Practicing Portion Control

What I’ve always liked about WW is that no food is off limits.  You just have to make sure it fits into your points budget and that you eat that food in moderation and with good portion control.

Portion control?  What’s that?  Most of you might be saying, “If I knew what portion control was I would have gotten fat in the first place.”  Just because a food is healthy doesn’t mean it can’t also be abused.  Even healthy foods can be eaten in abundance.

I’ve been talking about portion control with both my circle of friends and my circle of coworkers.  In a perfect world WW teaches us that we should eat based on our visual cues.  If you really listen to your body, it will give you a little sigh when it has had enough food and is satisfied.  Your body will also give you a cue when you are hungry and it is time to eat.  If we listened to our visual cues, again in a perfect world, we would eat only when we are hungry and stop only when we are full.  I don’t live in that perfect world and I needed portion control to assist me in my weight loss journey.  I also use portion control to continue to assist me in my maintenance journey.

I have trained myself to be a portion eater, much like you would train yourself to run a marathon.  It has taken a lot of practice and it takes a lot of pre-planning.  In the WW meetings there is something called Mental Rehearsing.  Mental Rehearsing is where you do some thinking ahead of time for how you will handle a food situation and/or what you will eat at a party or event.  It is sort of a loose plan of action so that when you are in the heat of the moment that you can stay focused and stay in control.  While I am not sure I really thought of it as mental rehearsing, I do pre-plan my food events or my meals out and I almost always stick to the plan.  It might seem hard but with practice it gets easier.

What also makes portion control easier is releasing the hold food has over you.  There is no good or bad foods and we eating someting "bad" doesn't make us a bad person.  Bottom line: we need food to fuel our bodies.  When our gas tank is low in our car we fill it up.  If we didn’t put fuel in our gas tank we wouldn’t be able to go anywhere.  How do you expect your body to take you anywhere if you don’t put the proper fuel into it?  It isn’t that easy though and instead we eat when we are happy, sad, mad, anxious, bored, celebrating, and we also eat when we are grieving.   No wonder portion control is so difficult.  Who wants to eat only a half a slice of cake when they are celebrating?  I know I’ve had my fair share of seconds (and thirds) when I’ve been celebrating.  Portion control isn’t easy and we don’t win the battle every time.  But if you can work hard at it and win that battle every 8 out of 10 times, it will make a difference over time.

I almost always have a pre-plan of what I will order and how much I will eat before I got to a restaurant.  We all know there are tips/tricks for navigating portion control at a restaurant, event, or even at home when you are eating something delicious.  This is what works for me:

·        Plan ahead, looking up the PPVs, and decide before you start eating how much you will eat of it.  There is always another day or another meal to enjoy leftovers or a similar indulgence.

·        Ask for a to-go box before you start eating or as soon as you are done.  It is too easy to pick at your plate sitting in front of you

·        When dishing up at home, don’t put the food on the table with you.  Keep the food in the kitchen so you portion your food onto your plate.  Then put the leftovers away immediately.

·        Keep whatever is temping you out of sight.  I know this doesn’t work for everybody but for me if I have to see the tempting food every time I walk into the kitchen it is harder to resist. 

·        Share a dish or a dessert.

·        Don’t bring the tempting item into your house.  If it isn’t in your house you can’t eat it.  Go out and have what you are craving and move on.

·        Track your indulgences, even if the points are pretty scary looking.

·        Every time you navigate portion control successfully, pat yourself on the back and reinforce that positive behavior.

·        Those times you slip up, as we all do, don’t beat yourself up.  Track it and move on.

·        Don’t be afraid to ask for what you want.  If you know you will struggle with eating half a potato or half a serving of rice then ask if you can substitute a second vegetable in its place.  You never know if you don’t ask.

·        If you have been to that restaurant many times, or frequent the same place, occasionally skip that tempting item knowing you can always have it the next time you visit.  If I know something is good but I just don’t want to spend the PPVs on it then I’ll plan for it next time.

Portion control doesn’t just magically appear over night.  I really had to work on it and I still have to work on it.  I know my “red light foods” and I know what I can and cannot control.  I don’t put myself into situations where I know I will lose control.  I also don’t skip out on social events or eating out because of my fear of loss of control.  I lost this weight so I could have a better quality of life.  I refuse to be unhappy!