Summer socializing is hard!

This little guy is the Weight Watchers 'hungry' gremlin,
but I think of him as a 'cravings' gremlin too.

All the summer socializing is really hard. There are temptations all over the place and of every variety. More temptations means it's harder to say no. And as soon as I start giving in to sweets, I crave them more and more. Three parties in three days left me eating Krispy Kremes, some homemade lemon pancake things, and lots of tortilla chips. I was hungry! I should eat a lot of yogurt first so I don't go to those things starving. A few of the sweets were really over the top sugary and unappealing to me but the Oreo cheesecake was calling my name. I only had a little. A little of this, a little of that.

Similarly, I used to have a "no free samples" rule for the supermarket when I was losing. I loosened that a bit for maintenance, but lately, I felt that uncomfortable mental pulling when I walked in to my local store, "What samples does the bakery have? I can have one. It's small and I will just have one." Now all those things are true, but I really don't like the monkey of "WHERE IS MY FREE SAMPLE???" calling to me as soon as I get in the store. I haven't felt that in a while and I'd like it to go away. It's just the letting-my-guard-down in general that leads to this sweet craving, especially when I'm actually hungry as well.

When I was losing I instilled a "Saturday Splurge" rule. Kind of self explanatory. For a while I had really managed the Saturday splurge quite well. It took a long time to get there but I was able to relax, enjoy what I wanted, not really overeat, but eat more food and calories than normal. I was getting so good at managing splurges that I really stopped doing the Saturday splurge thing at all. I was just modulating my intake during the week and adding in little mini-splurges as and without much struggle.

But the sea of end-of-the-school-year, start-of-the-summer social events is challenging me. So Saturday I had a real traditional splurge. I was hungry and ate whatever I wanted, including a Krispy Kreme donut and a Chipotle  salad for lunch - in that order. That's fine, and since I lost so much weight when I was sick last month even gaining a couple pounds wouldn't matter. But I am feeling that "I want food all the time!!" gremlin creep into my head and I definitely don't want to return to that state of mind. I don't want to be engaged in a mental battle in my own head about every baked good I see. I do not want a cookie to have power over me!!! And more importantly, it's just a losing battle. The food will always win. So I need to cut back on the sweets and indulgences in general. In the long run it's just easier.

I know many of my friends also continue to struggle with handling splurges and socializing (two separate but connected issues as it makes sense to save splurges for social events). Suffice it to say we're all in good company.