Everyday Systems

I'm brand new around here and brand new to No S having just discovered this eating plan a couple of weeks ago. I started officially last Thursday and so far so good for the most part.

I'm a 46 yo mother of 3 teens; mostly a stay at home mom though I work part time for a non-profit. I'm just under 5'4 and weigh 155 lbs and though I don't look overweight at all, I know I am over my healthy limit and there are those newly emerging love handles...ugh!

So today was the end of my first full week. I'm not having a problem saying no to sweets, those are not a huge deal for me because I've never been a big sweet eater and I think it's fun to have weekend treats to anticipate, so that part is kind of a game for me.

My biggest problem is with the no Snacks. I'm spending a lot of time really, really hungry. I have an extremely low, right on the borderline of normal, fasting blood sugar level, and to keep from getting nasty food headaches and the hunger shakes, I've been in the habit of eating 4 smaller meals a day, or 3 meals and a protein based snack. One of the reasons I eat more often is because I can't eat a lot at one sitting, I fill up fast and then because I have a pretty fast metabolism, I get hungry fast.
I've tried telling myself that the growling down there is my engine working to burn off the love handles but...

So I wonder, should I try to make myself eat more at mealtime to avoid snack temptation or would it be better to stick to the smaller meals but "tweak" NoS to allow that extra one meal? I did find that allowing myself one very small piece of dark chocolate helps, but that's a sweet.

Oh, walk as often as our rainy NW weather will allow, and I am going to start meeting my walking buddy an extra time a week to swim. All in all I'm feeling pretty good about this plan and if I can figure out the meal thing, I can definitely see this as becoming a life-style.

NoS doesn't specify how many meals per day you should eat, just that outside of planned meals you shouldn't snack.

I rarely have breakfast and if I do it's generally very small, so I often have a mini-meal in the afternoon between lunch and dinner - it helps me to avoid giving in to unhealthy snacks and sweets as I don't become too hungry either between lunch and dinner, or dinner and bedtime.

So, it's up to you what meals you choose to have, as long as you are sticking to the principles of NoS! Good luck with your first week!

Welcome here, Ginmarie

I've the same problem as you with blood-sugar levels. What I do, is to plate a fruit for breakfast, but then keep it in reserve, should I start getting the dreaded shakes. If I didn't need it between breakfast and lunch, I eat the breakfast fruit with lunch. When I plate my lunch, I add another reserve fruit, which is then either eaten as needed, or eaten with supper.

I still have my two fruits, they were plated, the eating was just delayed. I've also found that with three regular meals my blood-sugar levels stay ok, and I hardly ever need to eat the fruit in-between meals. However, it's nice to know that I have a parachute hidden away in my backpack.

Hope this helps!

milliem wrote:
So, it's up to you what meals you choose to have, as long as you are sticking to the principles of NoS! Good luck with your first week!

Thanks - I hadn't thought of it of it this way. It makes sense though.

Hoeka wrote:Welcome here, Ginmarie

I've the same problem as you with blood-sugar levels. What I do, is to plate a fruit for breakfast, but then keep it in reserve, should I start getting the dreaded shakes. If I didn't need it between breakfast and lunch, I eat the breakfast fruit with lunch. When I plate my lunch, I add another reserve fruit, which is then either eaten as needed, or eaten with supper.

I still have my two fruits, they were plated, the eating was just delayed. I've also found that with three regular meals my blood-sugar levels stay ok, and I hardly ever need to eat the fruit in-between meals. However, it's nice to know that I have a parachute hidden away in my backpack.

Hope this helps!

What a terrific idea! I can't use fruit, since when I'm hungry, fruit crashes me big time, but I could do this with a protein, like a small piece of cheese, or some almonds. If I stay on having a good breakfast, the space between lunch and dinner is really my only tough one. Thanks for the "parachute" idea.

Two weeks and two days done and I'm feeling very good about this!
The issue I first posted about resolved itself. I've been making sure to eat a good breakfast, especially my oats, and I'm finding that even with a small lunch, I'm just getting nicely hungry at dinner time. I have not had any low sugar crashes! I'm still getting hungry before bed but I've found that since this is the only battle line of the day, ignoring it, brushing my teeth so I'm not as tempted, and just plain going to sleep has helped.

Oh and I haven't had to use my "parachute" even once!

Thank you to those who posted with ideas. The support is so helpful.