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A PreMenstrual Disorder Perspective Podcast to help women know that health is personal and possible. Like, share, and subscribe for more. @adagiofit on IG
***Note: these thoughts are in no way to replace your physician. If you have questions, please consult your doctor and professionals for direction before you make any changes in your health. I am not a doctor, just a coach. Also, these podcast may contain information that is sensitive in nature and might be triggering. Please listen with caution. Thank you.***
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Cravings, temptation, and an appetite that just won’t seem to go away. These are some of the biggest struggles people have when going through premenstrual disorders.
Broadly speaking, people know which foods are fairly healthy, and which aren’t so healthy. And, when dieting, these people want to lose weight; that’s the reason they’re dieting, after all.
So, they know what they want to achieve, and roughly know which foods they should be eating. So why are long term success rates so low?
It’s because cravings, temptation, and your appetite eventually wear you down. Once the initial motivation you had begins to wane, it becomes harder to resist these. Your brain doesn’t want you to lose weight.
In an evolutionary sense, food was scarce. So, a drive to eat meant greater chances of survival and therefore passing on your genes. The difference now is that food is not scarce. In fact, it’s abundant. We are surrounded by high-calorie, high-reward food, but we still have a brain geared towards survival in a very different environment. This mismatch is a key reason why dieting is so hard.
Remove temptation from your environment
Clear out tempting foods, don’t keep them in the house. If it’s out of sight, it’s out of mind. If this isn’t feasible because you live with others and they won’t accept you throwing out the junk, then hide tempting foods instead. Keep them in separate cupboards, away from the ones you usually use. Keep them in opaque containers so you can’t see them. It’s amazing how small changes like this can have a big impact on our behavior.
You want to make it harder to eat unhealthy foods. Our brain wants to minimize effort, so increase the effort it takes to make poor choices. For example, having to go to the shops to buy a chocolate bar is a lot more effort than just picking it out of the snack drawer.
Willpower is like a muscle, you can only use it a certain amount of times before it’s weakened. So, don’t rely on willpower. Instead, alter your environment so you don’t need to use willpower every time you enter the kitchen.
Create an environment that supports your goals, not one that sabotages them.
2. Separate eating from other activities
Eat at the dinner table. Don’t eat while watching the TV, or while scrolling through your phone. You want to minimize distractions that take you away from the experience of eating.
Eat slowly. Separating eating from other activities will naturally allow you to slow down, focus on your food, and be more mindful when eating. You will feel more full and satisfied after eating in this way.
If you stop eating while watching the TV, for example, your brain stops associating food with these activities. If you’re used to watching TV in the evening with a few biscuits, you’ll find you start to think about biscuits when you sit down in front of the TV. Your brain has learned that evening TV = biscuit time and will urge you, through cravings, to continue this habit.
If you separate these activities, your brain stops associating them. If you have a rule that you don’t eat in front of the TV, the effort required to get a snack and sit at the table without your phone or TV means you’re unlikely to do it unless you’re truly hungry.
Again, it comes down to increasing the effort required to make poor dietary choices.
3. Stop snacking
Controversial, right? You don’t have to stop it completely, but I would recommend focusing on full meals first and foremost.
Snacking throughout the day, without having full meals, can lead to what I call the Not-Quite Cycle™. This is when you spend your whole day being not-quite hungry between meals, and not-quite satisfied after meals. This sucks.
Snack foods are typically easy to over eat and don’t fill you up. Think crisps, sweets, chocolate and other processed, packaged snack foods. You’d be better off saving these calories for a filling, nutritious meal.
If you do snack, choose things like fruit and plain yoghurt. These are minimally-processed, highly satiating, and therefore hard to overeat.
4. Limit hyper-palatable foods
Hyper-palatable just means tasty and easy to overeat. A combination of fat/salt/sugar is often what makes foods hyper-palatable. These types of food rarely occur naturally, and so are often highly-processed and calorie-dense.
Your brain get familiar with these tastes and that’s how cravings develop. Even protein bars, fiber one bars, and other ‘low calorie’ or ‘healthy’ snacks would still fall into this category. That’s not at all to say you can’t include them in your diet. But, if you’re someone who struggles with your appetite and cravings, it may be wise to forego them.
5. Prioritize high satiety, minimally-processed whole foods
These are foods like fruits, vegetables, lean meats, potatoes, fish, eggs, wholegrains, beans and legumes, oats, and plain yoghurt.
These foods are hard to overeat. They are often less-calorie dense, higher protein, and higher fiber, meaning they are highly satiating and therefore, you’re unlikely to over-consume them.
6. Don’t allow hunger to become extreme
Intermittent fasting is a useful tool but it’s not magic, and it’s not for everyone. You need to find what works for you. If you can happily skip breakfast and have lunch as your first meal, go for it. But, if trying to fast leads you to overeat later in the day, then don’t do it! I can’t believe I have to say this, but I do. Again, it’s not magic, it’s just one method. – if it doesn’t work for you, try a different method.
Spreading your meals evenly throughout the day can help to keep you hunger levels under control, and prevent you falling into the Not-Quite Cycle™, or restricting to the point where you end up overeating.
7. Consult your future self
This is a psychological technique called episodic future-thinking. It involves removing yourself from the present moment, and thinking about how this decision is going to affect you in the future.
Remember your goals, the reasons why you’re dieting, and the hard work you’ve put in so far. Ask yourself this question: “would my future self thank me for the decision I’m about to make?”
If you’re following the 6 previous strategies, then your cravings will be more like an occasional whisper, rather than a persistent chatter. Consulting your future self can allow you to look at the big picture, and make the right decision for you.
Here’s a quick recap of the eight strategies to manage your appetite:
Remove temptation from your environment
Separate eating from other activities
Stop snacking
Limit hyper-palatable foods
Priorities minimally-processed whole foods
Don’t allow hunger to become too extreme
Consult your future self
Manage your stress and sleep
Following this advice could be the difference between reaching your goals or not. Read it, understand it, implement it. Words mean nothing if you don’t put it into action. So, give yourself a checklist of action points to take away from this article, and it could change your life for the better.