Old Habits Are Hard to Break

I have been noticing lately that while I am eating healthy and being more active than I was before, some of my old habits are really hard to break.  One of them being overeating.  Eating past the point of full.  When I overeat, I feel terrible.  So one would think that would be enough to make me stop.  I know if I eat too much then I will regret it and feel lethargic and terrible.  So then why do I keep doing it?

Obviously it is a habit that is so ingrained in me that I don't realize I am doing it when I do it.  Where does it come from?  I have never been a person who has ever had a lack of food.  I'm not like my cat who overeats because in the first 3 months of his life he had to fight for food with his greedy kitten brothers.  I was hardly fighting for food growing up...my sisters liked to share.

Here is my theory.  My diet mentality has lead me to be an over-eater.  I think I went on my first 'real' diet when I was in fifth grade.  Diet in the traditional American sense of the word often means restricting the intake of food.  I learned very early on that if there is good food in front of me, I better eat as much as possible because I could be on my next diet soon.  This is a classic example of why diets don't work in general.  I am not alone in my habits.  Many people go on a diet, restrict their calorie intake, deny themselves whole food groups, do great for a few weeks, and then cannot sustain the restrictions, so they 'fall off the wagon'.  What happens when someone has fallen off and the wagon keeps rolling on without them?  They go back to those foods they had been denied for those weeks.  Didn't have any carbs?  Bring them on!  No fats?  Yum!  I want more!  No sugars?  Gimmie that candy bar!  And we start to eat like there is no tomorrow.  We have the euphoric feeling of, "Oh yeah, I am not on a diet at this moment...so I can have WHATEVER I WANT!"  The overeating begins because deep down we know that we will have to start another diet any day now and we may never have that food EVER again because the next diet will be the one we stick too.  Can you imagine never having another cupcake in your life?  Isn't that depressing?  So I better enjoy these 4 cupcakes now before I can never have them again.  I will have to remember these 4 for the rest of my LIFE.

Fast forward to my situation now.  I am no longer dieting.  I am eating what I want when I want.  I have learned the value of no longer eating fried, processed, sugary foods because for some reason, those ideas have stuck in my head quite clearly and I don't want to deal with the ramifications of my stomach being mad at me.  I really enjoy what I eat these days.  I do not feel deprived at all, but when I get a plateful of good food in front of me, I still have that instinct to eat it all up as fast as I can.  The other day, I put together a bowl of strawberries and grapes and I was kind of hungry, so I made a huge bowl.  Half way through I think I realized I'd had enough, but for some reason I couldn't stop!  I had to finish off the whole bowl until my stomach really hurt.  Now I know what you are saying, "Well, Beth...it was just fruit.  Don't beat yourself up about it!"  I don't beat myself up about it, it just worried me that I can so easily ignore my full signals.  What was wrong with covering that fruit up and eating it later when I was hungry again?  I don't know.  At the time it didn't seem to be an option.

This morning I went to get brunch at a place called Dozens.  They often have big portions, so I built my own meal.  I had a warm cinnamon scone, two eggs scrambled, and a side of fruit.  I noticed my fullness signal after half the scone, one egg, and half of the fruit...but did I stop?  No!  I just thought, "Oh man, this scone is delicious!  I have to eat it all!"  And honestly, the thought of, "I can take this home and enjoy it later" crossed my mind, but I ignored it and kept eating.  After we left the restaurant, I think I said out loud, "Ugh, I am so full" more than once.  Annoying to those who were with me and annoying to my too stuffed stomach.

I really need to slow down my eating and focus on my hunger signals.  Any delicious food can be saved.  There is no rule stating that I can't eat that food as soon as an hour later when I decide I am hungry again, right?  What can I do to stop myself defaulting on my overeating habit?  Because let's be honest, I love food!  And I want to eat all the time!  But if I do that, I feel terrible.  How do I enjoy perfect portions for me?  I think when I go out to eat, I need to start asking for a second plate or a to go box right away.  At brunch today, I totally could have put half of the scone, fruit, and one egg, in a box, closed it up and would have been totally satisfied with the food in front of me.  Then if later in the day my stomach said it could use that half of the scone I saved, then I could have enjoyed it!  Really, I would have loved to have saved that half of the meal until tomorrow and I would have been really excited to have a scone tomorrow morning.

So my focus this week:  SLOW DOWN while eating.  DECIDE what I won't likely eat before I start eating and get it out of my sight so I don't pick at it and mindlessly eat it.  FOCUS on my hunger signals.

Should I write these on the back of my hand so I can keep them in the fore front of my mind?  Maybe I will put an alarm on my phone with these rules that will go off when it is time to eat....