If you’ve been reading this blog for anytime, you know that I LOVE to EAT! I can be happy a lot of times just thinking of good food, and food combinations. I was avoiding thinking about our Easter dinner menu because I knew I had to go shopping for the items. But, once I started thinking about what we’d have for dinner, I just couldn’t stop! I was scouring the internet looking for new things, things that sounded scrumptious, things that made me want to eat them right off the computer screen.
OK, I know I’m a little over the top sometimes. But, this shows you how much I really LOVE food. I must admit that sometimes I go crazy eating food and just don’t stop myself. For example, this week we went to my sister-in-law’s restaurant, Dhat Island, and I had been thinking about it for days! I love the food there, it’s one of the most highly rated restaurants in the Inland Empire. Anyway, I ate so much that my stomach actually hurt. I went beyond full to about to explode!!! I do not recommend you doing this ever, but you’ve probably experienced this as well sometime in your life.
When we eat we rely on our “feelings” don’t we. We eat when we feel hungry. We drink when we feel thirsty. Like I described above there are times that I don’t “feel” like stopping. Other times, we don’t eat because we don’t feel like eating, because we aren’t hungry or are too busy. Our feelings have a lot to do with our eating patterns, which in turn can affect our weight.
I always taught to clean my plate. Before I could get up to play, or be excused from the table I had to finish everything on it, even if the portion was too big for me in the first place. As I grew up I realized that this type of thinking wasn’t good. Especially when the average American portion sizes have exploded! Have you ever seen Super Size Me?
After college I started regulating the amount I ate by how I felt. If I started to feel full I stopped eating. Recently, I’ve learned not to even trust that, but instead to find out how many calories my body actually needs (I took a test where they hooked me up to some machine to let me know) and then I try to eat that amount or less.
Why You Can’t Eat Until You Feel Full
Most Americans just throw down their food like if they don’t eat it in 5 minutes it will disappear and they will never get any more. I dare you, next time you sit down for breakfast, lunch, or dinner time yourself. How long did it take you to eat your meal? Our bodies take roughly about 30 minutes to feel full. That’s why you cannot trust your feelings and eat until you feel full. If I was to wait until I “felt full” most of the times I’d consume way over my allotment of calories for any given meal. If you are wondering why you are gaining weight, you probably are eating until you feel full/satisfied. Ladies, if I ate ice cream until I felt satisfied I probably would never get up from the table. 
Our appetites are complex. We see food, smell food, taste food, and we have things going on in our brain that sometimes take awhile to tell us we are full. Sometimes though, according to Harvard Mental Health, people who are obese, their receptors that are supposed to tell them they are full don’t. They “may suffer from leptin resistance, meaning that they are less responsive to satiety or pleasure signals from this hormone.”
Count It Out
You say you want to get rid of that baby weight right? Then don’t just eat until you feel full. Count it out, the calories that is. Try finding your “Magic Number To Weight Loss.” You can get a nutritionist/dietician to help you figure our how much your body is actually burning so that you know how much your body needs in a day. That’s what I did, when I was losing my baby weight. You can use this personal calorie calculator as well by clicking here.
Until next time make good choices!
Annett Davis, Olympian & Founder of Fit Moms Fit Kids
