I’m currently a lump of chocolate and cheese, but once the new year hits, I’m determined to make 2026 the year I finally get back to a healthy weight (I’ve lost about 20 pounds, with about 80-100 to go). I’m pretty good about exercising regularly, but, as they say, abs are made in the kitchen. Those who have successfully lost weight, is there anything you particularly recommend for maintaining a calorie deficit to lose the weight, and then avoiding gaining it back later on?
That’s definitely a challenge for me. I grew up with a bunch of siblings, so if you didn’t eat fast, you’d be stuck with leftovers. Inhaling my food is an unfortunate habit I’ve held onto.
You can get out in front of it by estimating how much food will get you to satisfied but not full and only place that much in front of you.
And wait about 10 minutes before going back for seconds. For some reason when I still feel hungry after eating, if I wait a bit before seconds, I don’t feel hungry anymore.
It gives your body time to start digesting, and once digesting it is like “I got to work on this food, don’t need any more just yet.” If you eat fast enough that the digestion doesn’t kick in then you still feel as hungry as you did initially and you have to fill your stomach before that feeling kicks in.
Source: vague recollection of some nutritional information from years ago
For me the big problem is that as a kid I would eat something for breakfast and then one big meal a day after playing outside constantly, so my eating pattern is wolfing down food until I feel like I could burst. That doesn’t work well when life changed to have three scheduled meals a day, but it did take a decade or two and a desk job to really catch up with me. Still a struggle not to over eat, especially with people around me encouraging me to eat more.
I can relate, and also not wanting to seem rude and turn down overly processed food/sugar laden cookies/pies, etc. I love sweets, I just don’t want them in excess, or hfcs/beet sugar, or really much cane sugar, especially white, and other things that are my own peculiarities.
Also yes, it seems I remember something about digestion kicking in, now that you mention it, thanks!
This is important! These small habit changes all add up.
A weird way I learned to eat more normal portions was to buy frozen meals. Sure they are super processed but when looking at the ingredients it looks like completely normal homemade food so it can’t be that bad. We ate that for a couple of weeks before we got tired of it. But that was enough to learn
Try using a smaller plate which forces you to take a smaller amount initially and consciously makes you aware of going back for more.