Why We Eat (Too Much) Thread 4

[TooExtraImmatureCheddar]

Hi to all regulars and lurkers!

Here's the 4th thread, based on the ideas in Dr Andrew Jenkinson's book. We've seen some amazing losses on these threads, and the benefits for me can be summed up as 'no counting, no starving'.
We don't count calories, and if we're hungry we eat. We're focused on quality.

General eating principles:

No sugar
No wheat (which reduces unhealthy carbs)
No ultra processed foods, and in particular no processed/ultra refined oils
Honourable mention to tipping the balance of omega 3 and 6, but that’s mostly achieved by doing the above.

His principles also include trying to sleep more and reduce stress, and take regular (moderate) exercise.

If any of this sounds promising, please feel free to ask questions and come and join in!

I'm having my tea break at work & battling with the biscuits I know are in the office drawer! Still aiming to stick to sugar free October - so in writing this it will help me to resist!
Am planning my first parkrun tomorrow. (There will be more walk than run) and I will have pre- measured my breakfast for afterwards (Greek yoghurt with flaxseed & a cut up apple) otherwise I would raid the fridge!

Hi everyone, I'm about halfway through the book now and trying to catch up on the other threads, it's going slowly due to my master dissertation and a 15 month old but I'm getting there. I've cut bread completely but this isn't difficult for me as I'm not a huge bread fan. The biscuits are the hard one! I've still been having my biscuits with my afternoon coffee, but I cut down from 3 to 2 and for the last 3 days now I'm not having any! It's a habit I never developed until I was breastfeeding so I'm hoping it won't be so hard to kick. I just don't buy chocolate so it's not in the house.
Whenever I mentally want to turn to takeaway or sugar (usually hard days - teething, lack of sleep, etc), I'm now channelling that into doing 30-60 mins of writing (I love writing). I need to mentally replace food as my go-to for emotions. So re-channeling that into writing my book seems to be doing wonders. I've cut pasta when it's Bolognese evening but I will still have the odd bowl of veggie pasta when I make it for the family or a wrap with fajitas. I'm just trying to reduce for now as going cold turkey just doesn't work for me.

Sometimes I find myself wandering around looking for biscuits or chocolate but there's nothing in the house which helps! The beginnijgnis always difficult but I'm getting there slowly.

@PC20 I've just read the part about wheat being quite processed and once you've eaten it, it basically turns to sugar in hour bloodstream after 30 minutes. I feel like this explains why I always feel ridiculously hungry after Weetabix and I'm decreasing how often I eat it now.

@PC20 it's up to you of course but if your breakfast is yoghurt and fruit you are ok to eat as much as you want.

Another lb off this morning! Probably a blip but still, woo! This is the weight I reached after dieting for my wedding 18 years ago...

Because I started down the low carb BEFORE reading the book, I've been swerving all bread, potatoes, pasta, rice, bananas etc - I've been eating porridge oats though, and the occasional fine oatcake with cheese. I still have a dash of milk in tea, and I still use sweetener here and there.

But otherwise my life is largely dictated by cheese, veg, chicken and peanut butter (not all at the same time). I found some amazing keto "peanut butter bars" online to make, they taste just like Reeses so they are my evening treat with a cuppa!

I've only just started the book but got bogged down in the science - I've skipped ahead to Part 3 to understand the actual food part (I will go back I promise).

I can't tell you the number of times I've followed strict diets, lost lots of weight but just fallen back into binge eating sugar again and piled it all back on plus more. This feels a bit weird, I don't feel like I'm "dieting". Appetite feels slightly dimmed, I'm not ravenous because I'm eating fat...but I don't feel deprived enough to feel like I'm going to lose weight though, if that makes sense? You only lose weight when you're famished and weak right.

Hard to change the habits of a lifetime. I guess I have to prepare for this to be a slow process...I'm keen to get rid of this chin I just discovered.

I've struggled a bit the last couple of weeks due to in-laws being here and everything being a bit disrupted. It was stressful. I haven't gained any weight, but I've had too many higher carb days and not done enough exercise. This week I've been so busy with work that I've put off getting back into my normal routine. I'm slowly sorting myself out though.

Although my weight has stayed the same, I feel bloated and kind of itchy, and some of my worrying nerve symptoms have come back. I'm trying not to panic about them.

In general, I feel that I am not eating low enough carbs, and probably am having too many treats here and there. They don't make me feel bad physically, but I know it can be a slippery slope for me. I think my long term maintenance plan will have to involve a couple of days a week where I am very strict to compensate - either a 24 hour fast, very low carbs, or both.

I'm eating too much fruit and too many oats every day, and tipping over the 80g carbs too regularly as a result. I'll never shift the last couple of kilos, or get rid of the fat around my waist (which is my biggest concern) unless I am more disciplined about this aspect of the diet.

@RavensWig it's worth going back to the science because the food part is not a diet, it's a series of suggestions. If you don't understand the basis of it, it could be hard to decide what to eat in practice sometimes.

I would summarize the science as:

1. your body controls its calories out very effectively through metabolism and will determine its own weight

2. fat doesn't make you fat, sugar makes you fat (because the resulting insulin spike from sugar blocks the receptors for leptin, the thing that tells your body how fat it actually is)

3. our omega 3:6 ratio should be about 1:3. If you have too much omega 6 it encouraged your body to put on weight as a preparation for winter. There is loads of omega 6 in most cooking oil especially vegetable oil. Processed foods are mostly full of vegetable oil and therefore full of omega 6.

Sorry that should read 1:4 for the omega 3:6 ratio. My bad! Lower than it currently is for most people, at any rate.

@TheLeadbetterLife sorry to hear you are not feeling great.

I understand that feeling of wanting to control and push it so as to lose those last kgs, and who knows, maybe you do need to. Everyone is different.

But it's also possible that if you continue as you are they will just drop off anyway.

I'm eating a much higher carb version of this than I think you are and it still seems to be working, but in that very slow stop start way that we all seem to be experiencing.

Of course you know your own body best. I am just hopeful for you that maybe it won't actually need extreme measures in the end.

The thing about the carbs is, what made me finally change my diet and lose weight was a fear that I was prediabetic or diabetic earlier this year.

I'm too scared to get tested, and I didn't have the obvious symptoms like thirst or peeing a lot, but I was getting weird tingling sensations, and had a couple of skin tags appear last year. I also had other risk factors, like being overweight and having a waist to height ratio that was too high. I then went down a google rabbit hole and convinced myself I was destroying my body with carbs.

I definitely was eating too much carb, and cutting it way down made me lose weight, so it's fine either way. I probably should have a whole suite of blood tests and find out what is making me feel strange from time to time, but I'm both scared of having and not having diabetes / prediabetes / insulin resistance.

If I don't have it, I will be relieved, but I worry that I may be tempted to eat too many carbs again. On the other hand, I don't want to know if I do have it, because Christmas is coming up and I want to eat mince pies.

When you unpack this diet, it's more or less identical to what they tell diabetics these days - cut out sugar, wheat, fruit juice etc. No more than two pieces of fruit a day (and to have them later in the day, not for breakfast), low carbs, high fat and protein.

The amount of fruit and wheat I've been eating has crept up lately, I've lost some of the discipline.

That's interesting if this is what they're saying for diabetes now. Makes sense I guess.

Prediabetes isn't all or nothing is it? You can have it and then stop having it again?

Hi everyone. Can I ask for a bit of advice please? Did anyone else feel really hungry when starting this way of eating? I’m only 5 days in and am so hungry! Today I have eaten:
Breakfast-a smoothie (full fat Greek yoghurt, full fat milk, strawberries, oats and spinach)
Lunch-homemade tomato and black bean soup
Dinner-beef stew with mash and green veg
I’ve had an apple as a snack and have just eaten a few of slices of ham because I felt so hungry

Hi @manicmom

If you're hungry eat more. Specifically, eat more fat and protein. It fills you up especially the fat.

So the ham snack was perfect!

I often have apple and cheese as a snack.

I've got the apple and cheese habit now too @manicmom.

I wasn't particularly hungry, no, but then I do eat giant sized portions.

What I did find was I got a bit constipated. This has happened again after re starting the woe after my blip. It's not about lack of veg, maybe more about the increased meat perhaps. Anyway, ground flax seed is the way to go. I mix it with a veg smoothie, and it works for me.

Actually ground flax seed is a good way of blunting the appetite-you can stir it into yoghurt too. I like the taste. Slightly sweet and nutty.

@words yes I second the ground flaxseed. I mix it with full fat Greek yoghurt and cut up fruit in. Also add it to my soup for lunch (tomato & lentil - my fave & pretty filling anyway)
I'm reading the flaxseed fills you up & is a good source of omega 3.

Another weight loss for me this morning after no sugar for quite a while and absolutely no bread for the last 2 days. Beginning to realise that I really have to minimise the bread.

I am very late to the party ! But Hi!

I had a look at this thread and a glance at the book (unexpectedly quite a lot of info. there). Most of it healthy eating-diet common sense - and I'e definitely recently come round to view recently that diets don't work, and never will in a month of Sundays. Its only changing habits and outlook that works. Preferably slowly. Currenltly I'm not dieting in any way. No weights, no measures of anything, including of moi. I've done the loss/gain thing/latest fad too many times.

One thing I've learnt from this thread is the amount of rapeseed oil they put in stuff - everything from hummous (I always assumed it was olive oil only) to crispbreads. I'm gonna be noting that in future!

Longer term also, I'm going to wait from now till next Summer to see where my weight 'naturally' falls, keeping up my outlook. Rather than the diet boom-bust stuff of the last 15 years.

Its time to accept myself completely. "I Am Who I Am" as the song goes.

P.S. One small question I can't see in my first perusals of the book - artificial sugar or Splenda. I know Splenda is not great and no sugar is better, but still, does the author write anything about Splenda as a substitute, does anybody know? I can't see it in index.

Hello @HeyNowHey and welcome

We've all heard of the 'slow' movement- you're doing a 'slow' approach to this woe! I like it!

Re the artificial sweetener - don't really know. I guess it falls into the category of things our grandmothers or great grandmothers wouldn't recognise, so probably not. But if it doesn't cause an insulin spike maybe better in one sense than sugar. Do you use it frequently? If not maybe it won't matter too much. I still eat some sugar (dark chocolate) and have been gradually losing , but with some blips and plateaux.

I may need to cut back but I don't want this to become a punishment exercise so we will see.

Anyway.No doubt someone more knowledgeable than I am will help out!

As with much else on this woe it's about working out what's best for each of us. We're all at different stages, with different tastes and preferences, different living circumstances and varying amounts of time available to us for cooking too.

Hi all. Thanks for the advice I’ve got some flaxseed in the cupboard, so will add some of that to my breakfast tomorrow. Also planning steak with veg in garlic butter for dinner tomorrow, so hopefully upping my protein and fat intake will help.

Re: artificial sweeteners, I think aside from the spooky ingredients, the issue is the addiction to sugar. So it's better in the long run to cut out sweeteners and sweet stuff in general, so that you are satisfied by a small amount of real sugar, or even just fruit. I find I am massively reducing the amount of sugar I put in recipes these days, because it's just too sweet for me now.

For dinner tonight we had steak with garlic butter, and spinach cooked with onion, garlic and full fat milk to make it creamy. The spinach was every bit as satisfying as mashed potato. It's just the garlic, butter and salt we crave really, isn't it?

There is a really interesting book about sugar called 'Sweet Poison' which looks at the impact of sugar on health and it discusses artificial sweeteners as well. I can't remember all the details, but my understanding is that they are not good because they trick the body into thinking it's eating something sweet (and therefore calorific) but when the expected calories don't arrive the body reacts by craving more food to get those calories.

Thanks all. Yes I’m vaguely aware of that theory TiredandBored. It’s a tricky one. All I can do is try and minimise both I think but I’m not aiming for perfection and will retain my freedom to have what I fancy. My sense of this thread is that the better you eat, the more you enjoy that, things generally take care of themselves .

Last day of my break today in my favourite place on earth.

I arrived feeling fraught, exhausted and bloated. I'm now rested, healthy and happy again. I slept over nine hours on day 2 .

The week has gone by unbelievably quickly, but it's been an invaluable opportunity to re set my routine, eat well, and spend as much time outdoors as possible.

Did 15 miles on Friday, three summits, eight hours on the hill altogether. One of the best walks of my life.

Anyway that's not really what this thread is about! Last night I had thé remains of the risotto. I also added some grilled bacon and a soft boiled egg to eke it out a bit, plus green veg. It was really tasty.

Then my brain went to 'need something sweet' so ate a couple of squares dark choc and two dates ( boy were they sweet! )

I think it is exactly what this thread is about @Words! We're all trying to improve our health and well-being through looking after ourselves better. It is much more than what we eat that impacts on how we feel, as well as it all being closely linked - the better I feel, the better food choices I make, the better I eat, the better I feel, the better I sleep, the better I feel and eat... Chicken and egg and chicken...

Really glad to hear the week has been so beneficial to you. I hope the benefits carry forward into 'normal' life on your return.

Couple of interesting asides from yesterday: I ended up having to be away on the road for most of the day, unexpected, so hadn't prepared lunch or dinner and was going to end up eating from service stations. Firstly, my friend who was travelling with me opened a bag of sweets on the way and was raving about how fanatically tasty they were. I took one, but it tasted so artificial and overly sweet to me, despite me (in my past life) having loved these sweets and normally could have wolfed the lot down.

Secondly, when we stopped for dinner at a rest-stop I found most of the fast food options to be totally unappetising. The thought of the grease and additives and other nasties just made me crave something natural and healthy so I took a salad and fruit. I had stopped with the intention of getting something hot and filling and accepted it would be off-plan, but I was surprised at how little appeal the food had and how much I preferred the healthy choice. Previously I would have been at the front of the Burger King queue loading my order! My palate has definitely changed so much with this way of eating.

Tired, yes travelling is a bit tricky . I’m off to Spain for 4 days, last of the summer wine, just staying at cheap b&b on my todd. It occurs to me there will be a lot of tourist food eg pizzas, tostas etc. where I’m going. Fast food is cheap for a reason!!!! So unless you eat at home or frequent expensive restaurants, there will be limitations. I will try my best is all, maybe some nice meat and salad options or paella’s etc if I’m lucky. Also looking forward to not cooking and shopping for 4 whole days, and a bit of ☀️.

I find buying food out and about very difficult. I'm a student and food at uni is difficult surprisingly. I only buy food once a week in uni. This week I had falafels and salad, it was supposed to be a wrap but I asked for it without and it was a measly 4 little ones with a side salad, didn't touch the sides. I usually try and get a jacket spud with salad but usually sold out by the time I get to eat.

Mixed weekend, in fact pretty rubbish but I have a horrendously bad period and I feel lousy and have been very busy so it just is what it is. Not losing sleep over it.