The diet industry is big business. People who want to control their weight and how they look are often desperate to try any diet that promises the results they want. There are many kinds of diets, from restricting certain types of foods like low-carb or low-fat; to diets restricting calories overall, while other diets let you eat any amount of calories.
Why is it so hard to stick to lose some weight or stick to a diet?
Many sabotage themselves despite their best intentions. Our diets say don't eat this or that, but we do. Even if we aren't on a specific diet but understand more about nutrition, we can be aware of how bad processed sugars and refined foods can be, yet it seems we are often still at the mercy of our cravings.
It seems that despite our conscious willful efforts, the ingrained desires and habits for those bad foods has us reaching for them over and over, even if we know it's not what we want for our long term goals. Dr. Heidi Sage has come up with three reasons why this can be happening to us. There are (1) food cues like smell or sight that trigger our desire to consume them; (2) the temptation of those forbidden foods we enjoy; (3) the "what-the-hell" effect of just going for it.
Food Cues
This is when our senses pick up on sensory cues that trigger automated responses like salivating or drooling over a delicious smell or seeing our favorite pastry. We could even be eating something else and a certain taste can remind us of another food that we are restricting ourselves from eating.
Hunger is felt in the brain through the stimulation of the hormone gherlin. At such times we notice food cues a lot more. Not only that, when we're hungry the brain pays more attention for cues about unhealthy foods that have high energy in them, which is usually foods that have high sugar or fat which makes them taste appealing and keeps us hooked and wanting more.
When we get hungry, we want to resupply on energy, and the quickest and easiest way is through crappy unhealthy food with sugars. High calorie foods are attention-grabbing regardless of whatever advertising they use.
Forbidden Foods Are More Tempting
The foods we give up in our diets are usually more pleasurable to our taste buds and possibly comforting in how they make us feel. Avoiding eating foods we enjoy doesn't mean the craving is eliminated. Research indicates that people can have an even greater desire to eat forbidden foods when we're depriving ourselves of them, as opposed to allowing ourselves to eat them have less of a craving.
We easily prime ourselves. Ask someone not to think about an elephant, and they will likely think of an elephant. Ask someone not to eat their favorite food, such as chocolate, and they might think of chocolate more.
One study showed that seeing images of chocolate -- or other deprived food -- made that food more important to them and have a greater desire to eat it compared to people who were not depriving themselves. And those who started to eat their deprived food again usually consume more calories as a result of being without their favorite food for so long. Avoiding to eat our favorite pleasurable foods will tend to produce more temptation.
The "What-the-Hell" Effect
We need to listen to our bodies for when were actually hungry, then that simply only have an appetite or desire to eat. Some diets force people into eating only certain things at certain times. People will overeat because they haven't been eating at other intervals in the day and are at the point where they are really hungry. Eating smaller amounts throughout the day might be more beneficial.
Sometimes calorie restrictions don't match up well with scheduled eating times as people are still hungry, and they will consume more calories than they should have according to the diet. Some diets claim a small violation is enough to derail the whole back.
This is where you get the what-the-hell effect, where people just go ahead and eat that extra piece because "what the hell", it's only one piece so it's not likely to have a major impact on the diet. Except that people who have broken the rules of their diet will also tend to consume more calories at a later meal as well. Once a dieting failure is recognized, they can also trigger negative emotions like guilt or stress which can also cause overeating. Binge eating can snowball as a result of "what-the-hell" eating.
The Right Diet?
Diets with rigid rules, such as eating at a certain time, only allowing certain calorie intakes, or forbidding certain foods that people and enjoy, can all contribute to increase the risk of over eating. By understanding ourselves more, how the brain works and the boys requirements for nutrition, we might better be able to withstand many of the temptations to being drawn to high calorie or unhealthy foods.
Personally, if you have issues with eating bad unhealthy foods, I would suggest learning about recipes that have similar flavors, sweetness or high caloric intake, but aren't unhealthy or as unhealthy. There are many recipes for natural sugars already present in foods, such as recipes with raw fruits. If you want to go sweeter and really mimic some of the high sweetness in many desserts for example, there are tons of recipes that have dates in them, and this provides the satisfaction for the sweet tooth that many of us crave.
Check out these recipes I've personally made. They are all uncooked "raw" desserts. They are very good. I'm not saying they are very healthy though, but natural nut fats and natural fruit sugars are a lot better for you :)
Blueberry Strawberry Banana Ice Cream Cake
Raw Chocolate Mousse Tart With Lemon Cashew Cream
RAW VEGAN CHOCOLATE CUPCAKES with VANILLA CREAM FILLING
Related:
- The relationship between reward contingency and attention to conditioned food cues
- Startling Sweet Temptations: Hedonic Chocolate Deprivation Modulates Experience, Eating Behavior, and Eyeblink Startle
- From Homeostatic to Hedonic Theories of Eating: Self-Regulatory Failure in Food-Rich Environments
- Beware the "What-the-Hell Effect," Especially on Holidays!
- Restrained and unrestrained eating
- Associating a prototypical forbidden food item with guilt or celebration: Relationships with indicators of (un)healthy eating and the moderating role of stress and depressive symptoms
Thank you for your time and attention. Peace.
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