We all have different routines to nourish our bodies. Unfortunately, some eating habits are worse than others.
Here are five eating habits that need to stop! Check them out and make some changes!
Speed Eating
The Problem: Eating too fast generally causes you to eat more than you normally would because your brain doesn’t sense that your stomach is full until it’s too late. This problem also causes your metabolism to slow, diminishing your body’s ability to use the food as fuel and instead storing it as fat.
The Fix
— Set aside extra time for eating
— Take 10 slow breaths before eating your meal (it will relax you and cause you to eat slower)
— Time how long it takes you to eat a meal and increase it as much as you can
Secret Snacking
The Problem: You’re hiding fun-sized Snickers in your sock drawer. Or maybe you have a secret compartment in your desk for sour cream and onion Lays. The problem with eating secretly is that it creates a pattern of you being ashamed of what you eat, and can cause you to get into the destructive habit of eating out of your secret stash as a quick fix for a bad emotional state.
The Fix
— Figure out which foods you stash and what causes you to eat them
— Don├óΓé¼Γäót let others make you feel ashamed of what you eat
— Redirect your inner rebel — if you find eating in secret exciting, try doing other activities that fulfill that need for excitement
Stress Eating
The Problem: Some people don├óΓé¼Γäót have a good way to deal with stress and, as a result, turn to eating. There├óΓé¼Γäós actually a biological component to it — when you get stressed out your body releases cortisol, which causes an increase in appetite.
The Fix
— Find other things that relax you when you get stressed out (deep breaths, a nap, etc.)
— Exercise
— Go easy on yourself — stress is natural, over-stressing is unhealthy. Don├óΓé¼Γäót be too hard on yourself all the time. Being too stressed out will hurt you more than it helps.
Starving and Stuffing
The Problem: Your body has natural hunger signals that you shouldn’t ignore. Starving yourself all day only to binge at night throws your natural cycle off. When the body is deprived of food for more than a few hours, blood-sugar levels nosedive, which triggers your brain to crave carbs. Bad, bad, bad.
The Fix
— Plan all of your meals in advance
— Eat some sort of protein during every meal
— Don├óΓé¼Γäót let yourself get too hungry — grab a handful of nuts or trail mix to tide you over in between meals
Mindless Eating
The Problem: This happens a lot when if you snack while working or watching TV. Once second you’ve got a full package of Oreos and the next you’ve finished them all. If you’re not paying attention to what you eat, you’re more likely to overeat.
The Fix
— Don├óΓé¼Γäót do anything else while eating
— Only stock healthy things in your house — it├óΓé¼Γäós better to mindlessly eat apples than cookies
— Never eat out of the package — set aside a certain amount of food and stick to that
[Image via AP Images.]