To overcome overeating, you must first understand why it is people overeat.
This will allow you to change your eating patterns to be able to maintain a healthier weight.
Not only will you be able to better control your weight, but you will feel like you have more energy, you will sleep better, and feel much better about yourself.
There are several strategies you can use during a meal that will help you to stop eating sooner.
Some of these are: Take smaller bites.
This causes you to eat your meals slower so that your body is able to recognize better when you are actually full.
It takes up to 20 minutes before an obese person's brain starts recognizing that you are satisfied and can stop eating.
In thin people this process can happen almost twice as fast.
Watch where you eat.
When you eat on the run such as when you are driving or watching tv, your mind is distracted so it doesn't notice how much food you are actually consuming.
Stressful social situations are also times when you need to be careful what you are eating.
So it is preferable to eat your meals in a calm and distraction free environment.
This will help you to feel when you really are full enough.
Use a small plate.
When you use a large plate for your food and you put enough food for a meal on it but the food doesn't cover the whole plate and there are big empty spots on it, your brain processes this as meaning you don't have enough food.
So then you end up eating more than you really need.
By reducing the size of the plate, you reduce how much your brain thinks you need to eat.
Eat foods that are more satisfying.
You want to eat foods that are high in either fiber, protein, or water as these will feel the most satisfying to you so will need to eat less.
A good example of something satisfying would be a turkey sandwich on wheat bread with lettuce and tomato but no mayo.
The foods that make us feel less satisfied and tend to cause us to overeat them are high in fats and sugars such as chips, cookies, ice cream, and cheeses.
Eat more often.
By this I mean you should try to eat many very small meals throughout the day rather than a couple large meals.
Never go more than 5 hours without eating.
The longer you go between eating, the higher the chance that when you finally do, you will binge and eat much more than you should.
Eating a very small meal every 2-3 hours will prevent this.
Not only that, it will help speed up your metabolism so your body burns calories more efficiently.
Plan your meals in advance so you're not rushing around trying to find something to eat.
Now that you know some reasons why you might be overeating and strategies to combat them, you can put them to use immediately to improve your chances ofbeing successful and overcome overeating for good.