Why now?
 

Well I was happy to have lost approximately 60 lbs. since July, most of the time without struggle. Through most of this time, I didn't even really have any junk food cravings. For the last few weeks I've been getting them really badly. Last night I couldn't stop thinking about macaroni & cheese, or those egg, cheese, and bacon biscuit breakfast sandwiches from Whataburger, or fried breaded catfish, french fries, bratwurst, etc. I guess what confuses me about this is why this is bothering me now when I thought I had re-trained my mind to crave the good stuff and I didn't have this problem for months.

When was the last time you had a cheat day or cheat meal?

I have this trouble more now than when I weighed 244.6. I don't know why it is either. It could be you've just lived at a deficit so long your body is screaming out for some junk. You can cave or you can hold out against it, either way it's going to be rough. If you cave chances are it'll make you sick and you can learn it all over the hard way, if you don't cave you'll still be on track and chewing off your fingers. When I get like that I usually try and stave it off with diabetic chocolates and/or Laughing Cow cheese wedges. Although it sounds like you are craving grease and salt with a carb overtone? Maybe you need to eat something with good fats in it, try an avocado, stir some flaxseed into a cup of yogurt or eat something cooked in olive oil (I swear by flaxseed). Eggs have a good bit of fat too, so a cheese omelet might give you some relief or a hundred salted almonds. Hang tight, and Mike is probably right in thinking you need a cheat day, a cheat meal anyway.

Here is a healthy and delicious way to cure that craving for the egg, bacon, cheese biscuit. Get egg substitute or use only egg whites, the fully cooked bacon that you simply microwave is only 70 calories for 4 slices, use the 2% cheese and try those pita pockets or sandwich thins. Every other day I eat a cheese omelet with bacon and toast and it isn't even 300 calories. And it fills me up. You can add onion, mushroom, and peppers to give it more substance and get your vegetables in for the meal.

I agree that the body craves what it thinks it needs, and being in a state of deprivation from some macro- or micronutrients, or even just calories, can trigger those cravings. I know I have read that pregnant women's cravings are often tied to nutrients they need in their diets; I can imagine the same process might be at work here. Even people who naturally eat healthy (or those who have trained themselves to do so) get cravings for junk now and again.

Everyone is different, but I know if I go too low on my calories, whether I feel hungry or not, I will totally rebound in the not too distant future and compulsively eat. It's a constant balancing act to eat at enough of a deficit to lose, but not so much that I eventually sabotage.

I don't really do the cheat day thing because I don't want to sabotage myself. I do eat avocados because each one really isn't that many calories.

The past couple of weeks my calories went up from an average of 1400 to more like 1700 so I haven't been losing anymore just been stuck on a plateau so eating more calories would be bad because I might gain again.

I haven't actually given in to this stuff although I like the idea of the healthier version of the egg and cheese thing thank you :)

It's just I get these random cravings that don't seem to make a lot of sense to me because they come out of the blue. I'm able not to give in to them but it's still a bit maddening. Most of it seems to be greasy stuff I'm craving too which is weird. I had a small serving of baked potato chips that were only about a hundred or so calories but it didn't seem to do much to help.

I used to eat a lot of cheese when I was heavy and I don't eat very many dairy products anymore (I don't particularly like milk except in smoothies or ice cream or cheese). I should get some yogurt maybe. If I am missing something maybe taking a vitamin supplement might help?

Thanks for all the suggestions so far. I do appreciate it. :)

If you think you can be disciplined enough to get back on the wagon, I'd suggest just getting your craving out your system. It should easy your mind and send you to the toilet. You'll probably get a kick start off of it.

Maybe I will. It's not so much that I'm craving one thing though, that's the weird part. It's like all the 'bad' foods from my past are coming back to haunt me or something. lol Halloween is over!

I was able to find substitutes for some things. Wanda had a good idea too in this thread. I'd rather substitute than eat something really high calorie because if I eat something really bad I'll have to try to cut back the rest of the day in other ways.

Not sure if you are, but I'll just say try not to beat yourself up over it. It's not your fault. It's not that you can "train your mind".

It's all chemical. Our bodies are technically addicted to sugar. When we take in something that our bodies think is sugar (sweeteners, etc.), we get an insulin spike and our bodies want more. Insulin is kind of like Jekyll & Hyde to us.

Maybe try to look at what you are eating and see if there might be a sweetener in something you are eating/taking (yogurt, protein powder, even gum) that could be triggering a slight insulin spike and thus, a craving.

Just a thought and kind of a shot in the dark. But good luck.

(Yeah, I'm a guy. But I saw this thread in "New Posts" and thought I'd share an idea since I'm studying to become a trainer and my course recently covered this. Cheers.)

Thanks guys again. Stick I do use artificial sweeteners but it has never caused this kind of problem before. I was using them as a substitute for sugar for years a lot of times which is probably why I wasn't any heavier than I was when I started.

I don't really like water plain unless it's summer time and I'm hot, then an ice water can be refreshing. Plain tea is too bland to drink and soda has a huge amount of calories if it's not diet.

It's either sugar or sweeteners of some kind and sweet and low doesn't have any calories (or has very little about 2 maybe per packet). I also drink Propel water which I think has sucralose in it, that is tolerable to me because it has fruit flavors in it.

The tap water tastes differently than it used to because we're getting some city water now which is filtered better, but the water out here used to taste HORRIBLE because it had a strong mineral/clay taste. Now if I don't sweeten it then I can taste bleach in it. That's not really desirable either. Plain unflavored bottled water has an unpleasant mineral taste.

About the only plain water I really like is distilled water. No nasty tastes in it, just clear clean water. I can literally go through a gallon of that a day if I buy one, but I heard it pulls minerals out of the body, so I consider that to be an occasional pleasure. If the water's not distilled, it needs to have some flavor to it for me to cover up the other nasty flavors like minerals or bleach.

I agree that using substitutes is a great way to go. I've made baked "breaded" fish by dredging fillets in egg whites and then in bread crumbs and popping them in the oven for 10 minutes/side. French fries are easy too, you just slice up the potatoes, spritz them with cooking spray and roast them in the oven for about 30 minutes. Not too hard really. If you've tossed out cheese for the calories, then you might want to take a look at some of the fat free cheese products, personally I love Greek yogurt and the Kraft fat free slices, it's 25 calories/slice and it even MELTS!

Most of the Greek Yogurt I've seen in the grocery store looks like a big calorie bomb. I would try it if not for that.

I like Kroger Carb Master yogurt, not too sweet and 60 calories per serving.

Man does it seem hard to live elsewhere!
Here where I live we don't have the priority to have many brands, but instead we got good tab-water. And no one local buys bottled ones.
If you know any kind of organic brand that's actually healthy, start buying their stuff. And now I'm not a fan of "not eating any unhealthy food". Since some food can actually help with something else.

For example Danish Dietitian discovered that dairy products helped isolating fat out of the body. Now I'm not sure if it's related by the genetic pool, but us Scandinavians are fairly used to dairy products.

Isn't there any brands that just do "simple" food down there in wherever you are? No chemicals or anything? (dairy that is)
There are a lot of products like Sour Milk and Skyr that if eaten unflavored are very good for you! (recommend skyr and oat meal!!)

Yes, you have to be careful with Greek yogurt, in it's plain state it's like sour cream, so many of the flavored varieties have a ton of sugar added to them. I buy either Oikos or Chobani, plain, unsweetened, 0% fat. It's about 70 calories for 4oz serving, and has 13-15 grams of protein. I usually add flax seed meal and frozen blueberries with a little artificial sweetener to it for breakfast. It's not a calorie bomb so much as a protein bomb. Sure tuna has more protein, but I just can't eat it every morning for breakfast. And since plain it tastes like sour cream, we actually use it that way.

That's a lot better than the 200+ calories I've seen on other Greek yogurts. If I can find the low calorie plain version I'll try it. Thanks for suggesting it.

It would be nice to have options when I don't shop at Kroger (which is less and less these days, their produce section is really not the best at the location I go to and produce is more important to me than it used to be.

It is a bit of an aquired taste, but I have grown to love the Oikos or Chobani plain yogurts. I will add my own fruit to suit and it tastes better than any of the pre-fruited yogurts.

I did try the Oikos. I loved the texture of it, so thick! Mixed with some onion soup mix I bet it would be a great potato topping.

I put sugar free chocolate syrup in it and sweetener. :D

My hunger has been THROUGH THE ROOF today. Growling, growling, growling stomach, and I eat but it doesn't do any good for more than a couple of hours. calories are higher than usual, still technically in deficit. Why does the cold weather make me so hungry?

I had a day like that last week. I just could not get enough food. I went over on my calories but went right back to proper eating the next day. Last night I realized that on that particular day I was eating because of stress. When it happens again I have to remember to ask myself if I am really hungry or is there something else going on to make me want to turn to food.

In response to your original post:

I had my first meeting with a dietitian today (I'm a new diabetic so I am going through the motions) and she spoke to me about cravings. What she suggested is that I eat using the 80/20 method. 80% of the time I behave myself and the other 20% I indulge myself in the "forbidden" foods.

It makes sense to me because by allowing myself the fries and gravy or a piece of cheesecake I won't feel deprived and I can go right back to proper eating the next meal.

Ultimately you will have to do what you feel is right for you. We can only offer suggestions.

Linda

Thanks for the post. I will be having a cheat meal if you can call it that because my family is celebrating Thanksgiving a week late so that my sister and her boyfriend can join us. Also I had to work on actual Thanksgiving that night so I had to sleep during the day...

but usually I don't do cheats. For me most of the time that would be self defeating. I try to find substitutes and stay between 1200 and 1800 calories.

I just wish it was summer again. I wasn't hungry at all in the summer.

Now hunger is always in the back of my mind and my stomach is actually growling more often, I feel weak more often, etc. every time it's cold. Dressing warmer seems to help but doesn't completely solve the problem. Since the weather got cold it's been non-stop hunger/cravings.

I had a giant frito pie dancing around in my head the past few days. Thankfully it wasn't actually being eaten.

If I didn't know how important this was for my health and general well-being to keep going and keep losing weight, I'd go get a bunch of pasta and mexican food right about now.

Hey Ruby,
Have you tried the "soup in hand" products by Campbells? There are a couple at 100 cals or less.

I find that they totally satisfy that winter craving for calorie-laden food. Even though they often aren't all that appealing when what I really want is a big old stuffed burrito, when I stop and make myself have one I feel 100% better.

I eat hot soup fairly often but it doesn't really seem to touch this. Even so I might try that particular brand and see if it works.

I know I'll get through it, even if that means I have to wait until warm weather comes again. I miss those days when I could eat carrots and tomatoes for breakfast and feel completely satisfied and full for hours.

I think it's more psychological somehow with the addition of the cold weather somehow playing into it. I feel on one level like I'm doing something wrong, by not listening to my body and following my instincts. Of course it was partly following my instincts and cravings that led me to being morbidly obese.