What are your ways of resisting chocolate?

[VLou77]

Hi everyone. I'm really struggling to resist eating so much sweet stuff. What are your strategies in saying no?! What do you use as a healthier substitute?
Thanks

I just don't buy it! If I don't have it in the house, I can't eat it. If I'm at a friend's house and they offer me a chocolate, I'll have one.
On average, I reckon I eat chocolate once or twice a month.

I have a mantra which is nothing tastes as good as feeling lean. This has worked for me for the last two years. I will have chocolate and sweet things ocassionally.

I have to go cold turkey with chocolate as I can never have just a little! I find it easier just to not encounter it all..
However I've been making healthy 'brownies' recently which are:
Dates
Raisins
Walnuts
Almonds
Sunflower seeds
Flax seeds
Carob powder (cocoa powder alternative)
Blend it all up, put in flat dish and that goes in freezer for an hour. Gives me a chocolatey fix!

Also agree with pumpkinpie, it tastes great for a minute but feeling confident body-wise is a constant high!

I eat it. But since the first mouthful is always the most satisfying, I don't have a second one. So about half a square at a time.

I have eating disorders and when I can feel a binge coming, I try to exercise. A hardcore 45-minute workout gives me a natural high without stuffing my face.

Agree with eating a small amount of what you enjoy. I'm a recovered bulimic. Fully recovered and healthy. I'm lurking on here to find some healthy recipes because I want to lose half a stone post Christmas indulgence. My 'trick' is to plan in a treat every day. Once my dd goes to bed, I have my treat. Today it was two chocolate biscuits. I ate them, enjoyed them and I've stayed within my 1600 calorie limit. If I were to feel like I couldn't resist going back for a third biscuit, id go for a walk instead or brush my teeth, or go for a lovely, long bath. The only way to beat any food issues long term is to eat healthily 90% of the time, but fo not deny yourself anything.

I repeat the mantra
'I want chocolate now, but I want a firm arse more'

I came onto this topic to start an identical thread but saw your question! I am a chocolate addict. I don't think any of these answers will help me Well, apart from just going cold turkey and not buying it. But then I get really cranky and grumpy and crave it.

Today is my first day without chocolate as I decided to stop buying it and I ate my last few Terrys chocolate orange segments last night! But I have sort of failed in a way - had a slice of Nutella on toast this morning and a mug of Cadburys hot chocolate this afternoon. I like to think it's my way of "weaning" myself off the real stuff...

Maybe we should start a Chocoholics Anonymous support thread where we come back each day and add our name to the list of posters who have managed to resist the addiction for another day!

I am a sugar addict, I'm convinced of it. I find it so hard to stop at just a taste / one square etc. I have found the Paul McKenna mind tricks useful especially the one where you think of the food you love and crave, and then a food you loathe (and concentrate on it to the point of nausea) and then merge the two things together in your mind. There's probably a better way to describe it but I've found it can really help.

I'm addicted to chocolate/sugar. If a box of chocolates is open then I have to eat all of them.

I find the best way is not to deprive yourself, just have a little bit. Eating one bar of chocolate won't make you fat.

Mamushka Can you wean yourself onto dark chocolate that's over 70%? It will stem your craving and it's not nearly as bad for you.

I literally cannot say no to chocolate... have cravings 24/7!!

trying to shift a stone to get me to my ideal weight but its sweet things that totally hold me back.

once i start i literally cannot stop........

Mostly 'not buying it', but if I know I'm going to have a crappy week I buy a small amount so it's there and ready and I'm not going to break in my weakness and buy lots.

I don't like dark chocolate all that much, but I know it's better for me than milk, so I buy the lindt stuff with caramel and sea salt. Then I eat less because it's not my favourite, but still get the cocoa hit.

Also - at the moment I'm having cereal bars/milkshakes for breakfast, which allows the occasional chocolate without breaking the diet.

I tried cold turkey, which went great for a month but then I felt the extreme need for one square and I have ended up with a binge habit, which I now have to fix.

It's hard now as everywhere is advertising their chocolate gifts and I saw in Asda that they are doing a pack of strawberries with a chocolate dip. I was like come to mama! But I didn't buy them I thought of the black grapes I have in the fridge so I'll snack on them

Strawberries would be like bullets this time if year, black grapes were the right choice.

my friend gives up chocolate and crisps (and now biscuits - the list grows each year!) every new year and only has it at Christmas, Easter and her birthday. works for her

I try and remind myself that it is just sugar and fat. Literally a lump of sugar and fat. It gets slightly less appealing then!

Also, it never tastes as good as you think it will. Like bacon sandwiches, or herbal tea. My theory is there must be some sort of mythical chocolate bar/bacon sandwich/cup of fruit tea somewhere in the ether which all others try and fail to imitate. But we have some collective memory of it!

Try buying the 70% chocolate, and having just a square or two.

I find it easier to have none. If I eat some, then I want more.

But if you don't buy it, then it's not in the house and you can't give into the cravings... Could someone explain to me why, if they know they crave chocolate, they buy it anyway? Serious question.

I mean, I often crave chocolate in the evenings, but as its not in the house I can't eat it!

Unless you live alone you find that other people in the house buy chocolate, unless you force a crack down on everyone because of your cravings. My dcs have loads of chocolate given to them at parties, school, birthdays, christmas, Halloween and it all speaks the same language - Eat me!

Buy the dark stuff- montezuma I think- with orange. It's a bit like a terry choc orange ( only a bit!) and you do feel that you've had a sweet fix but it's not so nice that you binge. It's easy to feel you've had enough after a square or two. There must be some addictive thing in milk choc...

I'd have binged on dark choc too - it's nice enough imo!

The only thing that works for me is to not have it in the house.

Last Halloween I bought a huge box of mini chocolates: Maria bars, Snickers, Twix. I made the mistake of opening the box before Halloween... I had one and I literally could not stop thinking about them! I something else like 15 of them in an hour!

I was like someone addicted, and that I found scary. Something so stupid such as crap cheap chocolate having such a hold over me... Can't be good.

Also, there was 60 calories per mini chocolate!!

It's just not worth it, and makes me wonder what actually goes into chocolate to make it so bloody addictive.

Mars bars, obviously, not sure if Maria is a bar