Food temptations and wanting to sneak food

Hi all, as I have two small children and a husband in the house, we have a variety of "no-no" foods such as chips, crackers, chocolate candy bars, bread, peanut butter....." I find it hard not to want to sneak in a little bite now and then. I start each morning with a new resolve to be a good girl. I do o****il around 4pm, and then the cravings start in. I have been drinking water and making protein shakes to try and ward off the evil food spirits. I guess my new mantra should be "each day is a new opportunity". Comments, please?

I hear ya completely! I behave myself all day and then, no matter what I tell myself or how many pep talks I give myself, I find that I am obsessing about what is in the cupboard and doing everything I can to keep from going on a binge. I am working hard on overcoming the mental part of this eating habit. I am fully aware of it and know aht I have to do to overcome it, but it is easier said than done. This is going to be my lifelong battle. I have found that I can handle well eveything else that has to be dealt with for WLS. The only thing that is tripping me up is my craving for sweets and wanting to binge at night. About 2 nights a week, I loss the battle and have a small binge. Of course this is much better than before surgery when it was every night and huge binges. Now it is just smaller binges. For example: having some Doritos and a chocolate protein bar that I don't need at 9 pm. I am doing lots of tricks to try to fight this such as drinking diet hot coca at night or lots of water. Or even a diet pop. Do you have any tricks that work for you? Dena B.

Hi... What's worked for me is having low cal healthy snacks on hand. My "go to" foods are in a separate cabinet so that I'm not tempted by the family's snacks. Here's what I eat a limited amount of... usually 1/4 to 1/2 of the standard serving size: ***Calcium Based...eaten with Caltrate 600 plus D: Fudgsicle Light n Fit yogurts individual 2% cheese: string, colby-jack, Babybel, Cracker Barrel Extra Sharp Cheddar ***Corn Products: Baked Cheetos mini popcorn bag (1/2 bag with "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter!" ***Protein Based BBQ soy crisps Ranch soy crisps Atkins Choc. Peanut Butter bar (pre-cut into 1/4 in snack-size baggie in fridge) Atkins Caramel Double Chocolate Crunch bar " " Atkins Choc. Chip Crisp bar " " ***Minerals, such as copper... mixed nuts (1/4 oz per day) ***Vitamins, such as potassium bananas (1/3 per day) ***Good Carbs: Success Brown Rice w/ ICBIN...Butter (several 2 oz snack bags in freezer) 1 oz whole wheat wraps w/ ICBIN...Butter and garlic powder (nuke wrap 1st) Quaker Low Sugar Maple Brown Sugar oatmeal with 1 pack Splenda Yams with SF Caramel DaVinci syrup (Walmart) and a bit of Blue Bonnet or ICBIN...B! ***Treat for me: SF Caramel DaVinci in decaf coffee w/ 2% milk Probably best tip I could mention now is using SparkPeople's food journal. When I log in what I "want" to eat, the calories posted usually help me reduce the quantity. Hope that this is helpful. I have not done well with other products so far. Ro

Hi Ro, I haven't made it over to this board very often lately but glad I did today. I really like the way you have your legal snacks broken down into categories...that would make the decision process a lot easier and help retrain my brain to see why I am wanting certain things and make better choices. And I definitely second your idea of using sparkpeople or a site like that (also fitday.com) to plan out those food additions. We get into the habit of making too many emotion-based food choices and letting an emotionless program like that assist us helps. I'm going over to sparkpeople right now to preplan today's eats. It should be a lot more fun since I didn't work this morning and didn't have to use up so much of my daily calorie budget for work energy. I'd also add that it might be a good idea to start weaning the family of their usual snack foods and slowly, slowly replace them with things that everybody can eat. Maybe it isn't possible to get all the junk foods out of the house but if they can be reduced then that is good for the whole family. Nobody NEEDS junk food. Molly

I can so relate! A couple of months or so ago I started little by little adding sugar and bad carbs back in my diet. I'd spent 2 months in hospital for mal-nutrition because of surgery. All I'd been hearing was EAT, EAT, EAT. Now mind you, they were talking about protein and good carbs, but especially protein. I am now 10 months out. Since my surgery I had no appetite whatsoever, hence the mal-nutrition because I just couldn't force myself to eat. I tried to live off protein drinks and that didn't work. Plus I think I was one of the unlucky ones whose system doesn't accept hardly any nutrients. Anyway, my appetite returned around July. I was released from hospital mid-June. Well, OMG, my appetite is worse now than it was before I had the surgery. I just crave food all of the time. I really try to eat protein and good carbs only, but it is getting harder and harder. Even eating those, I eat such quantities that it worries me. Went for 2 month checkup with pcp on friday and had only gained 2 pounds, but I have diarrehea a lot, ever since I had the surgery. Plus I have been having extreme swelling in my ankles and feet. I had resolved on Friday after dr visit to stick with hypoglycemic diet (a recent development and possibly linked to surgery, as I've seen on complications forum message board). I managed to not eat sugar on Saturday, but my sister bought me reese's peanut butter cups to have in my nightstand in case my blood sugar dropped real low. I told my sister I didn't think that was a good idea, since I would eat the whole bag and yet she bought them. I put 2 in the drawer, but managed to eat 4 with popcorn my sister had made. My sister had called while she was out and I asked her to bring me home a Dr. Pepper. Here she comes with an entire 8 pack. My sisters just don't understand about sugar addictions and how one bite leads to another and another and that its not about willpower. And again, we had pork chops for dinner and kept going back and eating and eating until there was only a small piece left, which my sister brought to my attention. I felt so ashamed...just like I did when I was a kid and a family member would say something about how much I was eating or me sneaking to eat. Sorry this is so long. This is first time I've posted here (I think). Just needed to get honest about some things. Calling my insurance co tomorrow to get a list of therapists in my network. Thanks for "listening".

Hi, "UCan"! Hope that you are feeling better since you've had a lot of complications. It seems like you are ready to make a sincere commitment to better eating habits. I believe that it is harder to stay on track, when others bring some foods home. I gather that you are looking for a therapist who works with WLS patients. By now, I'd hope that it would be easy to locate one. Keep in touch! Ro

Hi, Ladies! How's it going? Just being nosey!!! LOL Ro

Ladies, I know that a lot of women say that men have it easier, and I would like to say that I am going through the same thing right now. I find myself wanting to snack all the time, but I am still in that loosing weight stage. I think that I am doing myself a disservice because I am eating things that I shouldn't. I am now eating a lot of graham crackers, and 100 calorie snacks, but sometimes I eat 2 100 calorie packs instead of one. I am a kindergarten teacher so there are always snacks in our room and I find it hard not to partake in them. I usually eat breakfast, snack at 9, lunch at 10:30 with my class, snack in the afternoon, a snack when I get home and dinner. Sometimes I even have a snack after that. I have read all of your responses and I am fear that I will return to my old ways and start gaining weight back. I am really going to try and focus a little harder to not eat the snacks, but I think that I really need to start eating a more balanced diet and this should help.