Does anyone else look at the clock as you near the time for your fast to start and jam food into your mouth? I assume this is a bad habit but curious how bad and if I should make a significant effort to not do this?
I did that for a while. Mostly it was because my eating window ends at 7 and sometimes I would lose track of time and forget to start cooking dinner. Or if I was done with dinner by 6:30, I’d say ooooh half hour left to eat a snack.
But honestly that all went away with time. I learned to manage my time and my food so I’m not scrambling for dinner, or craving snacks. It just takes some getting used to.
I’m about to hit the 1-month mark in my IF journey and for the first few weeks, that was me. I was worried that restricting all day would trigger binge eating during my window because I would shovel in food when I finally got it. Thankfully, that didn’t happen and now I can slowly eat and enjoy my food when it’s presented. I have even been able to do 24-hour fasts without hardly any hunger or need to inhale food. I think it just takes consistency/time and your mind adapts to a new relationship with food.
I did when I first started. IF is also about fixing your relationship with food. Realizing that society and ads have conditioned us to believe we need food all the time. The more I took that in, the better my relationship with food became and the less I felt like breaking a fast or shoveling food while I could.
I don’t recommend doing that because fasting it’s not a punishment that you’re eager to end by eating. I remember that for the first months I was doing that, but after a while I just occupied myself on the rings I had to do.
(in my case I returned to work at an office, and had a lot of work to do, so it was easier that way, time tend to pass faster if you’re doing a lot of stuff)
In the beginning and every now and then but the feeling is turning more to looking forward to starting my fast rather than to jam more calories in that my body is just going to have to start with burning. I love this feeling of my body burning fat for fuel I think I used to think omg I have to eat my body is telling me so. Not anymore. I get excited when I hear my body working. I don’t know about anyone else but it makes me want to keep fasting around the 16 mark so maybe I will slowly creep up to 18. I pushed myself to 17 today-no problem. It was when I started to eat that I got hungry 😳
What helps me as well is to have lots of protein or even a pea protein shake as my last meal. It keeps me full and satisfied well into the next day!
Yes. My fast normally start at 7pm, but I had a reminder to alert me at 6:30. That reminder was my queue to have my last quick bite and I would eat even if I wasn’t hungry. I realized it had turned into some kind of “Pavlov’s dog” situation so I stopped the reminders. And that resolved the issue.
i rarely do it now ( was more difficult in the beginning of my journey ) but when i do i make sure I am breaking my fast with something simple like fruits or tea then an hour later i eat whatever spicy meal i was craving .