Ask Lemmy

You have what is called an “addiction”. An addiction is a self-destructive behavior you can’t control. Or rather, that you can control but not with the normal ease at which you normally control your own actions.

There’s two ways out of an addiction. One is far more effective than the other.

The method that’s more effective short term, but less effective long term, is willpower. Just force yourself to hold off on those treats. Wait five minutes, then dig in. Next time, try waiting six minutes. Just brute force your way out of the behavior.

The method that is less immediately effective, but far more effective long term, is to heal your psychological trauma so that moment-to-moment consciousness is not painful. This will remove the base motivation for pleasure-seeking, making that junk food mildly attractive, but nothing more.

In my own experience with addiction, brute forcing an addiction merely leads to another addiction forming. The only lasting addiction relief I’ve gotten in my life is from deep psychotherapeutic work, with men’s groups, with zen training, with individual therapy, and with native american healing ceremonies.

If your addiction were to alcohol or crack or something else that debilitated you, I’d recommend starting with the brute force method just to get breathing room. But a junk food addiction is more subtle, and doesn’t immediately debilitate you, so my recommendation is to go for the trauma healing strategy.

However, if your job is at all in danger, then I recommend the brute force method to begin with, because the inflammation caused by junk food will affect your job performance and if there’s any danger of losing your job then you need to take immediate action to protect it.

A friend of mine stopped their addiction by developing the habit of putting junk food in the freezer. The freezer makes it taste better but forces you to wait out the craving because it has to get cold.

It can be tough to break from habitual behavior in the moment (i.e. when you're reaching for a snack). Instead try putting some effort on making it harder or more inconvenient to indulge in that habit, while also giving yourself alternatives so it doesn't feel too torturous and make you want to give up.

For example, I'm guessing it will be a lot less emotionally "painful" to resist buying those snacks when you're out grocery shopping than it will be to resist grabbing them when they are already in your pantry. Use that to your advantage and stop buying the worst ones and try replacing them with a few healthier alternatives so that when the urge to snack hits at least the worst options are not available to you.

I'm hardly the healthiest eater, but a good apple sliced up satisfies a lot of my urges to snack. Baby carrots with hummus also keep your mouth busy and fill you up with relatively few calories. Try a few fruit/veggie snacks to see if any scratch your itch to snack. You don't have to change 100%, if you can break the junk food habit even 1/4 of the time, that's a step.

Another thing that's worked for me is portion control. Instead of bringing the whole bag of chips with you, pour a bowl and leave the rest in the kitchen. You might go back for seconds sometimes, but it still creates a barrier to eating more.

I think the most important thing is don't try to make it all or nothing. That will just set you up for failure and frustration. Take steps that are meaningful but achievable. And when you have the motivation, try to think of ways to set yourself up for it to be easier to make good choices when you have less motivation. You got this 💪

1. Make sure you don't have any mental disorders that you aren't aware of. Watch actual doctors (like Dr. K) on YouTube to figure this out. You'd be surprised how subtly a disorder can impact the rest of your life.

2. Do something more fulfilling. A decent chunk of the stuff you watch isn't helpful and doesn't satisfy you, so it's probably better to watch some really good movies/videos/shows so that you give it your full attention. If that doesn't work, find hobbies that do capture your attention.

I still have some of it in my house, but over the past year I've cut down majorly, by refusing to snack during the day, and tracking my calories each day. Just being aware of what I ate made a huge difference. Also, instead of ice cream, I buy TruFru dark chocolate raspberries and just have a few each night. I've lost about 50 pounds since last January through diet and exercise.

I am very careful about food. I try to choose only high-quality products, so I settled on https://srslylowcarb.com/products/the-low-carb-loaf bread with a low content of ulgevods. Perfect for light breakfasts.

After reading over the comments in this thread, it's plain to see a common theme:

Stop putting the bad food in your mouth.

Try to replace what you currently eat with something else that is snacky but healthy like carrots, nuts or grapes.

I stopped eating sweets by not buying them any more. It´s just takes a second to walk past a product in the store and when you don´t have them at home it´s easy to not eat them. This applies to any kind of food

Don't buy it, or switch to things like nuts or popcorn that you can eat a lot of without it being too unhealthy.