emotions and cheats

[jeangenie]

Looking for advice (or at least anecdotal sharing) on controlling emotionally driven cheating on your diet. Im trying to keep it all clean, but after a big blowout with the spouse went all out on the mega brown rice-tuna-cottage cheese thing. Clean, but excessive. now don't get me wrong, I'm generally pretty sane about food in general (love those cheat days of good merlot and endless sushi), but I realize how the emotional factors can mess up an otherwise clean cycle. just started on a new 8 week fat loss/lean mass regine (see my posts under "yet another new girl" for info) and blew it to holy hell on day 1 after a fight. May also be an ovulation thing as well, but I've been fighting MONSTER carb cravings all day. tried to cut the stress with b12 and DHEA but caved at the last minute.

Now I know this is some classic shit ladies...help me out to keep from doing it again. I guess its better to load clean than otherwise, but Im looking for some mental tricks to regain control in thie thick of intense emotional stuff...

 

[Sassy69]

Welcome to the world of food... the emotional crutch.

I have been reading a book called "Food & Mood" (by Elizabeth Somer, M.A., R.D) - Here's how the relationship between stress & cravings is described:

1) A person feels stress
2) Cortisol, the "stress hormone" is secreted from the adrenal gland
3) Cortisol turns on the production of neuropeptide Y (NPY) in the brain -- as NPY increases, seratonin levels decrease
4) This produces a craving for carb-rich food
5) Seratonin levels rise in response (This is why you feel better or "less depressed" after you eat a carb-rich food)
6) The person feels calm

So there's a biochemical reason for the urge to carb-load when you get stressed. HOWEVER, this does not mean you don't have the power to take control of that.

When you feel particularly stressed, find a better outlet for that urge. Your body's goal is to find a way to calm down, so the above cycle is one way. Another way is for you to redirect your stress -- if you can, go to the gym, go for a run, a walk, whatever. Once you are calm, do urge to junk out. This is also a behavior change and takes a little bit of work to break the habit of running for food when you get stressed, and instead create a new habit to replace the food urge.

More easily said than done, but you have the power to choose how you want to deal w/ food -- it controls you or you control it.

 

[jeangenie]

cortisol blockers?

sassy -

wow, thanks, you rock. im normally pretty under control with food, but you hit the chemical driver right on. i feel that cortisol rush like mad, and hit the carbs even after a 30 minute run to try to calm it (intense girl!). granted, i did 2 hard lifting cycles in the past 24 hours plus 2 hard cardio sessions. i suspect my body was just rebelling under the stress and craving the extra calories from all the work. would like to get it a little more under control though. what about supps for cortisol/strss rushes. i hit b-complex pretty hard daily, in addition to dhea.

in the long term, my 'clean' binge tonight, won't kill my adherance to my goals, i just hate being a slave to stress....

i suspect this topic aint on the boy-boards

 

[Sassy69]

Well, you may also have been depleted after that much training & cardio. That can catch up to you too. Just throw in stress and your body has nothing left to deal w/ that.

Do the boys have to deal w/ cravings??? Go read -- for those on a cycle, they usually are loading food anyway -- bigger is better I guess. But they still talk about it -- I think the difference is that they don't carry the guilt that women tend to. No fair huh? They say men think about sex ever 6 minutes of theday -- so that means even in the worst case, they will only bitch or worry about food for 6 minutes max....

 

[jeangenie]

mood + food

sassy girl. you crack me up...

i think im having a problem getting out of the 'less (food/carbs) is more' mindset too. i dropped 15 lbs (almost 100% fat) and had some good muscle gains off a super disciplined 8 weeks (protein shakes and very low carb clean food) and am going into another 8 week cycle trying to not hit the scales and really focus on building the lean muscle mass through more carbs and more weight. tonight just totally threw me off because as i am ramping up the weight + workout intensity i didn't expect the INSANELY massive carb cravings that go with it + the domestic fight stress feeding the fire. any advice on dealing with the hormonally driven shit around ovulation and monthly cyle times? id love to know how to optimize all that hormonal activity around maximum gains: again, another area where it seems like there's a lot more advice for the boys, whose cycles dont fluctuate monthly...

does anavar help cut through the monthly cycle of cravings? ive been having pretty good luck with dhea, but just curious...

 

[Sassy69]

Congrats on the progress so far! I would just say make sure you are getting enough good quality carbs -- not just going very low carb. I tried the "no carb" diet last year (no particular diet, just cut out all carbs to see what happens--- can you say "Carb Crash"?? All I did was get stupid -- your brain needs carbs to run -- unless you are following a ketosis diet -- but that's something different)

RE: anavar -- its alittle more than just a workout enhancer .... anavar is a steroid and that enters a whole new level of "supplement". I think if you took it, you would experience monstrous food cravings -- read some of the postings on anavar cycles here. You get great strength gains and can lift like a mofo, but your body is goign to demand food to support it.

If you want to look for appetite suppresants, I think ECA will provide that to some extent -- maybe Ripped Fuel or Adipokinetix.

 

[jeangenie]

anavar and monthly carb "spikes" for women

I have a pretty good ECA stack going right now but try not to do it after my afternoon workout (4ish)...a girls gotta sleep

My understanding from the posts re anavar was that the carb cravings are offset by increased stamina and lift capacity, was just wondering if they helped regulate ovulation/pms craving "spikes" in lieu of cravings all the time (offset by monster increased lifts and stamina etc.) - ive heard anavar often stops menstrual cycles temporarily and helps flatten the hormonal roller coaster -

Also: is there any supp thats good for cortisol-flood blocking? Besides the B complex...

Thanks for the advice...Im currently experimenting with my carb levels and timing re workouts etc. Just struggling with the monthly hormonal swings + stress induced stuff.

Nothing a good kick in the butt wont solve either

 

[keiko]

Since I have a planned cheat once a week, I don't have too much problems with cravings. I have a glass of wine a day, too, which greatly helps with the feeling of being deprived.

Pesonally, I believe in the adage "A little of what you crave does you good". If I have a real hankering for chocolate, I have a piece. It's not a trigger food for me, and one does fine. If I want bread and butter, i have a slice.

Before my period, I get carb cravings, so I eat carbs. I figure that my body's sending me a message.

I would work on the emtional part of craving control before I went to gear, personally. Otherwise, you've just stopped the cravings during your cycle, but the emotional part hasn't changed.

As for the emotional thingie--I don't let my emotions govern that part of my life. I can feel unhappy, acknowledge my unhappiness, wallow in my unhappiness, but I've learned that I can be unhappy and not eat something I don't really want. This didn't happen over night. I've studied something called Constructive Living based on writings by David K. Reynolds, who's very influenced by Japanese Mortia philosophy.

Basically, the idea is that the emotions don't have to rule the person. You can be afraid and still act with courage. you can be sad, but instead of lying around all day, and letting your sadness stop you, you do what needs to be done.

These ideas deserve a better explanation than I'm giving here. But, once I started learning about this, these ideas changed my life.

Here's a link to one site about CL: http://www.teledyn.com/fun/CL/cl-intro.html

 

[Phemomena]

chocolate cravings!!!!

for me personally, i give into emotional/hormonal eating once in awhile... its only natural... sometimes you feel like the only thing that can get you out of the mood is chocolate... what i do is freeze a few of those little chocolate bars (now that all the halloween candies are out in stores EEEEK!!!! you can stock up)... and when i get the urge for chocolate, i eat one of those...

usually just the taste is enough for me... sometimes i'll only have a small bite and put the rest of that tiny little bar back in the freezer.... its not my stomach thats craving it, its my taste buds.. so the taste is quite often enough.. (if i have it at the end of my meal then i'm not as hungry)...

now i've found that a good whey protein shake (chocolate flavour of course) will take away most of my cravings instantly... i actually have come to crave my shakes... (chocolate, banana and peanut butter, blended with soy milk and egg whites and ice...yummm) so i hardly ever need my little chocolate bars anymore

ice cream is a different story completely....

anavar hasn't interferred with my cycle yet (only on week 3 though..) winny is known for that....

anavar has not caused me any increase or decrease in food... my diet has stayed the same since i've been on... from what i've read some people have decreases in appetite due to upset stomach... not sure about appetite increases.. probably does happen if you are adding lots of muscle, but anavar isn't known for that.... or if you activity level is way up....

 

[jeangenie]

great advice

thanks keiko, phen...

the constructive living stuff looks really interesting. goes in line with my zen/buddhist leanings too...one of the things i love about making a commitment to developing your body is the opportunity to really grow in terms of mental and spiritual strength at the same time. developing the mental toughness and control seems to be 99% of the game here.

....still following your anavar thread too, phen, with much interest. i know anavar is supposed to be really good for women as a strength increaser: whats a good stack for doing that and also adding muscle. for example, I would want to do a cycle that boosts stamina and strength - to keep up the hard cardio for fat burning and lift power, but also make some size gains in my back and shoulders at the same time, rather than just lean out/cut up. there's a bunch of recommendations to the guys here, but i havent seen a specifc stack targetted to women trying to achieve these goals. Keeping the masculinizing side effects at bay is key. I like the idea of a 10 week cycle rather than indefinately, although long cycles are supposedly safe for women.

What do you guys think?