I get mad I can’t eat whatever I want

You said a mouthful (pardon the horrible attempt at humor).

All I can offer is that my desire to eat all the things all the time and comfort or soothe myself from boredom or anxiety with food, is not really a desire about food. It's a desire to "feel better" that I am used to using food to fill. Unfortunately I can't offer a magic solution, except that knowing my wish for "more" is really not about the food has helped me short-circuit the habit eating and emotional eating.

Just now, I wanted a sweet treat to ease afternoon anxiety at work. Instead I came here, totted up my calories for the day, synced my fitbit, realized that if I ate a sweet treat I was going to perpetuate my recent pattern of eating over maintenance, and saw your post here's the deal: I CAN eat whatever I want, I just can't eat whatever I want without eventually buying bigger pants that fit even less well. It's choice I have to make over and over and over...

Good luck and a hug!

You can eat whatever you want so long as it fits your calories for the day. If it doesn't fit your calories, you could always "bank" or "borrow" extra calories for the week too. I like to have a weekly average for this reason. This way I can enjoy the cheeseburger I'm craving. Even if it puts me over on calories. If I eat a little less in the days leading up to it, or a little less the days after, it evens out. It helps (me) to not have a "good vs bad" or "healthy vs unhealth" mentality on food. Just higher calorie vs lower calorie foods. And foods that leave me feeling sated and happy, and foods that don't last long and leave me hungry. But as soon as I tell myself a food is "off limits" it makes me want it that much more, and then I'll over eat on it later. It takes some trial and error to figure out what foods to eat for best satisfaction and hunger sating. It's different for everyone. But you totally can have whatever you want. Just maybe not as much as you want whenever you want.

You can eat those foods. The notion of “just fit them into your calorie goal” is a little more nuanced. My calorie goal is on the low side-I don’t have room for anything “extra” and I’m not really going to be satisfied (hunger-wise) by the one piece of pizza I could fit (instead of a meal). So I choose to save some calories each day, and have one day when I can be comfortably over my goal (while still meeting my weekly goal). On that day, because of my saved yo calories, I can have a couple pieces of pizza, donuts, ice cream, bacon cheeseburgers, or something else that I typically can’t fit into my goal - and still be under my weekly goal.

As for when the desire to eat “healthy” kick in? For me, it was learning I could eat an entire plate of food plus a salad instead of a small McDonalds cheeseburger. And never eating anything I don’t like. There’s plenty of food in the world-there’s no reason to eat anything you don’t like. It’s a lot easier to eat things you enjoy.

And finding a balance to include the foods that are very calorie dense (and perhaps not very filling) is pretty important too.

Make those things yourself and you can absolutely have them. Half my loss of 60 lbs has been filed by HUGE burgers. I just make them myself.

A half pound of ultra lean beef in a large multi grain bun with tons of salad and low calorie thousand island dressing in 550 calories. Makes me full and fits nicely within my 2000 daily calories. Sometimes I cut up some potatoes and micro wave them before putting them in the oven (no fat, just sprinkle with salt). Adds another 150 calories but still fits in nicely.

I'm a man, I tried the salad way and it doesn't work. I'm finding more and more things that will work for me the ret of my life, not for a diet period. I want food that makes me feel full and satisfies my taste buds.

The problem is something you can't have is always more desirable when you can't have them. The best way I think is to never ban any foods. For the most part eat a balanced diet and things you can't go mad on have on a special occasion or as a treat once in a while not every day

For me, it's never changed. When I'm going well, it's because I'm enjoying the progress and being in control more than I'm enjoying the instant gratification/indulgence.

fastfoodietofitcutie wrote: »

I’m a grown adult and know I can’t eat pizza, french fries, cheeseburgers, and ice cream all day but I want to! When does the mindset change where I’m happy eating a healthy meal? I know I can eat small portions of those foods but it’s just not the same.

All of those foods have nutrients and can be part of a healthy diet. You might be happier if you consider your diet as a whole and stop labeling food healthy or unhealthy. Eat food you like. Change your diet more gradually.
Maybe take the emotion out of eating a bit. You will eat differently because you have a goal you want to accomplish. No one is making you give up anything. You are making choices. You decide if it is worth the calories to use them on a big dish of ice cream, learn to like a small dish if ice cream or maybe there is a lower calorie option you also like.

I eat most of the same foods I always did just in appropriate portion sizes for my goal. There was an adjustment but I didn't have to drastically change what I ate just how I ate it. I like a lot of different foods including lower calorie foods so I don't feel like I am deprived if I am eating something lower calorie.

Having a plan helps. I prelog my food and adjust portion sizes to fit my goals. I look at calories first then meeting my protein goal. I try to eat several servings of vegetables or fruits a day. I generally have 100-300 calories for snacks.
I pair higher calorie foods with more lower calorie vegetables. Two pieces of pizza and a salad for example.
I look up nutritional information for restaurants. I can generally find something for 400-600 calories which is a normal lunch or dinner for me.
I reduce calories in foods by using less cheese, less oil, lower fat milk, thinner crust for pizza. I cook a smaller amount and us a food scale at home. I use smaller plates and bowls. I might share an order of restaurant food with someone else if the portion is very large. I might skip rice or bread or french fries if it doesn't fit my calorie count well that day. I drink mostly water or unsweetened tea and save my calories for food.
I increased my activity level so I don't have to eat 1,200 calories a day.
Common sense is that I don't try to have doughnuts, stuffed crust pizza, fried chicken, bacon cheeseburger and a peanut butter shake all in one day. That doesn't mean I never eat those things but realistically I am 45 years old, not getting any taller and not an athlete. I can't eat like someone who runs marathons weekly when I don't run marathons at all. I can't eat like a 6' 4" man daily if I want to be a healthy weight for a 5'4" woman.

Getting mad about how much I can eat isn't very productive.

jjpptt2 wrote: »

For me, it's never changed. When I'm going well, it's because I'm enjoying the progress and being in control more than I'm enjoying the instant gratification/indulgence.

I really hope it was an accident that this was flagged

I can relate to this. When I'm logging carefully, meeting my calorie goal, and making good choices, it gives me a sense of well being and control that I suppose mitigates the need to turn to food.

I get you, OP. I’ve binged on an almost daily basis for most of my life, and any time I’ve tried to lose weight I’ve had to wrestle with the understanding that if I succeeded I wouldn’t really get to...do that? feel that? again. Sometimes I thought I was ready and sometimes I knew I wasn’t, but as long as I missed binge-eating it was always there, waiting for me to slip up.

I started keto, which brought the cravings and emotional eating way, way down into manageable territory. I’ve been doing it for a year, seven months of which have been more or less maintenance, and I’m just lately starting to notice that that yawing chasm isn’t directly under my feet any more.

About 8 months in I started experimenting with moderating and eating intuitively and deviating from the plan and eating spontaneously. I’d always wind up binge-ing again, but it took a little longer and got old a little faster each time. By about 10 months I realized I can count on myself to make mostly good decisions for my body. Now, a couple of weeks away from 12 months, stuffing myself sick on whatever I want honestly sounds repellant. I can easily remember that it wasn’t always, but the appeal is just gone.

At Thanksgiving I barely ate more than I would on a normal day, a while I did have a number of carb-y treats I never eat otherwise, I had sensible portions of them and gave away the leftovers without a second thought. I’m not saying it’ll never happen again. But my relationship with food is the easiest now that it’s ever been, and it just keeps getting easier. I’d have to make my life a lot harder on a consistent basis in order to backslide, and that’s not a thing people normally do.

So...it takes a while. And you have to be happy with the way you’re eating; you have to find something that feels good. It won’t be nearly as good as the “high” of gorging, but as long as it’s enough better than the “low” that follows, it has potential to stick. Best of luck to you, OP.

nowine4me wrote: »

fastfoodietofitcutie wrote: »

I’m a grown adult and know I can’t eat pizza, french fries, cheeseburgers, and ice cream all day but I want to! When does the mindset change where I’m happy eating a healthy meal? I know I can eat small portions of those foods but it’s just not the same.

I have learned to substitute (and enjoy) lower calorie options of my favorite foods. Your menu would be: cauliflower crust pizza with no cheese and vegetables; oven roasted potatoes, black bean burgers, and banana nice cream. In regular portions.

I offered some substitution ideas as well, but it's good to note that not everything has to be a substitution and some substitutions are better than others at capturing the "real thing". Personally, cauliflower topped with other vegetables and no cheese is NOT pizza and would be profoundly disappointing and I suspect many would agree with me. But obviously, to each his own.

Someone around here posts a phrase similar to this and I like it, I don't know who it is though:

I can eat whatever foods I want, just not all of them at the same time.

Just because you cant mindlessly pig out on all the things at once doesn't mean you'll never enjoy that one food you really like. You will always have other opportunities to eat that food.

Also I think part of coming to terms with all of this is realizing that happiness/joy in life doesn't only come from food. There are lots of other things in life that make you happy. You can still enjoy life even if you're not indulging in 8 slices of pizza, ice cream, cookies, etc. every day.

I also just feel good about myself when I know I'm living a healthy lifestyle.