Here are some reasons why you might eat when you’re not hungry – and what you can do about it.

You’re not hungry but you eat anyway:

Life and calorie control would be a whole lot easier if we only ate when we were truly hungry.  Then it would simply be a biological drive that needed to be satisfied – like downing a glass of water when your throat is parched. It’s the rare person who doesn’t eat for reasons other than hunger – most of us find ourselves doing it from time to time.  Read more »

Most of my clients know the healthy eating drill pretty well – keep your fats down, eat plenty of fruits and veggies, make most of your grains “whole” and focus on low fat protein. But many of them have adopted some eating habits that they truly believe are healthy – and I have to spend some time trying to convince them otherwise. These eating habits sound like they’re healthy – but they really end up being less so when they’re put into practice. Are your eating habits as healthy as you think they are? Read more »

One of my long-standing patients has lost 150 pounds. Now, before you start thinking, “Wow – that’s a lot of weight” or “Gee – I wonder how she did that?”, let me just say that she didn’t lose it all at once. In fact, she’s lost the same 30 pounds five times now. She’s a classic “yo-yo dieter” – her weight goes up and down, but rarely stays in one place for long. It’s long been recognized that people are more likely to yo-yo when they adopt weight loss regimens that are too strict to stick with over the long haul. Once a dietary slip turns into a fall, old habits resume, weight goes back up and the cycle starts all over again. Read more »

You can always tell when it’s the start of a New Year.  Everywhere you turn – newspapers, magazines, radio, television or the internet – there’s another article about how to shape up.

I’ve already had visits from several patients who are ready to ‘turn over a new leaf’ for the New Year, but what I often find is this – with this flood of diet and fitness information coming at them, many of my patients have more questions than solutions.  Should they go vegetarian? Stay away from fruit?  Not eat after 5 pm?  Throw away the salt shaker?  The list goes on and on.  So today, I’m turning to you – what nutrition questions are on your mind?  Let me know what you’re wondering about …and check back here in the upcoming weeks to find the answers.

Spend some time around kids – or your household pets – and you’ll see that frequent grazing is the instinctual way to eat over the course of the day.

We certainly evolved as frequent foragers, not meal eaters, and frequent snacking isn’t necessarily a bad thing – if the foods you choose are appropriate, and if you are truly hungry, it can be a healthy habit.

We usually get hungry about every three to four hours, so several smaller meals spread throughout the day may actually prevent you from eating too much at meal time.   Snacks should have some healthy carbs – like fruit, veggies, whole grains (like crackers) – along with some protein (like nuts, soy protein products or nonfat dairy foods).

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