Many people know that feeling when you eat badly… you feel meh… possibly gained some uncomfortable extra kilo or two, the forbidden food is no longer pleasing… BUT you continue to eat (apparently, from despair) …
Are you with me?
Circumstances and reasons that led to a cheat month, months or a year are different for all of us. Someone “slips” during a vacation, with others this happens during stressful times. I know that for me, both occasions happen and I learnt how to enjoy the cheat period and how to go back to a balanced diet.
This blogpost is a selection of recommendations on how to correctly and quickly return to your normal diet. These tips are not only about food: this is a whole range of measures aimed at achieving holistic health.
1. Do not practice hunger strikes
This is a fact: the situation with gluttony can really get out of control. But there will come a time that you decide to put an end to it and when it happens, please don’t go on a diet. Even if there is no appetite, remember that this is not a reason to fall into extremes from the detox series on water or juice starvation.
In the morning, first drink a glass of warm water. Next, arrange a light breakfast for yourself, for example, a protein cocktail with the addition of fruits and greens. This will positively affect the level of blood sugar, stress hormone and will launch metabolism. For lunch and dinner, eat 50–75 % of vegetables and greens, and get the rest with high -quality protein and healing healthy fats (nuts, olives, avocados). Do not forget about herbs and spices that have anti -inflammatory properties, such as cinnamon, turmeric, sage, rosemary and Kayen pepper. And one more thing: during the period of recovery after the “breakdown” try to limit caffeine, sugar and dairy products as they disturb metabolism that you are trying to settle after a period of disruption.
2. Work on improving blood circulation and removing toxins
Easy sport, teas-diuretics – this is what is ideal for reconfiguration of the body immediately after stress from overeating. Training (a sufficiently twenty-minute run or recovery yoga class) will also improve mood and concentration as well as accelerate digestion. Diuretic teas (mint, hawthorn, nettles) will remove excess fluid from the body that stick around due to the sugar and/or salt eaten.
3. Look for the answer to the question “Why?”
That is, why did you (again!) have a “breakdown” … It is possible that you replace the missing emotion or need, or maybe you worry about your personal life, work or simply do not accept your body. If this is so, then neither diet nor intensive training will help you – or rather, they will only become a temporary measure, after which the ill -fated cycle will repeat again.
Awareness will help you.
Explore your emotional and spiritual needs, make notes about your mood and thoughts in moments when your hands reach for harmful food. Notice whether you were hungry or the reason for the craving for food was completely different. Determining the true motives of emotional seals and working with them is the key to a healthier and stable diet.
4. Have healthy snacks prepped
That is, “correct” snacks in the event of an “emergency” – for example, when friends have a batch of temptations at a party. The recommendation also applies to trips when you need to spend long hours on the road, and upon arrival it is not clear where and when you can eat a balanced dinner. Some useful snacks that help stabilize the blood sugar level: almonds or walnuts, canned sardines, hummus, fresh carrots and celery, apple, dark chocolate (cocoa content 70 % and above).
5. Do not refuse restaurants, but be vigilant
After depriving yourself of a meeting with friends, you will only increase the degree of emotional stress (whatever it is) that led you to a breakdown. Therefore, do not refuse to go to a restaurant or a gathering with friends. To make the most useful choice for you in food, just study the menu in advance. Almost anywhere is now offered fish with vegetables and delicious vegetarian dishes. And if on this day you still decide to afford something not the most healthy-also choose in advance what exactly it will be. Say, if a friend has a birthday, then it is quite possible that you want to drink a glass of wine, and if the restaurant is known for exclusive cakes, then eat a dessert. BUT do not indulge with everything at once: alcohol and pasta in creamy sauce and dessert. That is how long breakdowns begin …
6. Stop any obsession
This includes daily superintendent training, calculation of calories, weighing, obsessed planning of food meals, etc. All of the above, only increase stress in the body. Such a fixation is not an assistant to you. It can only give short -term results, but ultimately leads to emotional and physical exhaustion, as well as an uncontrolled need to “quit and relax.” It is not surprising if the prospect of abandoning the routine so familiar to you will sound frightening. However, this will have to be done. Try to devote the free time for meditation. It heals the body and harmonizes the emotional state, helps to become more flexible.
7. Do not cultivate your own guilt
Negative thoughts can cause internal inflammation, similar inflammation that harmful foods cause. Therefore, try to stop scolding yourself. Forgive yourself. Think more often about many positive things that you do for your health. They are highly likely to outweigh that recent weekend, when you fell off and allowed yourself too much. Also know that perfectionism and balance in nutrition are different and incompatible concepts. Try to find what you look forward to do, and not what you will have to do. In the process, let yourself do mistakes. That is a secret to balance.
To conclude think about how you really need those days when you do not deny yourself anything. After all, to be honest, the negative effect of denying is too bad. The trend leading to long breakdowns is just from the same idea that “on one day when I can eat everything in any quantities.” As a result, the day, which began with a McDonalds breakfast, continued with pizza, cake, chips and other carbohydrate “bombs”, often simply does not end and tomorrow everything is repeated again. Ideally, any of your favorite foods and dishes should periodically be present in your diet, only then they will stop beckoning the “forbidden” stigma.
This is largely the essence of a balanced diet.
