Hi!
Anyone have any ideas about solving the problem of the lust for garbage carbohydrates which attacks me in the evenings? I really do myself damage.
Thanks.
M.
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Several strategies that work for me:
- Workout, keeps one occupied, good for health, and even more, doing intervals, since it suppresses appetite
- Evening activities, aligned with charity, politics, or education. Depending on the activity, friends can be worse, and lead to more eating, but zooming is likely a good substitute
- Substitution, finding good healthy food and substituting for bad. For me, fruit, particularly frozen organic pitted cherries, but anything that is really tasty. I love berries and pears, but also apples. Also, tasty for me, organic vegetable medleys, to which I add mild pepper spread, mustard, and soy sauce. I don’t really like vegetables - it’s a taste thing, and most ‘good’ ones are bland or bitter to me - so the concession to add flavoring, even if not entirely healthy, is ideal.
Not something I do, but cooking seems to lead to better eating…
What type of garbage are we talking about here? Good garbage? Ice cream?
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LOL. if we use that example all garbage carbs are good garbage.
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Another thing, that Jane Brodie used to recommend for dieting, is to specifically give herself a treat. For myself, it’s a 300 calorie pint of Halo Top, while the rest of the day is mostly healthy, fruit, veg, nuts, and quality protein.
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Also, this has been hashed out recently with someone else. One my comments is the following, but the whole thread might be useful:
My entire set of responses is here:
I find that just limiting where you are allow food to be eaten helps. In my house we don’t eat in front of the tv. If you want chips you have to go in the kitchen.
You might find it helps break the habit of endless snacking.
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Best description I have heard in years. It is a lust fed by a survival instinct gone amuck. I dare say that if this errant survival instinct could be tamed we would make great strides into preventing type 2.
The human body was not designed to live in a land of constant plenty. It was designed for times of plenty followed by times of struggle. It is a strong basic instinct that tells us to indulge during times of plenty so that we will survive the times of food struggle.
The intensity of these instincts varies greatly in the human population, local conditions and evolution have made this so. It is no coincidence that type 2 is seen more often in populations that have traditionally struggled to survive but now no longer struggle.
That was a long winded explanation why many type 2 like @MapleSugar and myself lust for garbage carbs. The problem for her and for me is much more difficult than many members here might be able to understand. We are not fighting against lack of willpower here, were fighting a basic instinct.
I find that coping skill work best for me, I do something similar to @Timothy. I find that an idle mind is my worse enemy, I try not to watch very much television and if I do, I try not to watch alone for accountability sake. Place me alone in front of a television and I can really do some damage to my pantry and refrigerator.
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We just don’t keep any bad carbs in the house, so I can’t snack on food that is going to mess with my levels. In the long run, the price that can be paid is too darn high. Wish I had known that when I was younger.
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I wish we could say that, With my grown children and grandchildren in the house daily I am way out numbered. And besides, my wife takes her Nana duties way to seriously not to spoil her grand kids.
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Even though my son and his fiancé only live a few miles away, because of Covid, he hasn’t been in the house since last March. I could keep treats in the house without being tempted because I am paying now for eating mistakes I made when I was young. I didn’t get hit with anything serious in the way of side effects of diabetes until I reached 52 yrs of living with this disease. Now, I am rarely tempted to eat anything that is going to raise my glucose levels. Hard lessons have been learned.
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We were pretty good, but the lockdown, along the anxiety about family and the virus, has made it tough for my spouse. Up until the pandemic, she was enjoying her new retirement, but locked in she has succumbed to her carb-monster, and that has affected me as well, although to a much lesser degree.
We are usually pretty good about having only good food, just fruits and vegetables on the counter, and generally only healthy snacks in packets, like nuts, or dried apricots and figs. It’s not like we don’t enjoy splurging while dining out or entertaining with friends, but that was occasional, and although the at home bad eating has been reduced, it was chronic for a while.
For a good while I was eating a large high protein but fatty dinner, early (5-6 pm) which was effective at preventing a snack craving in the evening. However, if my evening was spent as a couch potato that dinner would torture me with rising BG about 3-4 hours later. Rising BG’s caused by those large dinners after an inactive evening can linger for hours and were hard to correct.
I’ve recently reduced my serving size at dinner and added a snack of 4 oz. nuts a few hours later. Seems to have brought the night BG back into controllable range. If I am mildly active after dinner I will have a larger snack. If BG is dropping late in evening a small dish of ice cream before bed seems to work well…as long as it’s not overly sugary. Haagen Das vanilla is my go to. Hard to be super active after dinner though in Seattle December weather.
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If there is any in the house, good garbage, e.g., the best ice cream.
If there’s nothing else, any garbage at all, like an addict: third-rate corn flakes WITH SUGAR ON TOP (I’m not kidding) or crackers with peanut butter.
I’ve tried that. On the few occasions it worked, I just got too frustrated, and went totally crazy, just like an addict.
In any case, it’s very hard to do because The Female is one of those Just… Only… But… about people, and I always manage to find her hiding places.
I like garbage and I eat a lot of it, so I just have to ask…Why must you stop eating garbage? Is there something that is not working after eating it? Is there some way that we could fix that so you can continue eating garbage?
Can you be more specific about your garbage eating concerns? I’m not prepared to condemn garbage eating, yet. Perhaps you are simply not eating ENOUGH garbage, eh?
Your a garbage eater, @MapleSugar. Can’t change it. Born that way.
I suspect that we might just need to ‘dilute’ delicious things a little, not eliminate them. Maybe like when you mix an adult drink for a teenager. You still want them to feel like an adult, you just mix in a little bit more seltzer water. They’ll never know the difference.
Popcorn is super versatile and can go either way - salty or sweet. Exploit popcorn to greatest advantage. You can pop it yourself and coat it in anything. That keeps it pretty close to healthy.
Less garbage-y garbage ideas:
SWEET
1.) Sherbet with reddi-wip (which is really just air) or coolwhip and walnuts on it
2.) reddi-wip right out of the can
3.) Cornflakes substitute might be (gimmie a moment to negotiate this) grapenuts. I know that they are high carb. But, I find that I can’t eat that much of them without feeling like my jaw is breaking, so that offers some temperance. You can still load them up with sugar and fruit and nuts. You’ll never be able to eat enough of them to hurt you, unless you have the jaws of a hyena. Those sweet or fatty soy/nut milks sometimes have very little sugar on their own and I find that they keep better during these pandemic times.
4.) Diet soda ice cream floats? 1 scoop of ice cream goes a long way in a diet A&W root beer. Diet A&W is one of the best diet pops, I think. But, diet Sunkist orange makes a nice cream soda, too.
SALTY
1.) Nuts. delicious. I have a giant bag of walnuts on my counter than my friends mom got me hooked on - she says walnuts are good for you. I eat them every time I’m standing there. Nuts are best with dried fruit and candy, but I know we gotta limit that stuff. I dilute the fruit and candy with nuts, to a degree that is reasonable, but not excessive.
2.) Taco salad
Do you like Taco salads? I’ve been enjoying a lot of taco salads. It helps dilute the taco with a bit with salad and is still delicious. Plate of chips with melted cheese on top. Then, LOTS of shredded lettuce. Make the lettuce delicious by topping with salsa and sour cream. To further dilute the bad, add (warm) beans to the mix. If there’s enough lettuce, then this works out to be healthy and filling and full of protein (its not much bad stuff - just a little chips and cheese, and some sour cream).
3.) A good spinach or dill dip - goes good on everything, even celery. A good spinach dip makes celery delicious. But, you must have a wide variety of the best veggies to make this good - cherry tomatoes, yellow squash, mushrooms. But, those are too delicate to be filling. You need meaty, fibrous veggies like cauliflower and broccoli. Have some cheese and crackers on the plate, too. Maybe some peanut butter crackers.
The trick to mac and cheese (which has been a pandemic staple here) is to dilute it with broccoli and fresh tomatoes. I like to always dilute noodles with ‘meaty’ vegetables.
I’ve also been mad for crock pot veggie lasagna because its so easy to make. The proportion of veggies to pasta is quite high. There’s actually not a lot of carb in it if your using hearty, ‘meaty’ vegetables like broccoli and zucchini and spinach and yellow squash. Use a good pesto. I made one this morning very quickly. It will last for days.
Yes, several things, but one is very important; Since taking Ozempic (and before that, Victoza) I get extremely unpleasant digestive symptoms when I eat a lot of carbohydrates. (In fact, I don’t think that it’s true that Ozempic and Victoza have very unpleasant side-effects; that is a lie spread by the enemies of the human race. Ozempic or Victoza +carbohydrates have very unpleasant side effects. And I have strong suspicions about metformin+carbohydrates.)
I would like to do something about the carbohydrate attacks because they make me feel so bad physically, as above.
Thanks.
M.
Like a raccoon?
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Ahhh, I see. That’s a tricky one.
The low carb-ers should know.
Otherwise, people with celiacs disease take low carb very seriously. But, even they can eat rice.
This is a hard one.
How are you replacing carb? With protein? Meat? Eggs? Deviled eggs? Chicken McNuggets?