark chocolate taste, worked perfectly. i ate the pack and went straight to sleep and slept restfully.
am i beating myself up? nope. i don't know why i wanted chocolate but clearly there was a pressing physical need - i was able to limit the damage (imagine if the only thing i'd been able to find was a block of baker's chocolate!?) and this morning it's back on track.
now, if i find that happens a lot, i'll have to do something about it because a diet isn't going to work if you're fighting against your biology.
Last edited by threenorns; 03-08-2012 at 05:00 PM.
I too understand the banning of cashews from my diet. About a month ago i had gotten home from the gym and it was late. I headed straight for bed but couldn't fall asleep due to my stomach growling. I got up and walked to the kitchen for a handful of cashews and proceeded to lay in bed and watch tv to fall asleep. I got up and walked to the kitchen five more times for another handful before finally taking the jar into my room and finishing it. From that day forward...no more cashews
Other than that I seem to have control over my diet. I definitely splurge and eat what I like but I don't overindulge and make sure to plan accordingly to keep it in my daily calorie range. The only things I cut out are the ones that I know I can't stop myself from eating the whole package in one sitting.
I don't know if there really is a way. For years I avoided low-carb diets, at least in part because I couldn't stick with them. Turns out, low-carb controls my huger best and allows me to lose weight better.
I always thought it was just a matter of calories, and I kept trying high-carb dieting and kept failing. I just couldn't stay on plan, and I never realized that the problem wasn't with my motivation and willpower it was that carbs destroy my willpower.
I didn't try low-carb until my doctor recommended it about six or seven years ago, saying that some research found that folks with IR lost better on low-carb, but that I shouldn't go too-low (in other words, he adviced me to experiment).
I think that experimentation is really the only option left to any of us.
How do you know whether to stick with it or change it?
