I have lost just over one hundred puonds now, and am very proud of that, but sometimes I get these uncontrollable urges for chinese food. always chinese food. I have made healthy choices and tried to substitute for it. and that is all good. but what scares me is the power food seems to have in my life. It feels like an addiction, I always end up in the same place. I dont know what to do. I need to figure out how to change food's power in my life or I fear I will not be able to hold on to my weight loss and my LC WOL. Sometimes it brings me to tears when I give in to a craving because I feel such an immense sense of failure.Has anybody expierienced this? What did you do to help control it? I just hate the feeling of being comepletely and utterly out of control.
thanks for your input everyone, I dont know where I would be without you.
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dna

Congrats on your weight loss, Dina. I don't have a solution for you, but I wanted to say I have the same fears/concerns. I've only been eating low carb for a few months, and I've only lost 25 pounds. Just this morning I was wondering if I'd ever feel more "secure" with my weight loss. I keep thinking the weight will suddenly fly back on.

I confess I was hoping that the cravings and the fears would ease when I'd got closer to my goal weight. Maybe not, eh?

How long have you been low carbing?

Learn to cook your own chinese food so you know what is in it. I make a generic stir fry by steaming cut fresh veggies (usually cabbage, broccoli, celery, onion) and mixing that with stir fried meat containing garlic and ginger, then adding a sauce (sometimes black bean based, sometimes sesame/soy/ginger based, etc.). Steaming the veggies is easier than worrying about getting all the times right on stir frying, and I can make this taste better than anything I get in a local Chinese restaurant. It has no corn starch, Splenda in place of any sugar needed. Very low carb.

Wow! What an accomplishment! You must feel like a brand new person.

As for your worries, I don't know what to say except that for me LCing is a WOL rather than a diet; I'm here to stay, for life. If you can get into that mindset which I'm confident you're there already, it's not so daunting, I think.
If you happen to slip, just get back up again.

I really appreciated something Dr. Eades said in PPLP. He talked about the 'Honey Tree' and how our ancestors would stumble upon such and would enjoy a treat! He said that's life! We should enjoy the honey tree on special occasions, knowing of course we might not feel so great the next day, but resumeing a stricter level of Carbs in order to stay on track.

I haven't lost as much as you, but over 40 pounds now and I have indulged in Chinese on occasion. I wasn’t delusional about the impending ‘consequences’ yet willing to make that trade. The days following, I simply went back to induction level carbs, drank lots of water and it balanced out.
Hey, I'm here to live! If it takes longer to get to my destination, I’ll just enjoy the scenery along the way!

Here's to life!! And Cheers to you!

thank you so much everyone! You really have helped.
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dna

I'm in something of a similar situation -- have lost about 100 pounds, (although I'm "regaining" as I lift weights consistently, but it's a good regain). I am far more likely than I was two years ago to snatch a bite of this or that.

At many of the burger joints here (the good, greasy kind, not the fast food ones) they server cheeseburger steaks. Some are absolutely to die for, and I've never quite been able to emulate them at home. Anyway, they serve 'em with wonderful Texas Toast. Just the right amount of crispy and buttery. If they bring it to the table, and they often do despite being asked to leave it off, I'm likely to eat at least a little of it.

All I can really say about cravings is this...

(1) A true craving will go away if you ignore it. Hunger will not.

(2) Fat is a good weapon. I was at a seminar yesterday, and of course the breakfast food was all carbs -- muffins, bagels, toast -- you know the drill. There was a little fruit, and I stole all the garnishment strawberries. My salvation, though, was the cream cheese they had out for the carbstuffs. I just got two packages of it and ate it with a spoon. It filled me up and made it easy to ignore the carbs.

I've also done this with nuts, but nuts stall me. Can't do 'em very often.

If it feels like an addiction, it may well be...I know I'm a food addict. A couple of things that have helped me:

1. On a "surviving cravings" front, I fight it by eating legal foods that I couldn't eat if I ate low fat. Basically, I totally agree - fight it with fat. It's filling, and you can usually find something that just seems wrong but tastes really good, something that might distract that part of your brain. Some things I've come up with? Buffalo bacon (which is just bacon cooked in butter and hot sauce and then dipped in blue cheese dressing), whipped cream chocolate mousse (made by mixing chocolate and extra creamy ready whips), burgers stuffed with fried peperoni and cheese, etc. etc. Come up with your own, too.
2. On the emotional front, I try to take a note of what *else* is going on in my life at that moment. Am I stressed about a relationship, about money, about my job, etc. etc. etc.? Is my brain trying to distract itself from feeling whatever I feel related to *that* situation by distracting me with these urges? If you start taking stock of that over time, you might find re-occurring correlations.

Also, I agree with the person who said to come up with some substitutions foods...you can make something chinese-tasting...it might just take a little extra legwork.

Fantastic work so far!

-j.

thankyou so so so so much. Fight cravings with fat! got it! Don't you love this WOL.
:P
<3
dna
P.S you really hit the spot with the emotional cravings thing. I have had some recent job changes and some (like many other people in USA right now) financial challenges, so now looking back I am pretty sure that is adding to the power of the cravings.

dnarroyo, I'm right there with you with the fears/concerns about losing control.
This is the third time I've taken off all this weight, and know this is about the time I fell off the wagon in the previous 2 attempts, and sometimes I wonder if it's just fear of losing control, and not really losing control.... You know, like years ago when I stopped biting my nails and they finally grew out long and pretty and I started painting and manicuring and taking care of them, and I would dream I'd bitten them all off in my sleep?
I've heard people on this board say they've had vivid dreams of cheating... same thing, I think... subconcious fears.

But we know what we need to do and how to do it.
I would like to eventually lose another 20 pounds, but right now, my appetite is up, I'm feeling hungry quite often, so I'm settling for maintaining. My strategy is to keep the house stocked with my low carb favorites, and if I feel hungry, eat, so I am not tempted by carbage or feel deprived.

Another strategy that helps me is to continue to track in Fitday, so I have tangible evidence that I'm doing ok. My calories may be higher than they were while I was losing (1800 vs 1400) but that's not failure and I may be feeling fear that I'm losing control, but fitday shows otherwise. It's reassuring. Without the tracking, I may have given in to the "I already blew it, so might as well dive in face first" way of thinking, when it wasn't even true.

Cravings for a particular food source usually connotes an allergy or intolerance to the food. Dr Atkins addressed that in the 2002 Dr Atkins New Diet Revolution.

I always thought it was trippy that we could be addicted to the thing which we might be most allergic to.

Well, my answer will be unpopular. The way I was able to maintain this WOE and to maintain my sanity was to not completely resist my cravings. I love two things that are so off limits for this WOE - spaghetti and sushi. And quite frankly, substitutions just do not do the job. So, in order to keep me on track, I actually planned my spaghetti and sushi meals every two weeks. By doing this, it kept me eating very, very clean the rest of the time because I knew I would have my spaghetti or sushi was coming up.

Sure, it wasn't the way Dr. Atkins said to do it but it kept me going and kept me from cheating ad hoc. I kept losing weight and I have kept off my weight successfully.

Now, there are some consequences to doing this though. I never felt too great after these meals, which usually helped to keep me from cheating further. Also, if you are a person with a slippery slope problem, this could be a problematic method. Fortunately, for myself, this was not a problem. I could have my one meal and get right back to eating on my WOE. Just another take on it. Again, a YMMV thing. I do realize this will be a very unpopular opinion.

I don't think any reasonable person would argue with your success, Southbel. Everyone needs to figure out what works in the end for them.

Unpopular?
I do the same thing as I find it a good strategy to have old favorite foods that I allow myself to eat once a month. Some months I go longer and am finding that I don't crave these foods as much as I used to crave them.

Chinese food is a biggie for me too....but I tend to binge when I eat it so I try to avoid it...or when I do have it, order it steamed with all sauces on the side for better control.

When I first got to maintenance, I too was terrified that I'd lose it and gain it all back. as time has gone by, I now see that I have truly changed the way I eat and I do have control of what I put into my mouth.

Congrats dnarroyo!!
Way to go on your 100 lb loss!!

Fwiw, from the other side of that - if I touched those out-of-bounds foods, I'd be in serious trouble. Some people can do it, others can't. Those who can't shouldn't see it as a shortcoming or wish it otherwise - just accept it and come up with a strategy that works for *you*.

-j.