Practicing good portion control is a multi-prong approach. We will tackle one at a time. This week I want to give you some ideas for slowing down your meal periods. As I said in my check-in email yesterday, research shows that the slower we eat, the less calories we take in. It takes roughly 20 minutes for the brain and the stomach to communicate with each other.
Often right after a small meal, we feel as though we could still eat more. And if the food is sitting in front of us, we will. My advice to you is to serve out the proper portion for your meal and put all of the food back in the refrigerator and pantry BEFORE you sit down to eat. Then, when you are finished with your meal, instead of asking yourself if you are still hungry, look at your watch, take note of the time and go get busy with a project for 20 minutes. I guarantee in the middle of your project you will say to yourself, “Wow. That really was enough food. I’m not hungry anymore.”
Here are some other ideas for helping you slow down your meals:
1. First, it’s important for you to eat at approximately the same times each day so you teach your body when to expect food and when to not expect food. This will keep you from eating for reasons other than physical hunger. It will also make your will power stronger when you are around food at “non-meal times”.
2. When you do eat, do not eat out of containers. Serve yourself a nice meal like you would if you were having a guest over. You probably didn’t realize that one of the main reasons for getting derailed on your nutrition plans are your feelings of deprivation. When you don’t treat yourself as nicely as you would treat a guest, you do not get the same level of satisfaction from your meal, leading you astray later in the day. On the same note, do not eat while you are driving in the car or standing at the kitchen counter. In order for your brain to signal that you are satisfied, your mind has to feel like you had a normal meal and to do that, the best place to sit is at your kitchen table.
3. Put your fork down between every bite. You’ve heard people say that you should chew every bite of food 15-20 times. Well that’s not too far off. Challenge yourself to put your fork down between every bite. I guarantee this will slow you down and you will feel more satisfied. Kathleen Allen and her husband challenged each other on their last date night to stretch the dinner out to 2 hours. Read about this experience and what she learned further down on the blog.
4. Do not do anything else while you are eating. Do not work on the computer, watch TV or even read. Again, it is important for your brain to be focused entirely on every bite in order for your mind to feel satisfied. Following is an article put out on this topic by the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
Want to Lose Weight? Then Pay Attention!
Picture this: You're sitting in a movie theater, popcorn and soda in hand, chatting with friends and waiting for the show to start. Finally, the lights go down and you reach for the popcorn and you realize you're scraping the bottom of the barrel.
That's right — you managed to eat the whole thing while you weren't paying attention.
The good news is you're not alone. A new study of healthy-weight women revealed that even restrained eaters consumed significantly more calories when they were distracted than when they were alone without outside stimuli.
Researchers from Hospital Hotel-Dieu in
They were alone without distraction, alone while listening to recorded instruction on how to focus on the taste of their food, and alone while listening to a tape of a detective story.
And they ate lunch with three other women who were also participating in the study.
Despite reporting equal levels of hunger under all four conditions, they ate considerably more calories while listening to the detective story.
Researchers recommend that people who wish to maintain or lose weight avoid eating while watching TV, talking on the phone or listening to music, all activities capable of derailing even the best weight-loss efforts.
Source: American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 2001, 74, 197-200
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