It's all about portioning

So I've been on a new kick recently.
After months of trying to restrict myself from eating unhealthy foods, I've come to a realization...

There was a time when I would go for a couple of days eating extremely healthy. I'm talking like... only raw foods, no fats, lots of fruits and veggies... but then I would collapse and would binge on everything I was restricting myself from; Like cookies, brownies, ice cream, peanut butter, bread, chips...but especially peanut butter :) My biggest weakness

Now I'm not saying that I still don't do that.
Because I do think I have a mild binge eating problem. I'm just an emotional eater, what can I say. Any time I'm sad or blah, peanut butter is always there for me.

But I'm learning how to control it. Slowly but surely, I'm learning to contain my cravings.

But anyways, my new thing has been to try and NOT restrict myself, and instead just watch my portion control. Why deprive myself of a chocolate cookie when all that is on my brain is I WANT THE CHOCOLATE COOKIE! I figure, if I just eat the dang cookie, my craving will go away. And for the most part, it does! But the thing is, portion control really needs to come in handy here, because it is so easy for me to jump off the cliff and eat 5 of those cookies instead of just that 1 that I needed.

Before (when I didn't pay attention to my portion control), if I had a craving for... chocolate lets say, I would eat anything and everything in my vegetable/fruit drawers to stop my desire for chocolate. I would eat like 3 stalks of celery, a bag of spinach, some carrots, some grapes and berries... and after being completely bloated and full after binging on fiberful, water-filled vegetables... I still wanted the freaking chocolate! Then eventually, whether it was the same day or some time during that same week, I would binge on all of the sweets I had been depriving myself of.

(not actually me, but you get the idea)

NOT GOOD!!! So I'm trying to now pay attention to what my stomach wants, and I'm trying to coordinate my stomach and eyes. I'm satisfying my cravings, while making sure my eyes are never bigger than my stomach and I'm portioning out everything. For the most part, I've been doing really well! I'm happier, fuller, and I'm enjoying the foods I actually want to eat!

This morning, I had a Chobani yogurt (I love those things!) But then after the yogurt I was still hungry, so I had half a cup of some puff cereal that was in my cabinet. I washed it down with some orange juice and felt satisfied. But then all of a sudden, like 20 minutes later... I was craving chocolate! I'm not on my period or anything so I found it really strange that at 8:30am on a Saturday morning I would be craving chocolate. But I trusted my gut (pun intended!) and had a Thin Mint girl scout cookie with a small glass of milk. One cookie is about 40 cals and the glass of milk was about 90. So a 130 calorie chocolate treat in the morning... yes I know. But I was satisfied afterwards and I'm glad! Now I know I wont be tempted to binge later because I got my chocolate fix right then and there.

I've stopped worrying about my calories as much and am just enjoying the foods I actually want to eat... in moderation obviously. This is the sort of food-eating lifestyle I have been wanting to have for a long time. Hopefully I can continue on with this streak.

Anyone else have stories to share?
Emily