how to fight lifetime junk food addiction

SergeantSausage wrote: »

Slharrison14 wrote: »

I won't be able to check replies to this until later but I am writing this morning because I am so frustrated that the scale keeps going up despite working out at least an hour to an hour and a half five to six days a week. Yes I"m getting in very good shape as far as cardio and strength but stupid scale is not reflecting my hard work and I know it is because of my bad diet.

Before I go any further PLEASE do not put negative comments or about willpower. If I naturally had willpower, I wouldn't be dealing with a true addiction to sweets and I know about addiction because I am in recovery (from alcohol) almost five years sober now but giving up junk food/sweets is ten times harder than alcohol was. My father was obese and died at the age of 33 from heart attack so I also know the consequences if I don't figure out how to stop this

I've been eating nothing but fast foods/junk food since I was a toddler and I have tried many times to eat fruits/veggies and the taste is horrible. I just can't bring myself to eat it. I have cut back fried foods and almost everything I eat is grilled/baked. I got a food scale for portion control. It's the sweet tooth and late night cravings I am dealing with as well as emotional eating especially during certain time of the month when I seem to not care for a few days (sorry guys)

There HAS to be a way to curb this sweet tooth and make me not pick up the sweets. I've even tried not bringing it in the house but next thing I know i"m asking my husband to bring me some ice cream (Blizzard at DQ are my weakness) I've even been trying self hypnosis for about a week but no luck with that yet either. I get so mad at myself to burn hundreds of calories in a workout only to eat twice that much later in the day.

I haven't been entering my food into the log so it's not accurate right now. I'm gonna work on doing that again starting today. It's kind of been hit or miss with my logging although I do write it down, I don't like putting it out there where other people can see it.

I know there isn't a "quick fix" I've been doing this long enough to know that and I have lost 70+ lbs twice in the past so I know it's possible but I've never had quite this much trouble before. Guess it's because I was younger then (I'm 38 now) Is there anything you have tried-supplement, mental trick, anything that helps keep you from picking up that 480 calorie honey bun or even worse 900 calorie ice cream/milkshake??

Oh also not as an excuse but just to kind of offer further exlanation as to why I'm struggling I also have struggled with depression my whole life and turn to food as a comfort thing. Thought about getting counseling for that but live in small rural area with not many options in that area unless I pay for it privately.

Nope. Sorry. Request denied.

Unless/until you learn and, more importantly, exercise some self-control, you will go nowhere with this.

Nowhere.

It's a simple question of what's important to you, and following up to take the necessary steps.

You already know what to do. We all do. You are *choosing* not to do it. It is FULLY in your control, and it is a conscious CHOICE.

Time to take some responsibility for your actions and do what you know you need to do, right?

Read your OP objectively - it is nothing but excuse after excuse.

Stop that.

mamapeach910 wrote: »

lemon629 wrote: »

L-glutamine does help with sugar cravings. I think you should continue taking it.

I also think you should go cold turkey for three weeks. No added sugars at all for three weeks. This should re-set your taste buds so you want sugar less. Things you used to enjoy eating, like Blizzards, will probably taste disgustingly sweet to you. You will need less sweetness to satisfy your sweet tooth.

After you start to re-incorporate sweets, when you decide to indulge, get better quality desserts. No more Blizzards and McDonald's milkshakes. Instead, get some good ice cream and treat yourself to a truly good homemade milkshake and drink it slowly, savoring every sip.

Oh gosh, so much this. It's amazing how discerning my palate became when I reintroduced sweets after giving them up. I am such an ice cream and chocolate snob.

Me as well.

For me...moderation does not work. I cannot just have "one serving" of something sweet. I go on a downspiral of binging and over-eating all the sweets. The only thing that has ever worked for me consistently is going cold turkey. I just don't eat any sweets (aside from fruit) at all. It's too much of a trigger.
Some people are saying cut in half/or swap for healthier treat options, but if this just leads you to ordering a blizzard, I suggest trying cold turkey. And yes, that would require will-power, and I know that's REALLY hard, but it does get easier.

You might not believe it, but you can change your tastes. It takes trying something up to 15 times to develop a liking for it. But, it works. My parents did this with me, and I did it with both my kids. They will eat anything now, as a result.

Try eating fresh vegetables, rather than frozen or canned. To me, the canned have no taste, and the frozen are watery. When I switched to fresh veggies, it made such a difference.

Secondly, preparation makes a difference. I used to just boil or steam veggies, and they were so bland and mushy. Now I sautee in oil, or I stirfry with some soy sauce, or I toss in a bit of oil and add spices and then roast them. For instance, I hated asparagus. Then I found that asparagus tossed in a bit of olive oil and sprinkled with Parmesan cheese, then roasted in the oven for 25 min, is delicious. Another way to try fresh veggies is to toss in oil, then sprinkle a packet of dry soup/dressing mix (onion soup mix, ranch dressing mix, etc.) and roast them for 25 min. I've found all veggies cooked like this to be totally delicious. You can also bake sliced sweet potatoes and sliced apples together with cinnamon and Splenda and margarine, and it tastes really good.

Another great way to get in veggies is to toss them in soup. Mixing together some ground beef, or some cubed chicken, along with peppers, onions, carrots, potatoes, and chicken or beef broth, makes a great soup and gets those veggies in. I find that the frozen soup veggies taste okay mixed into a soup. Normally, I don't like frozen veggies, but in soup, they are okay.

For fruit, try baking your fruit or microwaving it. You can cut up an apple, sprinkle with cinnamon and Splenda, then microwave it for 4 minutes. My husband slices fresh pineapple and bakes it. The house smells like a bakery, but it's just fresh pineapple cooking. It's delicious with a bit of low-fat whipped cream on it. You can mix any fresh fruits and bake them like this. I mix cut up apples, raisins and walnuts and bake them with cinnamon and Splenda, and I serve it as dessert, because it's so good. Fresh berries mixed together with lowfat whipped cream are also good. Eventually, you can develop a taste for the fruits alone.

It will take some work and some time, but you can develop a taste for many different foods, and you will be so glad you did.

PS, I almost forgot to mention quiche. Making quiche with spinach or other veggies in them is a great way to get in veggies.

If you need/want any of these recipes, let me know.

From my personal experience - I grew up eating junk most of the time. I was a really fussy eater and my family never bothered with trying to get me to eat "normal" things (I only tasted cottage cheese for the first time this summer, and I'm 25!). My diet mostly consisted of chips and chocolate and soft drinks of course, but I was still a skinny child. I got fat when I hit my teens (never weighed myself but I was probably around 80 or even more kg's at my heaviest). I would eat like 2-3 bags of potato chips EVERY DAY! I truly was addicted and even though I wanted to lose weight, I just had no willpower nor knowledge how to do it.
After 10th grade (when I was about 16-17) I moved out of my parents' house, started exercising a bit more (daily walks with my dogs) and although my diet was still crap, I began losing weight. Then came depression and disordered eating: my lowest weight was 51 kg (I'm 170 cm, so technically I was underweight, I was 21 at the time). Again - I was eating mostly junk, chips, chocolate, ice cream. The only properly nutritious meal I'd have was a bowl of salad. I wanted to get my diet in check but I was sure I had messed up my body so badly with all the junk that if I started eating properly, I would gain like mad. So I just continued eating junk.

Fast forward a couple of years - I gained about 15 kg after meeting my boyfriend. It was a combination of him cooking well, me choosing to lay around on the couch with him rather than exercise, and my dog died, which flared up the depression and I no longer had a reason to get off my *kitten* and go for a walk.

Two years have passed from that point and today I'm on a mission to lose those 15 kg's I gained. I am eating smarter, I am even cooking for myself, my daily meals no longer consist of a tub of ice cream and a bag of chips (although I drink too much alcohol, that is something I'm trying to address) - I HAVE DONE IT! I no longer feel the urge to grab a bag of chips every time I go to the shops, I'd much rather drink water than coca cola (unless there's whiskey in it), sometimes I can eat a few squares of chocolate and put the rest back in the drawer (or I'll just give it to my boyfriend who will get rid of the temptation for me ), and I don't go through the drive through every day on my way home. I can't remember when was the last time I grabbed some quick snack from the shops either - I'd much rather just go home and eat something proper, even if it is just tuna with cottage cheese (I'd never eaten tuna before either, until I joined MFP).

The change has been slow and gradual but when I was writing this post, I realised just how much my habits have improved. I'm eating almost like a normal person.

Like many others have said - ultimately, it is your conscious choice. You said you have not been logging - start with that. Don't worry about the red bar, just log everything as honestly as you can. Then make an effort to make wiser choices in the shops - want chocolate? Get the darkest chocolate there is, instead of your regular favourite. I find that the taste of the dark chocolate is so off putting that even though it gets rid of my chocolate cravings, I never want to have more than 2-3 squares at once. Buy some frozen fruits (I love blueberries) and when the craving hits you, have a bowl or two of those, instead of ice cream. I don't think anyone should cut something out of their diets completely, but if you are as strongly addicted to the stuff you would like to cut back on as I was, then going cold turkey for a while might help. I'm saying might, because everybody is different, but you have nothing to lose from trying.

Sorry for the long post, I think I got a bit carried away, but maybe there are some ideas somewhere in this wall of text that might be of help.

I grew up eating healthy foods, always liked them. So, I don't know what it's like to do a complete 180 as an adult. I can say that at one point, I'd gotten off-track by relying way too much on restaurant and convenience and fast foods. Things got out of whack - the food I ate was delicious but carb and fat heavy, and I wound up consuming way more than I should have, because I'd lost the sense I grew up with of what it means to be full. So I did something like what @Sabine_Stroehm described (actually, I did do South Beach), and it really helped reorient me.

The thing with it, once you've eaten in a kind of lower carb, high protein, high fiber way for a while, is that the food sort of naturally fills you up - you don't have to rely on willpower so much when it comes to stopping. (I mean whole grains, veg, meats, healthy fats, dairy, and nuts.) People actually have a hard time gaining weight on this kind of diet (when they want to gain). And after a while, really sugary things just don't even taste that great. The sugar winds up tasting obnoxious, over the top. So at that point, it's really not hard to say no to milkshake or whatever, you just don't want it, it's not even a question of willpower. Or you might have a bit and be like "ok, yeah, that's enough". (Now, with a lot of "a bit", over a long period of time, it's definitely possible to drift back into unthinking default eating.

Starting it, though, does take a firm commitment. As to how you get there, I think Sabine had good advice. And so did neanderthin, in the first post - you have to find a way to make this food appetizing to you. A cooking class would be a great way to do that.

I don't think the idea of willpower helps people in your shoes, either. By far, the easiest way to not eat things that tempt you and put you over your limit is just to not keep them in the house. That would be setting yourself up for success. Eventually, you may be able to go back to those foods with a different attitude, once you've recalibrated your sense of fullness, but I think having it around is just asking for trouble right now.

(I think, also, asking your husband to bring you stuff is sort of putting him in a tough position - he knows you want that Blizzard, and he also knows you want to lose weight, and he wants to be supportive, I'm sure. I bet he's thinking, "which wife do I listen to? The one from last week or the one on the phone right now?" I'm not saying that to judge you, at all, or to comment on anything other than it might be good to avoid that for the purposes of weight loss - I'm just thinking, if you try to keep in mind that asking him to get you stuff isn't fair to him, maybe that'll put a brake on you dialing out the request. Because sometimes it's easier to think about others than ourselves, so, why not make it work for you )

tomatoey wrote: »

I grew up eating healthy foods, always liked them. So, I don't know what it's like to do a complete 180 as an adult. I can say that at one point, I'd gotten off-track by relying way too much on restaurant and convenience and fast foods. Things got out of whack - the food I ate was delicious but carb and fat heavy, and I wound up consuming way more than I should have, because I'd lost the sense I grew up with of what it means to be full. So I did something like what @Sabine_Stroehm described (actually, I did do South Beach), and it really helped reorient me.

Truth be told, much of what I did probably *was* South Beach diet, I just did it before the book came out. I lost my weight in 2002. I was reading up on my increasing weight, and reading up on why I became a lunatic if lunch was delayed and came across an article about the glycemic index, and what not and it made sense. It may have been an early interview with Agatston for all I know, because when the SB diet book came out it made complete sense to me and I quickly fell into eating pretty much as phase 3 suggests. The SB diet book came out in 2003, so it really may have been something akin to his phase 1 and it probably was him I was reading. Three years ago as a "tune up" I *did* phase 1. There were a few differences between what I did, and phase 1, but it was close enough for government work. (FWIW I just did another phase 1 tune up. Super easy.)

Your use of the word "reorient" resonates with me.
It really did reorient me. A 180. And while I was losing I learned to cook some, learned how to order healthfully off a menu etc. My palate really did change. A few foods I despised even became special favorites. Prior to the shift, I really was living almost entirely on pre-prepared "foods" and sugary and salty snacks.

AmazonMayan wrote: »

mamapeach910 wrote: »

Oh gosh, so much this. It's amazing how discerning my palate became when I reintroduced sweets after giving them up. I am such an ice cream and chocolate snob.

I'm right there with you on that. I'm not much for ice cream because it makes me sick a lot, but even before this logging thing, if I'm going to have it, I want it to be good and not that very weird flavored/disgusting texture ice cream being passed off at dq and other fast food places. Homemade all the way. I honestly think most people don't know what real ice cream even tastes like or they wouldn't accept/buy what's for sale nowadays.

Most chocolate is so diluted with corn syrup and milk solids and various other things, that it becomes mildly "chocolate flavored" and so not worth the calories for me. I get the high percentage dark chocolates.

But really, 900 calories....I can think of much better things to do with 900 calories LOL. I allow myself sweets sometimes, but after getting away from my twizzlers and lemon heads because of calories, I don't think about having them much anymore. For 900 calories (I'd probably actually do about half those calories for a splurge) I'd rather have a slice of plain, nice, dense, real cheesecake (without that ridiculous graham cracker crust - it doesn't belong!). Yum cheesecake!

I agree with you. I have celiac disease and found out that cheesecake does not need that crust. A lower calorie option that's tasty? You can lightly sweeten a tub of ricotta cheese and toss it into a buttered baking dish and bake it for about an hour then let it cool. It will firm up. It's not cheesecake, but it's delicious with fresh berries.