Let's say extenuating circumstances have lead you to either miss a meal or not eat much or- whatever. And you are very hungry. But you don't want to end up overeating your next meal, of course.
How do you stop yourself from overeating?
So far, my best solution has been to drink a good amount of water before even starting to eat, so my stomach doesn't feel quite so cavernous.
First, overeating at a meal here or there isn't anything about which to be concerned.
Second, if a person is worried about binging or overeating because he/she is tremendously hungry, then he/she can, indeed, drink a glass of water first, which is usually a good idea with any meal. Then the person can eat things that are high fiber and "bulky": shredded lettuce and cabbage, whole wheat items such as pasta-wraps-bread, apples and other fruits, air-popped popcorn or low-fat popcorn, green beans and other vegetables, baked potato without the butter or sour cream, etc. In other words, there are many foods that can be filling but not overly high in calories. Thus, a person can get filled up, but not suddenly make up for a missed meal by consuming way more calories than a person thinks he/she should.
If you have skipped a mean entirely I wouldn't worry about eating extra to make up for it. In fact, I would probably encourage it so that you don't end up with too few calories for the day.
trikki: True, the person should eat enough to get in the healthy maintenance number of daily calories. My point was that a person would want to not "go off the deep end" in catching-up. It seems that sometimes, at least I have done this, when we try to make up for missing meals, we can trigger a "binge" desire and overeat. But I agree with you that one doesn't want to end up with too few calories for the day.
Mhm- I get that for sure.
But what often happens for me (this happened yesterday for example) is:
I eat breakfast and lunch as normal. I planned to have a snack when I got home but instead went to a friend's house till 7, and she didn't have anything I could/wanted to eat. So when I got home I was semi-ravenous, heh. Thank goodness for water!
looseymoose: Well, at least you showed will-power. There have been a few times that when something like that happens to me, I eat too much, too late. But if a person only occasionally misses a meal or two and/or overeats at an occasional meal, neither scenario will make any long-term difference.
Rather than drinking lots of water... which isn't really all that filling and has zero nutrition, why not simply start off in the time-honoured tradition of 'a starter'? A bowl of soup, some salads, a little bread..... something to take the edge off your appetite before you sit down to the main meal.
No need to reinvent the wheel is there?
To drink water or not immediately before eating a meal is like a lot of things in the healthy dieting area--there are differences of opinions, even among health experts. What I have found in my limited net research is:
- Drinking some water immediately before eating a meal can aid in digestion, according to some people.
- Some people contend that drinking too much water immediately before eating a meal dilutes stomach acids important for the processing of foods; not everyone agrees with this.
- Eating a bowl of soup or eating fruits and/or vegetables high in water content would be just as effective as drinking water immediately before a meal.
- It is perfectly fine to drink a glass or water before eating a meal, and some health experts do recommend this.
Actually, there might be big money in reinventing the wheel--if it performed better than the current wheel performs.
If I get home & I'm starving, I usually have a glass of hot tea (decaf, if it's the evening) with lots of milk. Hot, milky beverages are a lot more soothing & relaxing than cold water for me. I might or might not have a small handful of almonds (or something else with some fat & few carbohydrates - a string cheese would work). I drink the tea slowly (& eat, if I opt for food), and wait ~20 minutes. That takes the edge off the hunger for me. It also keeps me from diving into the cupboards the second I walk into my apartment, which is never a good scene - it's always better for me to plate my food and eat it in a more relaxed manner.
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