After eating junk food for a long time many people get addicted to eating junk food. Once you form a habit of eating junk food it becomes challenging to stop eating junk food all at once.
With proper planning and a system in place, you can stop eating junk food.
I can’t stop eating junk food. What steps should I take? If you can’t stop yourself from eating junk food then after reading this post you will know exactly how you can stop yourself from eating junk food.
Let’s begin.
I can’t stop eating junk food: Understanding the problem
People who say – I can’t stop eating junk food but want to eat less junk food needs to understand why and how they start craving junk food in the first place.
Once they understand how junk food works and the side effects of eating junk food they will think twice before eating junk food.
The real fact is eating many popular junk foods like – potato chips, soft drinks and other salty processed snacks makes you experience the bliss point. Most addictive junk foods are crafted in such a way that they have a mild flavour – it’s not too strong and not too soft just somewhere in the middle. So once you start eating them you will not get full satisfaction. You will always have some cravings left.
There’s another fact linked to eating junk food most often. Some people use junk food as their coping mechanism. So when they feel sad or get bored they use junk food to get out of the situation. Small factors like this influence your junk food consumption. You can break your habit of eating junk food when you notice and take action on triggers and causes that make you crave junk food.
If you have a habit of eating junk food then first you need to accept that it’s a problem and you need to have the desire to get out of this situation.
If you don’t want to stop eating junk food then no tips will work no matter how good they are. So if you are someone who might say I can’t stop eating junk food, how to come out of this situation? Then here are some of the steps you should take to eat less junk food.
I can’t stop eating junk food: 11 steps to fix this
Here are some of the steps you can take if you can’t stop eating junk food.
1. Find healthy alternatives to junk food
Apart from breakfast, launch and dinner, we need small snacks to fill our stomach. And all the time we don’t want to eat something heavy.
In many cases when we want to have a quick snack we end up eating junk food. To lower the amount of junk food you eat you need to find healthy junk food alternatives to tame your hunger.
There are many healthy snacks that you can eat. If you need recommendations then read our post on best healthy snacks to replace junk food.
2. Always carry some healthy food with you
When we get busy with our life, often we forget to carry some food. But in many instances when we feel hungry and we are outside we binge eat junk food.
If you want to reduce the amount of junk food you eat then you have to reduce the amount of junk food you eat when you are outside.
So next time try to make it a habit and always carry some healthy food with you when you are going out. It can be roasted peanuts, dry fruits, a healthy sandwich etc. And if you are in hurry then you can take one whole fruit with you. It can be an apple but try to always carry some ready-to-eat food with you.
This can be a game changer and can decrease the amount of junk food you eat.
3. Create a plan to eat less junk food for 6 weeks
If you have a habit of eating excessive amounts of junk food then it will take time to break this habit. If you try and reduce the amount of junk food you eat gradually, then it can take you up to 42 days or 6 weeks to break your habit of eating junk food.
So take a paper and make a plan about how much junk food you are going to eat for 6 weeks. And after every week reduce some amount of junk food.
If you successfully do this into practice then at the end of 6 weeks you will be able to break your habit of eating excessive amounts of junk food.
4. Only buy junk food that will last you for 1-2 days
When you buy and keep a large quantity of junk food at home, you depend more on your willpower to not eat that junk food.
When you want to reduce the amount of junk food you eat it’s not a good idea to store lots of junk food at home.
You need to force yourself to eat a fixed amount of junk food. And if you finish all those junk food at once then you can only eat junk food the next day.
So don’t buy junk food in large quantities all at once. Only buy junk food in small quantities, that will last you for 1-2 days. Doing this will help you to limit your junk food consumption.
5. Don’t store junk food in your fridge
If you are someone who questions – I can’t stop eating junk food and what should I do about it? Then you need to stop keeping junk food and soft drink cans in your fridge.
The more junk food you keep in your fridge you will have junk food cravings at night.
Instead, keep some healthy ready-to-eat meals in your fridge. This will help you to not eat junk food late at night.
6. Eat something healthy before you crave junk food
If you note down your pattern of eating junk food for some days then you will know about some specific time when you crave junk food.
After finding out at what time you crave junk food, you need to fill your stomach with some healthy food 10-15 minutes before that time.
Doing this will help you break your pattern of eating junk food.
7. Increase the portion size of protein in your meals
If you feel hungry soon after eating a meal and end up eating junk food then you need to increase the portion size of protein in your meals.
Doing this will help you not to feel hungry immediately after eating your food.
Because protein takes a long time to digest and stops you from feeling hungry frequently.
8. Don’t stay awake late at night if you don’t have a good reason for it
Most people who have a habit of eating junk food have late-night junk food cravings almost every day.
This happens because they watch movies or stay on social media for a long time after eating their dinner. After dinner, if you don’t sleep within 2-3 hours then it’s natural that you will be hungry again.
Thus to stop eating junk food at night – you need to fall asleep within 2 hours after eating your dinner.
9. Have at least 6-7 hours of sleep at night
Many people eat junk food when they get bored, because of mood swings and when they get upset over simple matters.
This type of behaviour and frequent mood swings is linked to poor quality sleep.
So if you want to eat less junk food then you should get serious about sleeping properly at night. Always try to get 6-7 hours of sleep at night. And to further improve your sleep quality, always sleep at a fixed time.
10. Learn more about the side effects of eating junk food
We know that junk food is bad for our health. But we don’t know in detail about the side effects of eating junk food.
When you are fully aware of the consequences of eating junk food and how it affects your well-being and health, then you will see eating junk food from a different perspective.
Knowing about the side effects of eating junk food will make it less attractive to your mind and you will not eat junk food more often.
11. Track your progress
When you want to stop eating junk food you need to understand that – like most other bad habits, it takes some time to break your habit of eating junk food.
Many times you will fail. You will find your craving is more strong than your willpower and you will end up eating junk food.
If you are not aware then this can demotivate you. Thus from day one, you need to track your progress. Even if you fail once or twice, seeing your progress day by day will make you confident and you will be able to break your habit of eating junk food.
So track your progress on a paper. Note down how much junk food you are eating per week and day by day at which rate you are reducing your junk food intake. Doing this will keep you motivated and you can stop yourself from eating junk food.
Conclusion
I can’t stop eating junk food – if this was the question you had before reading this post then I’m sure – now you know how you can stop yourself from eating junk food.
Like most bad habits quitting junk food takes time and you can’t stop eating junk food immediately. But gradually you can reduce the amount of junk food you eat.
If you make daily efforts towards eating less junk food then after 4-6 weeks you can break your habit of eating junk food.
Read next: How cooking helps you to develop healthy eating habits.
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