So close to my goal and all I want to do is stuff my face!

[TheChild]

It has been over 2 years to get to this point but I am 6lbs away from my first goal (which will just put me into the "healthy weight" bmi category) but now I'm so close, ALL I want to do is stuff my face with bread, sweets, chocolate etc

I had a day off for a special occasion last week and was good at getting back on track (I follow a LCHF way of eating) but god the cravings for sweet stuff is driving me insane.

I have problems with binge eating and emotional eating and have had a pretty shit week which has made me reach for the kids treat tub multiple times. I've managed to put it down and walk away because I know that going off track will result in instant water weight gain. I went to the fridge to get a bar of the 85% chocolate we have for emergencies and they were all gone 😭

Why am I thinking like this when I'm so so close? Does anyone have any advice for someone who eats their feelings and has no self control when it comes to sugar?

Bumping my own post as I'm still struggling with this, every day the urge to binge eat is dominating all my thoughts. Just got back from Morrisons and wanted to buy a french baguette, crisps and chocolates and had to fight myself just to buy the stuff I needed.

I thought I'd left this person behind, I truly never had such a strong desire to binge on rubbish food for over 2 years, its so frustrating!

It's self sabotage, isn't it?

Do you have any lemons in the house? If so squeeze one and add hot water. It will take sweet cravings away.

Have a look at some of the threads about how the benefits of losing weight - they are inspirational.

Hey :) just wanted to post in solidarity. I'm nowhere near my goal and have only recently begun but I also have awful sugar cravings and after an initial run of feeling sooo in control and not hungry, I'm struggling. I made the mistake of eating a Kitkat chunky (worked into my calorie goals) and to be honest it has just opened the flood gates

I'm struggling with appetite at the moment and have done okay, no binges but I'm hearing the call so to speak. Luckily the kids Easter eggs are being stowed at my mums house! 😅

We can do this OP. I saw a good post on reddit the other day about "choosing your hard". Not overeating is hard but feeling unhappy with your weight and unhealthy is harder. Hang in there

Also for a practical tip, IF and high protein tasty but lean food and no sugar/sweeteners kill my cravings. Could you try a couple of days eating that way and seeing if it helps?

You've worked so hard, can you get yourself a non food treat as a reward

I think you need to plan a food treat for yourself, so for example, ice cream tonight after dinner. Then you can look forward to it and feel back in control.

I think you are feeling scared and worrying about not having control because you are so near your target.

Start telling yourself you can do this - you've got this!!

Thank you so much for your kind replies 😊 HollowTalk it most definitely is self-sabotage. I'm getting so frustrated that I only have about 6lbs to go to get to my target of a healthy BMI, but its so difficult to get there as I've had to cut out EVERY treat I allowed myself in order to keep losing. So I think "fuck it, I may as well eat what I want!" even though that will mean my target is even further away.

I think I need to go into maintenance mode for a little while until I get control over the cravings. I know I won't lose weight but it means I can have a small bowl of raspberries and cream or a little bar of 85% chocolate so I had something I could enjoy. Deprivation is making my issues worse. Maybe my body just doesn't want to be smaller?! I'd like to be in the middle of the healthy BMI scale but I'm struggling just to get to the top end 😅

LoverOfLight I'm so glad I'm not the only one who struggles with this! Yes, one little "treat" can open up the floodgates and then it's game over. I so wish I could be someone who just eats "normally", as in, everything in moderation. I think long-term that's the healthiest way of eating. But bread, sweets, chocolate (so basically sugar) are what I call my trigger foods, I'm just greedy and I cannot eat them in moderation, so it's safer for me to not eat them at all.

Well done on your fantastic loss so far!🌷

Come and join bootcamp - we’ve still got a week to go on the current one, then we’ll have a break (But lots of us keep chatting in between and also continue with losing or maintaining until the next one starts). It’s really helpful for navigating the compulsion to cheat and also for setting up positive strategies for maintaining! Lots of knowledgeable people and lots of advice and support.

(Apologies if you’re already on the BC threads, I’m absolutely shit with remembering usernames...)

Happierwithouthim I think when the shops open I will treat myself to some new clothes, money is a bit tight and everytime I think about getting myself something I change my mind as I think "nope, don't really need this!"

I might do myself a bubble bath and face mask tonight 😁 I've been meaning to tint my eyebrows for ages now so a pamper night is a good excuse!

MrsBobDylan you have pretty much hit the nail on the head. I'm absolutely terrified of going back to the person I was. I couldn't get off the settee without my knees hurting, I was sad and hated myself. And now I can actually run for a bus, I'm not particularly fit but I can race my toddler down the street without being embarassed and I know that I'm setting a good example for my children.

But the other person in me is sad and, if I'm honest, a bit pissed off that I can't eat all the chocolate and be a size 8 😂

I definitely think you should treat yourself to some lovely new clothes!

Perhaps make a list of all the things you hated about being overweight and all the advantages now, like running?

Do you do much exercise? That can make you feel great so you're less likely to want food.

Ninkanink I've never actually joined the bootcamp officially, despite following the plan for over 2 years. I'm more a lurker on the bootcamp section but I might join 😊 it would be nice to speak to others who might be going through the same thing. I'd never joined before because the spreadsheet got me a bit confused, I wasn't sure if I added myself or if I posted asking someone else to add me! Sorry I am not too good with technology!!

Well done on your amazing loss!

Could you give yourself a very limited 'treat' window, say, once a week? Then you would have it to look forward to, and focus on when you experienced a craving at another time.

I have mine after my weekly weigh-in as a little reward.

HollowTalk that's a good idea, I might do it on my phone so I can read them everytime I feel like I want to eat something rubbish. I just filled myself up on a big chicken salad and the urge seems to have gone, despite making a giant chocolate filled cookie pie with the toddler. I really enjoy baking so over the past 2 years our family have received a lot of food packages. I bake and then have to get it out the flat ASAP otherwise it whispers to me everytime I go into the kitchen!

Arbadacarba (hope I got that right!) I would like to do that when I hit my goal weight, my worry would be I'd use it as an excuse to have a cheat day rather than a cheat meal or cheat pudding. I did the same at Christmas, gave myself 3 days "off" (which actually turned into 6 days 😔) and basically ate everything because I could. Everytime I walked into the kitchen I was scoffing some sort of snack, I don't think I was once ever truly hungry during those 6 days.

I’m terrible with tech and I can’t make the spreadsheet work either - I just ask one of the other lovely campers to add my stats every week and someone’s always happy to oblige.

It definitely helps to have support from likeminded people with the same or similar goals and who understand the way of life, as well as guidance and advice - I lost three stone in three months by myself years ago with LCHF but following bootcamp from time to time has definitely helped me to avoid ‘carb creep’ and keep that weight off for the most part over the 7 or 8 years (maybe longer? I can never remember unless I sit down and work it out...) it’s been by now.

Like Arbadacarba says this or a Sunday dessert maybe?

It sounds like you have done incredibly well over the past two years

Couldn't you switch tack for the last 6lbs and do the 5:2? (or my own variation, the 4:3)

Basically every Monday, Wednesday and Fridays I have 'starvation' days where I skip breakfast, have home made vegetable soup for lunch (no bread) and a small protein and salad based dinner. I am very hungry on those days but cravings never become excessive because I know that on the very next day I can wake up and have a satisfying breakfast, decent lunch and dinner. I even have a bottle of wine at the weekend and a takeaway and still lose weight.

I reckon on my starvation days I am eating perhaps 600/700 kcals

it sounds like I am telling you how to lose weight when you have in fact been doing this very successfully for the past couple of years....its just that I thought this might be a strategy you could try since you are now struggling with the rigour and denial of over 2 years of dieting. This way (5:2 or 4:3) you can have mini breaks from the diet every other day (as along as you don't go overboard)

Are your hormones influencing your cravings at all? I want to eat chocolate, carbs and aaaaaaall the cheese about 5 days pre-period. I made myself macaroni cheese last month. It was lush!

If it's periodic (pun!), then you can either give yourself a break and know you'll stop in a few days, or it will give you the willpower to ride it out, as it is only a few days.

Mine is definitely hormonal. I'm still messing with different contraceptive pills trying to find what works for me and have just stopped taking mine for a few days. Cue all the chocolate cravings to the point where I was dreaming, no word of a lie, of a banquet with loads of chocolate desserts and galaxy bars .

In all seriousness, a cheat meal with some carbs and a day of making sure you are ultra hydrated (and remain so going forward) can really help. Depleted glycogen stores, caused by both dehydration and calorie restriction, can result in feeling tired and hungry. Replenish them and then move on!

Could it because you had higher carbs last week?

I'm LCHF but went off plan on Sunday for a celebration. This really ramps up my cravings and hunger levels.

It takes me a good few days to get the cravings and hunger levels back to normal (still not back to normal today, 3 days later!)
When I feel like this I have LCHF treat food like brownies/cream or dark choc with peanut butter on etc.

Good luck and well done!

Avoid going off plan wherever possible. Sugar addiction is the worst thing and once you get a taste of it it reawakens all the old cravings and overpowers you so that all you can think about is sugar. Some studies say it's more addictive than cocaine and there have been experiments where rats and mice choose sugar over cocaine. I find if I don't have any at all I'm fine and never think about it but if I slip up and have some it's all I think about for days as my body fights for more.

@TheChild what are your exercise levels like? I'm sure you know this already, but as you decrease in weight, your basal metabolic rate decreases too. Majorly unfair that as we get lighter we can eat less!

The only way to counteract this is to burn extra calories. I find that if I exercise enough that it depresses my appetite. Has to be about 2,500-3,000 kcals of exercise per week according to an article I read (otherwise you just feel hungrier due to expending energy!). That's probably an hour of brisk walking / other similar exercise per day, but it doesn't have to be done all at once. Chasing after toddlers should be good for quite a lot of that I'd imagine.

Sorry for the delayed response! Exercise levels aren't too great. I do a lot of walking and it's very rare that I have a day where I have walked less than 10,000 steps per day, but it's not vigorous exercise. Mainly school runs, shopping, housework and running after the toddler! I have a membership to the gym and was trying to get into the habit of going again before the latest lockdown, DD starts her 30 hours at nursery soon so it will give me the chance to go again when the gyms open up (when I could go in the evening it was always the last thing I wanted to do!)

I'm not sure if its hormonal cravings or not, I don't usually get strong urges to eat rubbish and if I did I could usually just ignore them. It's ever since I had that stupid cheat day I can't stop thinking about all the food I want to eat. Usually I have no problem with having the food in the house, I can leave the kids treats in their treat tubs and not be bothered by them, but now it's like I have this little piggy Devil in my brain telling me to go stuff my face. I was soooo tempted to eat some of the cookie cake that I baked with the toddler yesterday, so instead I portioned it all up, wrapped it up and put it in the freezer to make it as unaccessible as possible 😟

I weighed myself this morning and I'm 2lbs up from last week, which is so disheartening. I think I'm suffering from carb creep and I just do not have the will to start tracking everything I eat on MFP at the moment.

Sorry I am very aware that this is such a whiney post, I will start to track my food properly and look at where I'm going wrong. I appreciate all the different suggestions about changing the way of eating, I think the best thing for me is to stick with the low carb as I truly do not have any self-control when it comes to sugar and carbs, so for me it is best to stick to LCHF. I also do a very loose intermittent fasting where I only eat between 12pm and 10pm, I tried OMAD very recently and I don't think that was for me, the entire day without food and then just having one meal left me feeling very deprived and bored and I think contributed to my urge to binge which is when I then had that cheat day.

Thank you all for allowing me to be a self-indulgent pain in the arse

Also disclaimer, I do always post with paragraphs but for some reason half the time the MN app removes them, so I'm really sorry if this post is just a solid wall of text!

@TheChild how are you getting on? I've succumbed to carbs this week too. Sugar not such a big thing for me, but fresh white bread is like crack. The wine has crept back in too, instead of the herby teas. No idea what it means for the scales, but my tummy feels all big and bloated. Will try to find the reset button!

Hey OP, I've not done much weightloss dieting but I had gestational diabetes twice and the only way to get on top of the sugar craving is to have loads of protein and fat. Oddly fat doesn't actually make you gain if part of a low carb diet. I lost weight both times when pregnant despite that no in itself being a goal.

If you're desperate for a sweet treat have a look at the GeStational Diabetes UK website and maybe have a go at their brownies? The recipe is on there. They taste just like normal brownies but no sugar at all.