Any tips to help shake food shame?

I can absolutely relate. I live alone and hate cooking. Take out restaurant food is a big temptation. But, if you had some, and it was a reasonable portion and you logged it - convert that shame into a victory. Eating foods you love and being able to lose weight while doing it - is what it's all about. Better than what I can do, that's for sure.

- Well done, I say. (*)

I know the feeling. My boyfriend loves take-out and whatnot, and for the past three years I've been happy to oblige him because hello, delicious food I don't have to make myself (plus we get to go out, even if it's to a little pizza place)? Hell yeah. Except that turns into "oh hell no" when I inevitably stuff myself way past satiation and into "ugh I suck" territory.

Tracking calories helps. It forces me to be mindful of my portions, and it's actually come with the surprising discovery that although I can pack down a LOT of food, I don't actually have much of an appetite. I think the shame of UGH TAKE OUT I SUUUUUCK is sorta reduced when you take control of the situation - log the calories and eat a more reasonable portion. There's no reason to deny yourself something you enjoy as long as there's moderation in it, I think.

Analyse why you feel shame. Its probably becayse you havent programmed your brain to accept that if you stay in your calorie deficit then you will lose weight and fast food is ok to eat in moderation. Therefore if you are eating it you are allowed to enjoy it and feel no shame. What you are trying to avoid is eating to excess, which you were not.

Dont demonise food and write it down so you understand your food guilt is misdirected and just a waste of time. Once ypu get used to loging then you will realise you might wnat to get more food for your calories elsewhere.

Oh yeah I can help you with this. You don't need to feel ashamed of what you are eating at all, if you stay at or under your calorie limit it's no problem. A calorie is a calorie, whether it's from carrots or a big mac or coffee. You can eat healthy foods and some treats and still lose weight. I eat a lot of crap and I am super fit and have lost a ton of weight. Enjoy your food and just make the math work!

I think that the feeling will lessen over time as you find that you can eat limited amounts of takeout and still meet your weight loss goals.

TJR88 wrote: »

I absolutely love take out food, from burgers and pizzas to curry and burritos. It just all tastes SO good. If I had to boil down my excess weight to one single factor it would be eating too much takeout. Everytime I've tried to lose weight in the past (without tracking calories) I've done best when preparing my own food and swearing off take out and when I inevitably ran out of willpower and found myself devouring copious amounts of take out I'd feel such shame and guilt and disgust with myself.

Now that I am tracking calories I'm finding ways to enjoy much of the take out I want while maintaining the deficit I need to lose weight but it all still comes with that side of shame, I just can't seem to shake it. Had take out this evening, ate a reasonable portion size, tracked it and stayed well within goal but still just feeling kind of ashamed

Anyone else dealt with the same thing? How did you shake it? Will the feeling just go away as I lose more weight?

For me it just took time... I love take out too, and what worked for me was having one "free day" a week where I eat what I want (within reason, I don't binge). After doing that the shame went away mostly, I think because I felt like after eating well and exercising all week, I DESERVED that big plate of Thai food.

Today I went out with my sister, who was here from out of town, and we had fried calamari, crabcakes, french fries, and a couple Stellas, and I didn't feel guilty at all. I'm making progress, eating right most of the time, my blood numbers are good. I have nothing to feel guilty about. As long as you're doing your best to get healthier, there's nothing to beat yourself up for. I hate that society makes us feel that way as women. I've never seen a guy eat a huge meal and then be like "aww , I feel so bad now, I really shouldn't have eaten that". Guys don't give a f-. Why should we?

I don't really have your problem but i certainly did have your dietary type of habit with sweet foods. I also have problems that have brought me into touch with psychologists and counselling,. I'd say you should go and have some sessions with a CBT therapist. that stands for cognitive behaviour therapy and they teach you how to challenge problematic aspects of your thinking.

Clearly the shame is very very deep with you so you won't fix it straight away. But i would expect you could start to deal with it and have some tools that would help you. Visiting the supportive therapist for a while give you some time for reinforcement. there's also a book on weight issues written by a CBT therapist called Judith Beck . I would look that up. But in the end there's no replacement for a real person. I get both the book and the therapist at the same time if i were you.

There are also other books that deal with this sort of problem but i would go with this particular approach first because they don't dictate how you should eat in anyway. The focus is only on your thinking patterns.

On a personal note, i can say that i've learnt to suppress shame i feel over certain things so that i don't worry too much about them at all and they cause me no distress. That includes eating too much junk. That said i have quit sugar so i'm not at risk there anyway anymore. But with regard to the feeling, even before i quit sugar, i had dealt with the shame. One answer is just owning it and being totally open about it. Not saying you must run around telling everyone about all your secrets but i find it liberating to say things like "i'm a guts" or to say "i will eat 2 litres of icrecream in an afternoon" but at the same time, i can say oh i hate being fat. Its not like i'm proud of myself. Its just that i don't pretend its not happening. Hiding stuff makes feelings of shame more acute. I think i came upon this whole solution through therapy where you learn to be open and honest with your self and with others about stuff. Honesty with yourself is a great tool to have on your side and being able to own up to things with other people is also a great source of strength at times. Then you find, you won't do what you are really ashamed to do and for which there is no cure. For instance, i wouldn't go shoplifting. That would really kill me if someone found out but generally i have no desire to.

Recently i had a situation where someone was giving me a hard time and tried very hard to put me in the *kitten*. Rather than get frightened that this person was going to put me in someone else's bad books, i thought, bugger it, i'm not going to take this so i put my story out there completely, knowing that i was risking getting myself booted out of the group and even said so. But of course it went totally well for me and it turned out that the other person is probably more in the *kitten* than me, although i don't yet know what the fall out with her was. All i know is that she didn't turn up last week. The whole thing was completely unnecessary but the other person was not accepting that she was in the wrong from the beginning and got defensive and decided to make mischief.

When all is said and done its about taking responsibility. And forgiveness and acceptance. And then just doing the best you can.