How to Overcome Your Sugar Cravings

You can learn to manage your food cravings!

Food cravings can be a challenge, and even more so during perimenopause. Due to the changes in your reproductive hormones, you may experience increased hunger and appetite. Daily stressors and poor sleep can add more fuel to the fire and leave you ravenous and wondering if any relief exists. However, with the right skills, you can reduce your cravings, learn how to eat to stay satisfied and manage your weight. 

First, it’s important to distinguish between hunger and appetite.  Hunger is a physiological need that occurs when you need food. Signs of hunger may include grumbling in the stomach, low energy, or headache.  Appetite is a want that can be precipitated by external factors such as smell or site (have you ever noticed wanting food while walking past a bakery), or thoughts and feelings can trigger it.  

Now that you know it’s not in your head, here are some practical ways to curb your cravings. 

1. Start your day with a protein-rich breakfast. 

Aiming for a high-protein breakfast (one that is between 20-30g of protein or 1-2 palm-sized portions) will help decrease cravings throughout the day. Research suggests that individuals who have diets that are high in protein are less likely to overconsume carbohydrates, fats, and highly palatable foods.  The first step may be to learn which foods are high in protein. For example, a two-egg breakfast only has 12g of protein.

2. Practice mindfulness.

Mindfulness can be done in many ways and helps you focus on one thing in the moment. Cultivating a mindfulness practice will help you stay present in what you are feeling emotionally. It can also help you accept what you are feeling, which is the anecdote to emotional eating. 

3. Practice mindful eating.  

Mindful eating is the practice of eating without distractions and experiencing eating with the five senses. It also includes checking in with yourself while eating to see if you are still hungry. Mindful eating helps you pay more attention to your fullness, increases the memory of your past meal, and decreases snacking later in the day. 

4. Power of the pause.

Having an impulse to snack does not mean that you are hungry.  Pausing between the impulse to eat and eating allows you to determine if you are experiencing hunger or appetite.  If you are not hungry, pausing teaches your brain that you don’t have to eat when you have the impulse.  Most urges to eat subside within 10-15 minutes of the craving.

5. Eat nutrient-dense foods. 

Eating balanced meals with enough protein, carbohydrates, and fats will help keep you full longer and satisfied. Eating balanced plates will give your body an array of nutrients and can decrease cravings. 

It’s important to know that whatever you do to manage your cravings that restriction or deprivation will not be helpful.  In fact, restriction can have the opposite effect of making you want the food or think about what you are craving more.  Instead, try to eat the foods you crave mindfully, or find an alternative that serves as a buffer food (something you can mindfully enjoy). 

Finally, it’s important to remember that you don’t need to implement all these skills simultaneously to make progress. Find the skill you are most interested in doing, one you feel at least 80% confident you can do, and start there.  Practicing the skills frequently will decrease your cravings over time.  

If you are interested in receiving account and support to master your cravings, consider joining the Cravings Control Bootcamp. The boot camp is a five-day program that runs a few times a year. It will provide you with support and accountability while you practice many of these skills. 

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With awareness, support, and the right skills, you can manage your cravings and thrive in midlife.