How Do I Get Rid Of My Cravings?

So often clients ask me:

“How do I get rid of my cravings?”

I am sure what they want to hear is “Eat clean for a week and all your cravings will magically disappear”.  The truth is, I can’t tell you they ever go away. Before you get all worried about your future or tune out because I don’t have the magical answer – relax and keep reading. Your cravings may not go away completely, but they will definitely decrease and change.

Cravings are crazy strong feelings to that we have when we want to eat something specific. Most of the time it has an association like pregnancy and cheesecake or ice cream!!! The triggers can be anything from emotional stress to smelling fresh baked goods as you walk past a bakery. The good news is that there are ways to decrease and change your cravings.

One way to decrease your cravings is to monitor them. Discover if you crave salty, sweet or fatty. Are you cravings linked to certain emotional triggers like spending time with extended family, deadlines at work or fights with your significant other? Do they happen at the same time each day? Do they happen when you have not eaten great meals throughout the day or the day before? These patterns can help you plan for the elimination of your cravings.

Once you have a sense of the trends of your cravings, you can start to put a plan in place. Here are some ideas you can use:

• If your cravings happen as soon as you come home from work, have a healthy snack ready to go.

• Hmm…you normally crave sweet, prepare something with natural sweetness like a fruit or a date filled with raw almond butter or natural peanut butter and coco nibs. 

• If you normally crave salt, try having a tomato, cucumber and avocado salad with some sea salt on top.

• If you are taking part in emotional eating and you know you are really not hungry, buy a tea that you really enjoy. Make sure to drink this tea when you feel stressed instead of eating and train your body to want the tea instead (make sure it’s a natural tea and not one that’s filled with sugar).

• Make sure you are eating well balanced meals throughout the day. If your sugar levels are consistent throughout the day your cravings will significantly decrease.

• Make sure you are drinking enough water. Often we think we are hungry, but we are really dehydrated. Drink some water and see if you are still hungry 10-20 minutes later.

• Finally, eat a whole food diet and eliminate the processed foods.

This last point is so important to remember. If you are eating a healthy diet full of fresh foods, you will feel full, satisfied and your taste buds will begin to change over time. Then your cravings will become foods that your body needs rather than what your mind wants. In addition, your body will crave foods less often as you are already fuelling your body and getting amazing nutrients with the great, natural foods your body needs and wants.

Adam often craves avocados. Simple enough for me! You can throw them in your lunch bag whole and bring a spoon and a covered knife. They don’t take much preparation and they can be enjoyed in a variety of ways. I think that he craves these as his body wants the extra (good) fat. I also know of people who crave specific smoothies which tells me their body is asking for some of the nutrients those smoothies contain.

So what are my cravings?

I crave roasted cauliflower with thick tahini lemon dressing. Weird? That’s OK. It’s healthy, nutritious and delicious.

Make sure to like us and follow us on Facebook that way you’ll get my favourite cauliflower recipe Wednesday and maybe it’ll become one of your cravings too!

~ Plant Trainers

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