Looking at pictures of food

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I´m curious what others might think about this. I have the habit of looking at pictures of food, reading food blogs, and collecting recipes (although I rarely use them). The thing is, they are mostly foods that I cannot eat and maintain my weight loss goals. Sometimes when I get a craving for a particular food (say, pasta carbonara), I google it and look at the images. Could it be bad for me?

Does anyone else look at food like this? Is it cathartic or does it trigger your eating?

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  • Behavior_Modification
    Behavior_Modification Posts: 24,482 Member
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    Very interesting. That would totally trigger me. Or at least I think it would, although I've not experienced this in that order. Usually it is the pictures that come first and then the craving. I wonder if it would make it worse for me or not to get a craving and then look at pictures. Maybe when I get a craving I should go look up healthy food pictures that look appetizing. :huh:
  • Natihilator
    Natihilator Posts: 1,778 Member
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    Triggering for me, I don't get any sort of satisfaction from looking at pictures of food if I have a craving, it just makes the craving worse.

    @Behaviour, look at healthy food pictures regularly and you just might start to crave them. I follow "pictures of healthy food" on tumblr and I do find that it influences my cravings. I never thought I would be someone to start drooling at a picture of a watermelon wedge dipped into yogurt and almonds, :laugh:
  • woou
    woou Posts: 668 Member
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    I follow "pictures of healthy food" on tumblr and I do find that it influences my cravings. I never thought I would be someone to start drooling at a picture of a watermelon wedge dipped into yogurt and almonds, :laugh:

    i'm not familiar with tumblr. could you recommend some good pages?
  • janiedoe111
    janiedoe111 Posts: 161 Member
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    I don't know that beautiful pictures of food would trigger a binge so much as make me want to binge on those foods. I avoid keeping heavy breads and pasta in the house which is what I typically crave.

    Looking at these pictures regularly is a form of masochism for me. Self-punishment. Makes me jealous of people free of food issues. Nothing which helps me.
  • jilltaylor86
    jilltaylor86 Posts: 87 Member
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    I definitely do this. I like to bake and have a major sweet tooth so I read a lot of baking blogs and save many recipes for pies and cookies and such. My pinterest food board is filled with a ton of dessert recipes.
  • mandasimba
    mandasimba Posts: 782 Member
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    I agree that it is very triggering. Even those awful TLC shows about the super morbidly obese... I've watched a few and they show what they eat and I sit there drooling, craving everything that they show. Most people say they get grossed out at the though, I sit there jealous and wanting all of that food!

    @cloud. That is interesting... looking at pictures of healthy food, maybe I'll give that a go one day, when I'm feeling a binge coming on, maybe it will direct my mind to eat a dozen apples as opposed to a dozen cupcakes, lol!