You can stop your cravings by recognizing your triggers

Get ready… you only have a couple of days left before the official start of the holiday season.

On Thanksgiving Day, look for a special version of your Doctor’s House Call. I’ll give you some holiday eating dos and don’ts. But before we get to that, you should know that you don’t have to let holiday cravings make you fall off the wagon in your effort to stay lean and healthy.

A lot of those cravings are hormonal, and you can control them.

Hunger is usually a good thing. It’s normally a sign that your body is functioning well and responding to the right signals. It’s your body telling you that it needs nutrients and fuel.

But not all hunger is the same. There’s another kind of hunger called “hormonal hunger.” This feeling of hunger comes on suddenly. It often has nothing to do with mealtime. In fact, hormonal hunger can strike right after a big meal.

Have you ever felt full after that big turkey dinner and then suddenly found “extra room” for some pumpkin pie? This is hormonal hunger.

And it can cause strong emotional cravings for specific foods – especially carbohydrates. It can often overpower even the strongest willpower. It can cause mood swings and low energy. And it creates a near-continual desire to eat.

Sometimes hormonal hunger comes from simple temptation. Junk food is available almost everywhere you go. And then there are advertisements, free samples, gift baskets, holiday parties … it’s almost impossible to resist the cravings.

Or your hunger could be a result of your habits. For example, maybe you always eat potato chips when you watch television. Or you might open a soda every time you sit down to talk on the phone. Hormonal hunger is causing your “automatic craving” for food in those cases.

You can stop your cravings by recognizing your triggers. And when you can break your habits or replace junk food with better options, your hormonal hunger will stop.

Many of the snacks we eat today hardly even qualify as “food.” In many cases they’re nothing more than sugar, refined grains and artificial flavors. These foods are nearly devoid of nutrients, so even after you eat them, your body will send you the “I’m hungry” feeling.

Fresh, whole organic foods on the other hand don’t contain anything processed that doesn’t need to be there. They’re called “nutrient-dense” foods, and they’re one of the best ways to stop the snack food/hunger cycle.

Take strawberries, for example. They’re nutrient-dense because each cup has only 150 calories, but 3.5 g fiber, 86 mg of vitamin C and 26 mcg of folate.

Other nutrient-dense foods include nuts, whole eggs, meats, fish, and organic vegetables and fruits.

One of the mistakes modern “nutritionists” make is that they tell you grains, cereals, rice and pasta are nutrient-dense. What’s worse is you’re told to stay away from “fat.” But it’s starches that give you empty calories and make you fat, not protein and healthy fats from whole foods.

That means you should fill up on natural, nutrient-dense sources of protein like walnuts, almonds or pumpkin seeds. And it also means you should stay far away from nutrient-depleted foods like pasta, bread (even whole-grain bread), cereal, crackers, chips and food bars.

Nutrient-dense foods give your body what it needs to stay up and running throughout the day. You won’t get the “hungry” signal and you’ll be less tempted to eat your trigger food.

Another key to breaking your hunger cravings is water. It’s true that water can fend off hunger by making you feel full. But the real reason to drink enough water is that if you’re dehydrated, blood flow to the brain and organs decreases. This is bad by itself but your brain also will confuse thirst for hunger, causing you to eat when you really need a drink.

There’s also another solution to help you stop your food cravings.

My colleague, Dr Roberta Temes, has developed a program that can help you defeat hormonal hunger and resist temptation.

Dr. Temes’ program can help you train your brain to shut off the cravings and help you get from Thanksgiving right through New Year’s without having to loosen your belt a notch or two. It works by enhancing your communication with your body. You’ll increase your focus on specific thoughts, feelings and images while decreasing your interest in hunger triggers.

In fact, her entire CD series uses the latest research combined with cutting-edge techniques to help you stay on track with any eating and exercise plan. You’ll get real results that stick.