I genuinely live on chocolate. Please no judgements

[Nowanextraone]

OK I'm genuinely embarrassed to write this but I feel a 'confession' will hopefully be a pathway to recovery (if that's the right word)!!

I am addicted to chocolate. Cadbury's chocolate. I wish I was joking but I'm not .

I am about a stone overweight (I weigh 11 stone) at 5 foot 4 but my weight hasn't changed for years. Despite my chocolate intake, I stick to about 2000 calories a day.

But for my health, my diet is SHOCKING. My day is basically a 100g bar of cadbury's chocolate for breakfast, and another for lunch 😖 None of my family know I do this, it's like my dirty secret. I have done it for years (genuinely 7/8 years).
I don't eat anything normal or proper during the day.

Then for dinner, I eat a normal, healthy family (home cooked) dinner. Then in the evening, I might share a few squares of chocolate with my husband as a 'treat' (he has no idea about the rest of my day!).

What do I do? I have tried, but I'm honestly like a heroin addict trying to get to her next hit and it all goes wrong by lunch time and I'm back buying the chocolate.

I honestly don't know what to do. I am permanently tired. I'm also permanently hungry during the day. I feel very very unhealthy.

Help

Another vote for going to GP to check blood. Cadbury is very sweet so it’s not about chocolate - it’s sugar you’re craving.

oops , I trigger typed and didn't even read the end if your post OP where you say you're very tired. It'll be your sugar ups and downs. Get your bloods checked to see if all is well and go from there .

This is bad advice. The problem is this isn’t a healthy balanced diet and it has way too much sugar in it. Multi-vits can only do so much and should not be replacing a healthy diet.

She is probably consuming about 3 or 4 times, if not more, the recommend sugar intake.

It’s best to adopt a preventative approach to illness, don’t eat yourself into sickness and then once you’ve got various conditions get stuck on medication or trying to reverse it.

Not to mention the fact OP is not surprisingly feeling tired & hungry on her current diet :

I honestly don't know what to do. I am permanently tired. I'm also permanently hungry during the day. I feel very very unhealthy

OP is there anything healthy-ish and easy to make you can make for breakfast? Start with filling yourself up with that and add a small chocolate bar to it for breakfast if you can’t go cold Turkey to begin with.

I had a terrible diet throughout the pandemic, chocolate filled croissants for breakfast, cookie dough and ice cream several nights a week, would sometimes eat entire cakes or packet of biscuits and eventually it caught up with me. Helped wreck my sleep, felt terrible and it’s an ongoing battle as I’ve always had a sweet tooth but gradually I’ve moved away from that and try to have things like fruit on hand to satisfy sugar cravings or I bake single serve cakes instead of baking huge cakes to eat. I have dark chocolate in the house sometimes too, which I’m less tempted to gorge on than milk chocolate but it helps with my sugar cravings.

I'm an ASD person with a very restricted diet, and my life would be much much easier if I could eat dairy milk chocolate, but I can't. Milk chocolate has a lot of iodine and calcium in it and fat and all sorts of good stuff. I think if you're ticking over okay on it then you really could be doing lot worse. Well done for coming out and saying this but honestly, I think you could be doing much much worse.

Hi it wasn't so much advice as an opinion but I appreciate your reply.

Make small changes and be kind to yourself. This is more common than you think. Work out when the danger periods are in the day when you will crave chocolate then leverage some peer pressure.

Consider if you can change your routines to eat more meals in the company of others. For example a filling breakfast eaten with the kids every morning? A regular lunch date with a friend? Even if the lunch date is just once a week, every day you eat a little more healthily will help your energy levels.

If you find you’re not hungry before the school run, try to eat earlier in the evening or cut your dinner portion slightly, so you feel more ready for breakfast when you wake up.

Try taking your chocolate as cocoa drink (not drinking chocolate). Get the nicest cocoa you can and use full fat milk so you look forward to drinking it. You can then gradually reduce the sugar.

Treat yourself to a good quality vitamin and mineral supplement, as deficiencies can make cravings worse.

When you make dinner, make some simple swaps to help even out your blood sugar. These will help you feel more full too.

for example:

Switch white bakery products for whole grain - check out the speciality bread aisle so it feels like a treat and not a chore. Date and walnut bread could be a good choice as it’s a little sweet.

Pre-cook pasta and let it cool, then Reheat before eating.

Add lentils to bulk out stews and curries

Eat more hummus and beans.

Keep good quality nuts, dates and dried apricots / peaches / pears, to snack on.

also I did address the tiredness in a later post.
My own diet is restricted also due to ASD and dysphagia. I eat what I can manage, that is why I had quite a blasé reply to begin with. My health is fairly good but I walk 3 hours a day so I get away with it for now.

No judgment.

Try Hypnotherapy

I agree with cutting it down slowly. Definitely start with breakfast, try and have something high protein. One I like is a ricotta spinach omelette and roasted veg. Then gradually have less of your chocolate afterwards. Sugar makes you crave more sugar so if you’re having any sugary drinks you could reduce those at the same time.

And if you can in the morning, see if you can swap a chocolate bar with a chocolate favoured protein shake, (use a powder, not ready made) some of them are quite nice. If in the morning, your blood sugar doesn’t skyrocket and then crash you never know you might not fancy chocolate for lunch.

I can't thank you all enough for your support and for being so kind. I honestly felt like I deserved judgement, but am very glad I didn't get any!

I agree that I need to wean myself off this slowly. Weirdly it is the breakfast chocolate that I am going to find hardest to ditch. It is a real ingrained habit. I drop the kids off to school and then stop off at Tesco Express, get my chocolate and then do my 45 minute drive to work eating it. It genuinely feels like a drug habit as someone else said!

This morning, I did the same BUT, I only got a bar for breakfast. I didn't get any chocolate for lunch. For lunch, I had a cous cous and roast veg thing which was lovely. But I then started to feel very very hard done by, so got a freddo which actually satisfied the craving.

So overall I did better today than I have in years and years. It's definitely got to be slowly slowly and introducing new habits like grapes or a banana with my chocolate.

That was a good start, baby steps, those Freddo bars are a good idea, just saw the below online, didn’t know Cadbury did those----

Well done OP! That's a great start. It sounds like your lunch was very healthy but didn't have much protein in it-- it might be worth adding much more protein in to your breakfast (once you start eating one) and lunches to help keep you on an even keel and keep the cravings at bay. Something with fat in it too might help since you're used to having quite a lot of fat in the chocolate. So maybe some cheese, or meat or fish or something to go with your couscous and veg.

If you're weaning off, for a breakfast treat sometimes I have a bowl of porridge with a portion (so around 150 cals worth?) of 85% dark chocolate in it and a handful of nuts, with a tiny drizzle of honey or some banana. It feels like a treat but actually isn't too unhealthy.

No judgement here either OP. Look you know its not great, but it isn't horrendous how much you are eating. Your weight doesn't sound too far off either, you aren't actually eating that much from the sounds of it, you just need a more balanced diet.

Why don't you start by cutting down initially. Or have something like a pain au chocolate for breakfast and then aim for a healthy lunch. I've always had a sweet tooth so ill never be able to change that, but I've started to make better choices and hopefully you can do the same.

There are healthier chocolate alternatives you can switch to so you can still have your sweet treats, but cut down the sugar and calories. Have you tried Alpro soya chocolate desserts , or Muller Light Fix chocolate. Or Aldi do a chocolate high protein mouse and pudding and they also do a low calorie ice creams ( like Halo top) Just a few suggestions, and just make sure you have these with you at work, or in the house so you aren't tempted to buy the choc bar!

They say it takes around 60 days to change a habit, and you will probably feel like crap for a few weeks whilst your body goes though a sugar withdrawal, but it will be temporary. Another idea is to make a note of your body measurements and take some before pictures rather than track weight, seeing changes will spur you on to keep making better healthier choices and you should feel better for reducing your sugar intake

Cadbury milk chocolate does not have “all sorts of good stuff in it.” It certainly doesn’t replicate the nutrition you get from a proper meal.

I would see if you can find an understanding dietician, perhaps one who specialises in ARFID or similar because they will be used to someone who eats a very restricted diet and how to work with them to try to expand and be successful.

Good luck.

I've just thought that having a chocolate avocado pudding in the fridge or chocolate chia pudding overnight and then eating for breakfast before you do the school run also might keep cravings at bay as they would contain fat.

...but with the caveat that these small changes might not be enough and it might be worth seeing a therapist or as recommended by PP a dietician.

I can't do all or nothing, I'd give up straightaway. So I'd have a small bowl of cereal (for example) and halve the chocolate. Or fruit and chocolate.

For lunch I'd have a small sandwich/salad/some protein, whatever and a treat size chocolate.

You could try it at least? Nothing to lose.

I eat chocolate almost every day but not very much. I'd hate to stop. I love it and when it's the time if the month it feels medicinal!

I'm not great so can sympathise, the first thing I do in the morning after turning on the kettle, is have a square of Dairy Milk. With me I think it's habit as when I am on holiday sat. I'm fine without. You could try the cold turkey approach, or eat more normally but allow yourself say 2 Freddos a day? Or one of the smaller bars which comes in a multipack. You need protein and vitamins.

That's great Op! Well done x

I could have written your post myself this time last year - I was a chocolate addict and even worked in a chocolate factory for a while (where we were allowed to eat as much as we liked on the basis that most people got sick of it very quickly - I never did!)
then last February a blood test for other reasons showed that my HBac1 was 50 - just over the limit for diabetes. Immediately the NHS kicked in with podiatrist checks, eye tests and dietitian appointments which made me realise how serious it was

I went into panic mode and cut out all carbs including bread, potatoes, pasta and of course sugar. I lost 2 stone in 3 months (although my BMI was never in the overweight range even at my heaviest). I’m still battling with the urge to eat chocolate and sometimes I do give in, but I only eat it in small amounts though I can’t deny I’d love to have more. My bloods are now back to a normal range and I’m considered to be in remission. I’m completely diet controlled and have to watch my diet all the time - it’s not easy but (mostly) doable. I had a big birthday this year and didn’t even have a slice of my own birthday cake which is really sad when you think of it. I guess I’ve become obsessed with my diet now and so wish I’d cut down on the chocolate when I was younger instead of building up problems that are of my own making.

That’s so great OP! I know it sounds stupid but find a non-food related reward and try and treat yourself today to celebrate starting.

With breakfast if it’s an ingrained habit then don’t try and change it for now just try and have a bit of protein or porridge or something alongside it. Your lunch sounds really great.

Thank you again, so so so much.

I have another confession - I am T1 diabetic. I have been since I was 5 years old! I don't know if it makes it better or worse but I can carb count my chocolate so well that I hardly see a rise in my blood sugars!!

I feel like this is my own AA group 🤣

My T1 diabetes and all the associated risks makes this even more important to kick.

I do love dark chocolate. I am wondering if I can eventually switch to some dark chocolate each day.