No snacking after dinner! Who's in??

[summerisacoming]

I'm not very good with diets and I really don't want to try one then have it fail. So this is my plan:

As soon I have finished dinner, I'm going to brush my teeth and make sure I don't eat anything else that evening. Simple.

Ok, it's not the most imaginative of plans, but here's why I think it will make a huge difference:

1. My worst snacking is in the evening
2. Eating chocolate in the evening makes me stay up late (caffeine) so I'm tired for work the next morning
3. Am I right in thinking that eating right before bed makes you store more fat?

I am 5'8'' and since having kids I now weigh around 12 stone (size 12/14). I want to be a size 10 again!

I'm going to start small and do this for 1 week, starting today. If all goes well, then I'll aim for a month, then two months (should be a well-formed habit by then), then drop sugar.

If you're in, let's report back every evening right before we go to bed to confirm that we didn't eat anything after dinner.

So who's with me?? Come on!😁

Oooh can I join?

Post-dinner snacking js my nemesis; I can be so disciplined all day, then somehow after dinner all bets are off 🙈

Have had dinner & 2 mini choc protein balls and have 'closed' my MFP for the day to guilt-trip myself into not breaking it - argh!

Day 20

I had a real challenge this evening. I made cookie dough with my DD, and where I knew it would be a terrible idea to let her have a cookie right before bed, I thought it would be a great idea for me.

So even as I was putting her to bed, I was thinking about whether I should have one or two. But my trusty trick worked again! On the way to the kitchen I made myself go into the bathroom and brush my teeth. I also told myself that I can have 7+ cookies tomorrow, I just can't have any tonight. Hoping I don't follow through with that tomorrow. But, tbh, even if I do, I'm still going to count this as a win, because I'm just focusing on the evenings for now. I don't want to spread myself too thin by tackling all areas of my unhealthy eating at once (excuse the pun: I'd like to be thinner 😁).

@GallstoneGertie One week! Huge acheivement 🎉

@RaspberryCloud Of course, join us. Completely agree: there's something about the evening that skews my idea of what a reasonable snack is.

Another successful evening, although dinner was later than I prefer. I'm doing more in the evenings because of not slumping in front of tv with snacks. I feel more relaxed at bedtime.

This is great everyone! I'm so glad we're all feeling better with one change. Another pound off for me this morning! I must admit I'm very surprised with that and it has focussed my mind as although there has been no snacking in an evening I can't say I've been brilliant during the day so I need to watch that this week!!

Hi I am going to join you all. Hope that is ok. I managed to not snack last night, though never had my dinner until 845pm. I am still happy as I would have stuffed my face even after such a late dinner.

i am also 5 ft 8 but 12 stone 4 and would love to be down to 10 stone, but even 11 and a half and I will be well chuffed. I know when I was below 9 and a half stone I never snacked unless it was weekend nights. Hoping to achieve this mind set again.

I am so impressed with how well you are all doing. I am off on holiday next Monday but hoping to not snack in the evenings until I go away, then resume when I get back.

Day 9 for me. Definitely feeling more energetic without the sluggish mornings from no snacking the night before. Trying to be more mindful in the day what I eat during the day.
I felt like I needed to eat this evening so did my first postpartum workout instead. My youngest us 16 months. Nearly killed me but I made it and feel a 1000 times better.

Everyone is doing so well! I need to remember to do a weigh in.

Well done everyone! I’m back on the wagon, hopefully this week will be better!

I've now lost 10 lbs in 10 weeks doing 16:8. Still drinking wine and eating crisps. Down from 13 st 5.
I'm 6 feet tall and am aiming for 12 st 3.
I eat at midday and again at 7pm. Don't miss breakfast at all.

Yesterday (Monday) I had several spoonfuls of dry cereal after dinner. Caught myself in time. Dinner was a lot later than usual, and the cereal was mindless eating. I need to prioritise eating my meal earlier.

Oh wow! That's really good! I've been debating doing intermittentent fasting but not sure I could skip breakfast. I could maybe do late breakfast and eat between just 10am-6pm. Do you think that would work?

Day 21 (for yesterday)

Busy day, went to bed very early.

Day 22

I'm going out for dinner tonight, so it's going to be a challenge not having dessert without explaining this whole thing to my friends (and they know how much I love dessert).

Well done, everyone!

@AuntieMarys That's very impressive. I'm also intrigued by IF - is the idea that you do it for just a short period (e.g. a few weeks) and then go back to normal, or is it supposed to be a permanent change? I'd struggle with never having breakfast again. Keep going though, it's definitely working for you!

I occasionally have breakfast...had porridge on Sunday as we were going for an 8 mile walk at 11am. Then ate at 6pm.
But I just don't miss it at all.

Enjoy your dinner OP! I ate late tonight as I was working and hadn’t managed dinner. Healthy small meal at 9 but then I mindlessly had a pack of crisps after. I just shouldn’t buy them. Oh well. Otherwise been alright.

I loosely do IF, I find no breakfast v easy since mornings are usually chaotic with 2 wee ones. Now it’s a real habit I don’t look for it, to point we decided to book no breakfast when we went to a hotel recently, and just went for brunch after checking out. Decided that was much better! Only issue is I often feel I need to eat by about 11 then I’m tempted to snack in afternoon with early lunch. Given I’m doing no evening snacks, I’m not strict about pms at the moment but probably should be! Needs to feel doable though eh.

How was your meal out Summer?

Day 23

I feel quite great! I'm used to this emtpy feeling when I go to bed now.

Had a really nice dinner out, thanks for asking @Badatmostthings. A few desserts were ordered and everyone was given a spoon so we could all share. I mean, it would have been rude not too, right? I was quite restrained 😇.

This is the weird thing - I would never pig out with friends (or even my husband), and not even because I'd be embarrassed to, but because I just wouldn't feel like it. When I eat almost an entire pack of biscuits, it's normally because I'm exhausted and sat on the sofa on my own at the end of a long day. Socialising feels like the opposite of that.

I'm basically just trying to justify it. 😀

@Beginningless So you're doing IF too? I can see that if you have to skip a meal, breakfast is the obvious choice. It feels so ingrained though, that we MUST have breakfast, so I don't even think about it. In fact, doing this makes me wake up ravinous, so I'm very impressed you manage to hold off.

A friend said I looked like I'd lost weight, so I'm very chuffed, and it's given me a little boost to keep going! A month feels very doable now...

Today went well,and I had my dinner when the alarm went off. Finished by 7.30. I feel so much healthier like this. I like the idea of IF, and will try having a later breakfast.

I’m not formally doing IF, I just loosely do it since a period a year ago where I did it formally and enjoyed it. So usually on school days I don’t have breakfast until 11ish but weekend I don’t always bother. If I’m starving or if I’m really tired from a crap sleep I usually eat. But it’s quite a habit for me so I’m not often hungry til a bit later. The no evening snacking takes a lot more mental power!!

This week's update, minus 4 pounds!!. Well chuffed, 2 pounds to go and that's a stone. Getting used to nothing after dinner now.

Day 24

The days seem to be speeding by now. Those first couple of days, by comparison, took forever, so this is definitely getting easier. Although, I guess this is when complacency can set it, and then exceptions start being made until you've slid completely off the plan.

I had a really early dinner tonight (well, early for me) at 6.30pm, so might be a struggle tonight. I've done my teeth though, so fingers crossed.

@Beaverbridge That's brilliant!

Out of interest, how many calories do you all think you're skipping by not snacking in the evening?

I recently found out that a 100g bar of chocolate is more than 500 calories (a quarter of my daily total!). And, in all honesty, sometimes I'd have more than that. So today, for the first time in years, I bought just a regular-sized mars bar. It was still £1 (same as the 100g cadbury bars, so bit of a rip-off), but I enjoyed it just as much. Hopefully, I've turned a corner 😀

Good luck for tonight, everyone!

Summerisacoming, thank you. Seriously my evening overeating on rubbish was over the score. Usually 2 packs of crisps, about 4 2 finger kit kats. Some nights would have a family bar of aero chocolate. Wasn't helped by the fact OH would bring in "bargains" from supermarket he works in. Cakes, biscuits etc. Give him his due he waits till I go to bed before he has anything!

Back on track this week, still snacking in the day but not at all after 6pm. Not weighing myself but I love the way I feel the next morning, less sluggish.

Can I join please?

I really want to try and lose some weight overall but also before I go away in 6 weeks - may be unlikely.

I'm fasting to some extent, skipping breakfast so generally going about 16 hours between last meal and first one of the next day although I've been having coffee with milk which I believe breaks it so I've actually only been doing it for about 11 or so hours but I can't cut that yet. I feel I need to do little steps or I'll give up altogether.

I've stopped snacking in the day, I'm not a massive snacker but now I'm just trying to do lunch, maybe some fruit in the afternoon, dinner and then because we eat fairly early with the dc and I've not snacked in the day the evening is where dh and I have our time to relax and it always involves a biscuit or a bit of chocolate or something sweet with a cup of tea. I eventually want to cut sugar but I can't bring myself too yet.

So I really want to start in the evening, though I'm currently putting baby to bed and I'm already thinking what's downstairs that I can have with a cuppa 🤣

I've done a bad thing....but here's the case for my defence...feel crap, cold/flu like. Had a late lunch and didn't fancy any tea. At 7pm had a crumpet, bag of crisps and a cookie. Can't say I enjoyed any of it and I only had the cookie as it was the last one and then I could wash the jar. My bad. Was feeling really good (despite feeling like crap if you know what I mean!) and now I feel pretty rubbish, so lesson learned. Back on it now. I needed to fess up, please don't make my mistake! It's really not worth it!

I did this Tuesday evening. Hormones and pms I'm blaming. Like you I felt absolutely awful afterwards so did a 40min workout before bed. I definitely won't make that mistake again.
It's amazing how much stopping snacking makes you feel so much better but even one slip up can affect one so much.

Day 25

So nuts - I can't believe it's been 25 days!

Last night was difficult. I woke up at 3.30am and lay awake until 4.30am, I can only think it was because I was hungry (that never happens otherwise). So I got up and had one weetabix with milk, then sat reading until 5:30. Then fell asleep, and was obviously exhausted in the morning.

To make it worse, I also had an early, smallish dinner tonight (ate with the kids), but because it was so early I didn't want to eat much. I started panicking that the same thing will happen tonight, so I quickly had some nuts and an apple after to try and fill me up. Which isn't the worst snack, but it's still a snack 😬- maybe this is the slippery slope?!

It was about 6.40pm I had dinner - this is too early, right? But if I wait until after the kids are in bed, I end up eating past 8pm. What time do all eat?

Fingers crossed I'll sleep alright tonight...

@oneuponedown Yes, of course - join us! Putting the kids to bed can be so dreary and exhausting, that I completely understand needing a reward - I used to have one every night! But, honestly, this approach has helped me so much. Even if I'm desperate for a treat, I just start planning what I'm going to have tomorrow and when, literally down to the hour. Just thinking about it feels great 😁

@Lemoncurdslice Brilliant, well done! I also think I've got loads more energy (despite this morning being exhausted, I got so much done today).