Stress Eating

Some people lose weight when they are stressed. Makes sense to me. Wouldn't that be a natural response. You are stressed and anxious, your stomach gets into a know...you don't eat. This holds not true for me. I eat to fight stress. Funny that this is a fairly new realization of mine. When I am relaxed and don't have a worry in the world, I lose weight easily. When stressed, my thoughts centre around food and I don't have the energy to fight it.

I am quite aware of what my stressors are:

• Sleep Deprivation: This is huge for me. I have been an insomniac all my life. My sleep is poor, easily disrupted and fragmented. In my younger years, I probably was able to cope better with the exhaustion and sneak in a nap during the day. With the demands of work and my family, naps are out of the question now. I have read that scientists have identified different sleep patterns inherent to specific people. One of the more common pattern were two sleep cycles per day, i.e. sleep from 11pm to 3am and again from 5am to 7am. And here I thought I was an insomniac. The above describes my natural sleep pattern - not that it plays out like that every night... What to do with that information? I am not inclined to get up at 3am and busy myself...too cold and I might wake up the rest of the family.
  For now, I try to be in bed by 11pm. I need 7 hours of uninterrupted sleep to fill my bodies need for sleep. Getting up at 7am allows for an hour of toss and turn...
• Fighting children: Ever have the feeling after the kids are finally in bed and all the bickering has stopped to just stuff your face? I always feel that once they are tucked in, I am in need and deserve something sweet. Very dangerous. My tactic to fight that right now is to keep busy after dinner. I am also following the rule of no more food after dinner (difficult with a grazing, skinny husband).
• Abdominal discomfort: this is almost counter intuitive, but I often eat when my stomach/intestines feel irritated, bloated or crampy. I think I have a bit of IBS and when I do have symptoms I tend to put more food into my system to fight the uncomfortable feeling. Weird one. Eating veggies and fruit eliminates my abdominal issues almost completely, maybe because they are easier to digest?
  

They say that knowing your enemy is winning half the battle, but I have known most of my stressors for a long time...

Double Dipping Moms

The cooks in this world deserve a pat on their shoulders for staying thin or attempting to lose weight. Think about it, you are supposed to cook healthy, nutritious and tasty meals for your charges, what is more natural than lick a spoon here or sample a little something there. How can you cook without sampling? Don't you have to test your product?

I try to limit my nibbling during cooking, but boy, it's not easy. First of all, I am hungry when I am cooking. It's dinner time after all. And of course, I want to make sure that the dish is balanced and passed my taste buds. Cooking and baking to me is an art. I love experimenting with spices, consistencies and combinations. I hardly ever cook from a cookbook or if I do, I change the recipe to suit our tastes or availability of ingredients. I grow my own herbs and some spices and love to use them. I pick up new ideas from books, conversations or just standing at the grocery check-out looking at the covers of magazines. I am proud of my cooking... and a ruined meal is a stain in my reputation as good cook.

But even if you just try to get dinner on the table without any culinary aspirations, how do you avoid turning into a double dipping mom? During the last couple of weeks of intense dieting, I have stuck to tried and true recipes, where I didn't feel the need to sample before serving. But I know the day will loom when I am tempted to experiment and need to sample. One might say that if you sample during cooking you'll limit what you eat at dinner...well, that has never worked for me.

Come to think about it, I am not just a double dipping mom, but more like a triple dipper...What to do with all the leftovers. I was raised in a time where you ate your peas and finished your plate. Never a problem for me, unfortunately. I admire people who for reasons nebulous to me cut the crust off their pizza or the fat of the meat. Since I raised my children to listen to their hunger indicators in their bodies, I have never forced them to finish what is on their plate...so they regularly have leftovers. Danger zone for me. It just hurts to throw food out. Are you a triple dipping mom? And what are your tricks to avoid the pre and post dinner sampling?