How to handle cravings?
It’s like a catch 22, if you don’t feed the cravings, the cravings will ultimately go away. If you keep feeding the craving, the body will keep the cravings coming via strong hunger hormones. Sometimes, easier said than done.
If you have a craving for an unhealthy food that you want to curb such as chocolate or chips, if you remove it from your home and don’t eat it for 3-7 days, the body will think that the food is no longer available and grehlin, the hunger/cravings hormone, will stop being released and cravings will ultimately go away.
The cravings may pop up from time to time, in an effort to encourage us to look for the food, but the cravings will go away if we don’t eat it.
Cravings (for processed high calorie foods such as chocolate) are more like a reminder system to look for a food, rather than a true need for a specific food.
The best strategy to reduce or stop cravings is ideally, to remove the food from your home if possible and if not, remove yourself from the kitchen during cravings. If I am out of the kitchen during bedtime, brush and floss, my cravings reduce and often go away.
Do you have cravings for any specific foods?