I need help

jennifermi

I don't know if anyone out there can help me. I am 5'5 and weigh 216 pounds. I am not happy with me right now and have the best intentions to fix it. I am having ALOT of trouble putting it into action. I say I am not going to splurge on sugary treats (mainly chocolate), it lasts a week and then I am doing it all over again. I don't want to say I can't help (I am buying it after all) but I feel so bad after and feel like a failure. I hope somebody can help me because I am extremely frustrated and sad with myself. Please help me figure out some tools to help me get past the sugar addiction and start to love myself enough to get healthy. Thank you for helping

barbecuesauce

So instead of beating yourself up, work your sweets in. All you need to lose weight is a sustained caloric deficit. When you signed up, MFP told you how many calories you needed to eat in order to lose. Can you afford the odd piece of chocolate on that calorie budget? Probably.

What might help with chocolate is to buy higher-quality expensive candy as an occasional treat.

Edit: 5'6", started at 200, -59 to date. Eating sweets at least once a week.

kshama2001

How I eat chocolate these days is count out 32 Ghiradelli semi-sweet chocolate chips and suck on them one at a time until they are dissolved and gone. Takes me about 45 minutes and costs me 70 calories. Some days I just have 16 chips.

I upped my protein, fiber, and exercise and am really not troubled by sugar cravings anymore.

ps - I would previously down a pint of Ben & Jerry's in a day.

TimothyFish

Yeah, you don't have to love yourself to lose weight, you just need to eat less than you burn. I keep hard candy in the house, but I buy soft candy sparingly. The hard candy gives me something sweet to suck on when I need it, but the time required to eat it helps me keep it under control.

kshama2001

When I ate too many simple carbs, I would never feel satisfied, and want to just eat and eat.

http://www.nutrition.org.uk/healthyliving/fuller/understanding-satiety-feeling-full-after-a-meal.html

The temptation to overeat is everywhere, so in today's society it can be difficult to control how much we eat and maintain a healthy weight. There are countless different weight loss diets around for us to try, but dieting often leaves us feeling hungry and deprived. Could there be another way to help control how much we eat, without going hungry?

Satiety is the feeling of fullness after eating that suppresses the urge to eat for a period of time after a meal. Such feelings of fullness can play an important role in controlling how much we eat. If we feel really full or ‘satiated’ after a meal then we are likely to go much longer before we feel hungry and may eat less at the next meal. But, if we do not feel very full then we are likely to get hungry again more quickly and may be tempted to snack or eat more at the next meal. So, if we can understand how to enhance these feelings of fullness or ‘satiety’, this may help to control how much we eat.

...Tips on how to feel fuller

So how can we best try to enhance these feelings of fullness to help us control how much we eat? Here are some top tips for helping you feel fuller:

• Foods high in protein seem to make us feel fuller than foods high in fat or carbohydrate, so including some protein at every meal should help keep you satisfied. Foods high in protein include meats such as chicken, ham or beef, fish, eggs, beans and pulses.
• If you are watching your weight, opt for lower fat versions, using leaner cuts of meat, cutting off visible fat and avoiding the skin on poultry as this will help reduce the energy density of the diet, which can help to enhance satiety (see below).
• Foods that are high in fibre may also enhance feelings of fullness so try to include plenty of high-fibre foods in the diet such as wholegrain bread and cereals, beans and pulses and fruit and vegetables.
• Alcohol seems to stimulate appetite in the short-term and therefore drinking alcohol is likely to encourage us to eat more. Alcoholic beverages can make you forget about your intentions to eat healthily by making you lose your inhibitions. Alcoholic drinks are also calorific, so you should cut down on alcohol consumption if you are trying to control your weight.
• The ‘energy density’ of food has a strong influence on feelings of fullness or satiety. Energy density is the amount of energy (or calories) per gram of food. Lower energy density foods provide less energy per gram of food so you can eat more of them without consuming too many calories. Low energy density foods include fruit and vegetables, foods with lots of water added when cooking such as soups and stews, and lower fat foods. Click here for more information on energy density.