Hello, I'm Priscilla.

cillaboom90

Anyone have suggestions on how to quite the food noise? My brain is my worst enemy when it comes to being healthy. I'm seeing progress and am dedicated hoping this gets easier.

springlering62

Hi @cillaboom90 welcome to the boards!

Excited to read that you’re seeing progress!

For me, it was (and still is) a combination of things.

I prelog several days out- including snacks. Knowing a snack is coming up, at what interval, and what it’s going to be, gives me something to oook forward to. I know I’m not floundering around and scrounging for a last minute snack. It’s there, in writing.

I make sure each of my snacks includes a good hit of protein. Many people find protein satiating. I most certainly do.

Sometimes our bodies mistake dehydration cues as hunger cues. I also interpret low sodium as hunger. I do a lot of hot yoga and cardio, as well as swimming. Swimming is surprisingly dehydrating, probably because I sweat like a pig under the bathing cap. 😬

Drink some water and wait ten minutes, before grabbing a snack, and see if that helps.

I don’t keep trigger foods in the house. If they’re there, I will eat them.

Another thing I’ve begun doing is slipping a small candy in my bag for between or after classes, to take the edge off before I get home. Mine of choice is 15 calories, perfectly acceptable, and it lasts until I get home if I remember to savor it, and not to gobble it.

AnnPT77

Good suggestions from Springlering upthread there. I also agree that it gets easier.

Someone here once described changing eating habits as like training a puppy: If we're consistent in reinforcing/repeating desired actions, improvement can happen faster and more smoothly than if we are inconsistent. However, I'm not endorsing "never eat bad foods again", because I'm one of those annoying people who think there aren't bad foods, just ones that are more or less nutrient dense, more or less calorie dense, and more or less easy for a given individual to eat in moderation.

If there are foods a person absolutely can't moderate, it may be necessary to get those out of the house and stop eating them altogether, at least for a while. But it's fine to include some treat foods (less nutrient dense, more calorie dense) in reasonable portions, if the overall context is calorie appropriate for your goals and nutritious on average over a day or few.

Some people think of this as an 80/20 approach, aiming for 80% high nutrition foods and maybe 20% of some more treat-ish ones (some of which may make a modest nutritional contribution, too).

That said, "Quieting the food noise" is often how people here describe effects of the GLP-1 drugs (like Ozempic, Wegovy). I'm not necessarily suggesting you take those drugs, that's up to you and your doctor.

It's a bit speculative, but there are some indications that certain foods can potentially have a similar effect through the same biochemical pathways, just less long-lasting. Some foods have more of that effect than others, and an overall context of eating relatively more so-called "whole foods" and relatively less of "highly processed" foods may help extend the effect.

This is a consumer-friendly article about that concept:

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2023/10/30/1208883691/diet-ozempic-wegovy-weight-loss-fiber-glp-1-diabetes-barley

I don't want to oversell this, as it's kind of new research, and for sure not a magic bullet. But it might suggest some ideas to try out, see if they help you.

For sure, from reading lots of posts over the nearly 9 years I've been on MFP, many people do find they feel more full more of the time when eating more of less-processed foods, less of highly-processed (refined) ones. Nothing's universally perfect, though, IMO.

Best wishes!