How to avoid snacking while snowed in!

Another snow emergency! A $2500 fine for driving plus -15 degrees means another indoor day. But I find that staying at home all day makes me want to snack! I'm also staying with my food hoarding Mom, so I'm boxed in with LOTS of junk food! So what can be done avoid caloric disaster?

Finding your triggers is important. We eat for a lot of reasons outside of hunger, so if you attempt to control the eating without knowing what is causing you to want to eat, most likely it won't work.

For example, I had to be really honest with myself to admit that two of my triggers are boredom and procrastination. "I can't focus on doing xyz now, because I'm hungry." Or, eating seems more pleasurable than actually doing the task at hand. Just the act of thinking about eating: should I eat now or wait, what I will eat next, etc, takes the focus off what you need to get done.

Therefore, what helps me is distracting myself from food thoughts by taking a break to do something ELSE I enjoy, or just being honest with myself on what I am avoiding, sucking it up and diving in - also realizing that getting things done is more pleasurable in the end than moving farther from my goal weight. The next thing I know an hour or two has gone by and it really IS time to eat now. Sometimes I then even go past the point of when I was supposed to eat without realizing it.

I have also scheduled times to eat and in what calorie amounts, so I don't waste mental energy on the whole debate about if/what/how much I should eat now or later (though it still happens sometimes!) I schedule in calorie amounts, but not exact foods, this way when the meal time comes, I still have flexibility on what to eat - but can adjust portion sizes to fit the allocated calorie limits.

Second, because of my living situation, in this small house I can't help being in such close vicinity to unhealthy food. When living on my own, I don't keep junk food in the house. So if I'm snowed in, feeling hungry and not wanting to cook or just having a craving, I can't just go grab a bunch of cookies 10 feet away *sigh*. So for now, I managed to get her to agree to put most of her unhealthy foods in a cupboard or in HER office area (out of site, out of mind... it helps!) I also find that chewing gum and drinking lots of various flavors of hot tea helps.

Here is an interesting article on the psychology of snacking: www.psychologytoday.com/
blog/prefrontal-nudity/201
304/stopping-snacking

What helps you avoid snacking your way through the Polar Vortex???