How to beat over eating
This is a major problem for a lot of people.
It is definitely something that I used to do and took a while for me to change.
It has been a hot topic this week and it often causes people to head for a quick fix diet or into a tough exercise programme to counteract the effects of bouts of over eating an weight gain.
The key to overcoming this problem is to first understand why you over eat then put in some strategies to combat it.
Here are some of the reasons that people over eat.
1. Pleasure – From a young age we are fed food as a reward to celebrate with. When babies cry we give them food, when children are upset or hurt themselves we give them sweets to make them feel better & sooth them. We are conditioned to eat food to make us feel better from a young age.
2. Signal override – Once again as a young child we tend to know when we are hungry and when to stop eating. We then get told by our parents to finish what is on our plate often with a sanction if we don’t and the reward of a dessert if we do. This is encouraging us to over eat and we get used to feeling over-full.
3. Mindless eating – Many of us eat while we are distracted such as watching the tv or doing other things which can mean that we miss the warning signs of when to stop eating and we do not realise how much we have eaten.
4. Habit – We often eat out of habit even if we are not hungry. Many people will get a snack to go with their coffee or have popcorn when they go to the cinema as a habit rather than because they need to eat food.
5. Dehydration – If you do not drink enough it is easy to mistake thirst for hunger. Being under hydrated can cause food cravings.
6. Eating too quickly – it takes 20 minutes from when you start eating for the message to stop eating to form and reach your brain. So if you eat quickly you are more likely to eat too much before your brain realises it is time to stop eating.
How to beat over-eating
1. Identify what is causing you to over eat. What are your eating triggers? Emotional, boredom, stress, dehydration etc. What situations and behaviours are causing these?
2. Delve deep into your feelings and emotions & fix the cause of your problems rather than using food to give you temporary relief.
3. Break the over eating habit & change the routine so that over-eating is not the automatic reaction to your triggers.
We help you to identify your over- eating triggers and plan ways to eliminate them in our long term body transformation programmes.
