How I Put an End to Compulsive Overeating: a Guest Post by Lani Muelrath

Hi everyone, it's so nice to "see" you here. I miss you all so much. It's very exciting when I have something to post. There's a rush of excitement for me.

I feel so lucky today! Why? Because we have a guest blogger. When Lani Muelrath found out that I was struggling with keeping up Healthy Girl's Kitchen posting along with my other responsibilities she quickly offered to do a guest post for us. She asked me the type of content that I was looking for, and of course, I asked one thing, "how did you overcome compulsive overeating?"

If you don't know Lani Muelrath from the Plant-based internet world, let me fill you in on her background. Lani is also known as The Plant-Based Fitness Expert (www.lanimuelrath.com), and she specializes in helping people who struggle with weight and energy transform their bodies -and their lives - without going hungry or practicing grueling, excessive exercise. Lani is the author of Fit Quickies: 5 Minute Targeted, Body Shaping Workouts.

Read more �

Thoughtful Eating is . . .

Every once in a while an HGK reader sends me something that I want to share with all of the other HGK readers. I found this piece of writing to be deeply meaningful, real, true and inspiring. It's a good reminder of all of the things that I am still struggling with, but have improved over the years. I trust that it will be as thought provoking for you as it is for me.

by Judy

Thoughtful eating is:

� about love (of God and me)
� not about shame or guilt
� about honor
� not about contempt
� about the process
� not about magic
� about forgiveness
� not about judgment
� about enjoying
� not about deprivation

Read more �

Where I'm at with a Plant Based Diet--the Good, the Bad and the Ugly

It's been about three years since I first read Dr. Fuhrman's book Eat to Live. Approximately six months after that, I began blogging about weight loss, weight loss maintenance, emotional eating, and recipes. I was a member of Weight Watchers at the time, and, believe it or not, Healthy Girl's Kitchen wasn't an oil-free, 100% plant-based blog when I started. As time went by and my learning process continued (reading Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease and The Engine 2 Diet) I was no longer interested in cooking with oil, nor in food that had a mother or a face.

But my road to peace with food is an extremely bumpy one, not without continuing trials and tribulations to this day. And in the last few weeks I have received two letters that have left me with the feeling that I really need to talk about that more. It seems that there is an impression that I have found ultimate success with this and that my struggle with food and my weight is over.

Well, it's not.

In the words of Ricky Ricardo, I think I have a lot of splainin' to do.

Read more �

The Heart Attack Grill Diet

I want to thank every one who took the time to comment on my last post about The Pleasure Trap. Your comments REALLY help me to figure things out in my head. As much as I blog because I want to help other people find their way in this crazy mess of a food world, blogging helps me to stay the course, even though that course may be rocky from time to time. Being someone who is public about my struggle with food is one of the hardest things I have ever done. But it's also one of the most rewarding. I honestly do not know where I would be without HGK, because I would have no real accountability. With HGK, I am accountable to all of you, every day, and that is a very good thing for me.

This guy choose another path to go down with his food addictions. The nicest thing I can sayabout this video  is that at least he was honest.





Was. He's dead now, age 29. It's not funny anymore, is it?

The Heart Attack Grill. Is there really taste worth dying for? I kind of doubt it!

If you are here, reading HGK, you have made the decision to go somewhere very positive with your food choices. Give yourself credit! Be happy about it!

Had you heard of this restaurant called The Heart Attack Grill? What did you think when you first found out about it? 


Comments are very welcome. Please click on the title of this post (the orange text) to read or leave comments.

The Pleasure Trap Book Club

Thank you to everyone who left comments on my last post with your food movie recommendations. I have added all of the available movies to my Netflix queue and look forward to watching them all. The first one that I just HAD to see was Rip Esselstyn's Engine 2 Kitchen Rescue, so I watched it this morning at 4:45 am, if you can believe it. I'll save my thoughts on this video for another post. 


Why? Because something interesting kinda popped up on the Internet a few days ago. It seems that Lindsay Nixon (The Happy Herbivore) had the brilliant idea of forming a book club. Our peep Natala Constantine over at The Engine 2 Blog thought it was a great idea and blogged about it too.

The first book Lindsay chose?  The Pleasure Trap, Mastering the Hidden Force that Undermines Health and Happiness by Douglas J. Lisle, PhD. and Alan Goldhamer, D.C.

Well, there you go Lindsay, sucking me in to another project! I've been wanting to read this book for what seems like forever, so I couldn't resist ordering my own copy from Amazon. I was pretty stoked when it arrived unexpectedly the next day. I started reading almost immediately.

As best as I can, I am going to share my experience of reading this book with you. If I start to think that you are getting bored, as sometimes starts to happen with projects like this, I might stop talking about it. But I can't say where this will go, other than I'm starting right now.

The author proposes that people are motivated by three general things: to seek pleasure, to avoid pain and to conserve energy. Why? Because these three things "encourage behaviors that are associated with survival and reproduction." It's all embedded into the design of every living creature.

I'm just guessing here, but I think as the book plays out we will come to understand why those three motivations have conspired against us in the modern age and have caused the epidemic of obesity and poor health. And I'm also going to guess that Dr. Lisle is going to give us coping strategies for modern times so that we don't need to be another statistic.

But I'm getting way ahead of us. 

Back to the beginning. The first thing that really struck me was this sentence in Chapter 2, "Very often, in both human and animal life, the rewards of pleasure are not immediate. Pleasure requires work, effort, skill development, and risky competition."


So motivation cannot be sustained by pleasure seeking alone. We need to know if we are on the right path to achieving pleasure, we need signals. Enter our moods, happiness or unhappiness. Moods "work like the clues in a treasure hunt." They are subtle feelings, but they keep us going (or they stop us) in our hunt for treasure.

For me, and I think all humans, one treasure is achieving and easily maintaining a healthy weight.


But biologically, the treasure of food consumption causes pleasure also. "Pleasure was designed as the unmistakable signal of success for reaching survival and/or reproductive goals." If we don't eat, we are going to starve and if that happens, we won't be surviving, let alone reproducing.

It made me think of how difficult it has been for me over the past year to remain "plant perfect." There was a time when it was very easy. Some might have even labeled me as"orthorexic." A label that I would glad wear today considering how difficult it is for me now to make the best choices day in and day out.

Enter happiness.

"Happiness is not a final destination." You don't get there and stay there forever. But happiness signals to us that we are on the right track. We can get happiness from being productive, from being with friends, from feeling secure, and from feeling relief (amongst others).

At the time when I was really "on it" (and that did last a good, long while) I was very focused on the happiness that I got from eating plant-perfectly, even though the pleasure and the rewards were not immediate ones. I always had in the front of my mind all of the great reasons why I was eating so plant-perfectly. I derived a ton of happiness from making good decisions about food and the thought that someday in the future I would be rewarded with the size body that I wanted and good health.

As time went by, the good happy feeling that I got from saying "no" to the wrong foods faded a little. It didn't fade entirely, but it wasn't front and center. So it became easy to have a bite of this or that, and then a piece of this or that, and then two of this or that. Because the rewards of eating the wrong foods are so immediate (and oh-so-short lived!).

And now I can see how the mindset of happiness of plant-perfection has gotten somewhat away from me. Enough to cause me pain (emotionally). So I want my old plant-perfect, orthorexic-if-you-will, mindset back. It worked very well for me and had no downside other than some wisecracking friends and family. And that is why I'm very interested in reading this book and discussing it with all of you.

If you'd like to read this book along with us, may I suggest that you order a copy here? A teeny weeny bit of the money goes to help support HGK!

Do I sound like a nut case? Am I making any sense here? Thoughts? To leave a comment or see the comments section of this blog, please click on the title of this post (the orange text above).

Why My Personality Puts the Pounds On Me

Did anyone catch this article in the Wall Street Journal entitled, "Is Your Personality Making You Put on Pounds?" by Melinda Beck?

I'll summarize it for you. If you suffer from any of the following personality traits, you are very likely to be overweight:

1. you are not an "easy" person, a generally disagreeable type
2. you are a night owl and/or sleep deprived
3. you are a stress junkie (you thrive on competition and deadline pressure)
4. you are a mindless multitasker, enjoying eating while doing other tasks at the same time
5. you are a giver and put other people's needs ahead of your own
6. you are a perfectionist

Why am I bringing this up here on HGK? Because I think it gets to the heart of the matter. Like the author of the article says, everybody knows that broccoli is healthier than McDonald's. So why do we have such a hard time consistently making the right decisions?

Because our personalities get in the way.

For me, I fall into category #2, 3, 4, 5 AND 6. 

That's a lotta dysfunction. But those same personality traits are the ones that got me where I am today. I just have to know when I am taking things too far.

I am a big believer in self-awareness. Not to be confused with me saying that "I am self-aware." Quite the contrary. But I am committed to working on it. Because if I don't know the reasons that I am making my mistakes, how can I ever do anything differently?

Which personality categories do you fall into? Do you see a connection between your personality and your weight issues?

Do You Have Trouble Passing Up Food that is Not on Your Plan? What About Night-time Eating? Beck-Day 13: Overcome Cravings

I don't have any problem making great food decisions all day long.

Until 5:15 pm that is.

That's when I walk in the door after work and usually a work-out. My energy stores are very low. I'm attempting to accommodate the needs of three other little people all while trying to prepare dinner, that they wanted a half-hour ago.

If I can make it through dinner prep unscathed, there's still the rest of the evening to contend with. And that's where the battle really begins.

Eating a Plant-strong, Nutritarian diet has eliminated all of my food ghosts and goblins of the past, except for this one: night-time snacking. I have absolutely no problem resisting any food craving I have all day long, until 7 o'clock hits.

What's up with that? I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one.

The New York Times published an article about something called "decision making fatigue." Here's a key excerpt from that article:

"The discoveries about glucose help explain why dieting is a uniquely difficult test of self-control � and why even people with phenomenally strong willpower in the rest of their lives can have such a hard time losing weight. They start out the day with virtuous intentions, resisting croissants at breakfast and dessert at lunch, but each act of resistance further lowers their willpower. As their willpower weakens late in the day, they need to replenish it. But to resupply that energy, they need to give the body glucose. They�re trapped in a nutritional catch-22:

1. In order not to eat, a dieter needs willpower.

2. In order to have willpower, a dieter needs to eat.

As the body uses up glucose, it looks for a quick way to replenish the fuel, leading to a craving for sugar. After performing a lab task requiring self-control, people tend to eat more candy but not other kinds of snacks, like salty, fatty potato chips. The mere expectation of having to exert self-control makes people hunger for sweets."

Holy s#1+. That just described me.

And the NYT isn't the only news organization talking about this phenomenon. Here's how the people at Prevention Magazine described it on NBC's The Today Show:

"Budget your resolve: Each of us has a limited supply of self-control, which means if you try to exert it in too many areas at once, you'll rapidly deplete your reserve. A study from Case Western Reserve University illustrates the point. Researchers placed freshly baked chocolate chip cookies before two groups of participants, instructing one group to eat two or three and the other to eat radishes (while watching the others partake). Then everyone was asked to try to solve an impossible puzzle. Participants who had to resist the treats gave up on the problem twice as fast as those who were allowed to indulge. 'Willpower is like gas in your car,' says Vohs. 'When you resist something tempting, you use some up. The more you resist, the emptier your tank gets, until you run out of gas.'�

That's me. I run out of "gas" at the end of the day, big time (well, not the literal kind of gas, I've got enough of that to last all night, and all morning).

Well, maybe not "big time." I wouldn't call my night time eating a binge. I've overcome any of that behavior by filling up at breakfast, lunch and dinner with high nutrient food. So what I'm really talking about here is that "treat" at the end of a busy, stressful day. But that treat, every night, is the difference between me at my happy weight and me at my something more than my happy weight. And I don't like it.

It's just like Beck says on Day 13, I have to overcome my cravings if I want to remain at a healthy weight for me. Because that's what it is: cravings. I'm not hungry at night. I'm craving a treat and my resistance is shot.

Beck says that we don't have to give into cravings and that they will disappear. Wait it out, it goes away, and over time you gain confidence that cravings do pass. Here's Beck's advice on how to do just that:

(1) Label your feeling as "just a craving" and not an "emergency" or real hunger. This is a very important step and if you don't feel that you know the difference yet, please do the exercise on Day 13.

(2) Decide you are not going to eat anything, because just that decision will relieve you of the tension. Beck says it's the not knowing that causes us the strain. Once we make a firm decision of "no" the craving should start to diminish. Do not give yourself a choice.

(3) Get involved in a compelling activity. Watching TV is probably not enough. Taking a shower, talking to a friend on the phone, reading a book or working on a project is more like it. Beck has a long list of great ideas for distractions.

(4) Drink water, tea,  or club soda. Thirst can mask as hunger.

(5) Distance yourself from the food you crave. Remove the food from your house or you from the place that the food is. I always need to remind myself to throw away whatever it is that has newly become my nighttime "treat." Guess what I'll be doing as soon as I finish writing this post!

(6) Read your Advantages Response Card to remind yourself of why you want to resist cravings.

The key is this: you don't want to strengthen you giving-in muscle. You want to build your resistance muscle. And it is a muscle. I built it once before and I can do it again.

How are you doing with resisting food that is not on your plan? Is this particularly difficult for you at night?

Got any tips and tricks for building a resistance muscle?

Just a reminder, if you haven't done so yet, please enter HGK's blogger giveaway of two copies of The Complete Idiot's Guide to Plant Based Nutrition. The questions are awesome so keep 'em coming. I can see some popular ones beginning to emerge from the pack!

I Need a Kick in the Pants. Hello Beck Diet Solution!

I started blogging a year and a half ago for one reason and one reason only. To keep the weight off that I had lost. I figured that it would be mortifying to gain the weight back if I was public about being healthy AND that the constant having to think about and write about food and health would keep me on the straight and narrow.

Has it worked? Yes, mostly. But not entirely. I don't know any of the stats because I too darned scared to get on a scale, but I'm pretty sure that "the weight" is creeping back on. My clothes feel a little tight. My stomach sticks out a little further.

It's time to get a grip.

This Plant-strong food tastes too darned great! All of the people who are eating fast food and thinking they could never give it up, well they have no idea how delicious a plant-based diet can be if you just give it a chance. And when food tastes this good, I find it hard not to overindulge.

Not only that, I'm giving myself too many allowances. Allowances for goodies on special occasions. Allowances for too many plant-indulgent dinners when what I should really be eating is low calorie soup and salad--without the nuts.

So thank you blogging world. Thank you for giving me this opportunity to catch myself before it's too late. I am at your mercy. I have to once again focus my energy on what I know works:
1. The Beck Diet Solution
2. Eat to Live

I can do this! I am a warrior.

I have already reread the introductory chapters and it is amazing to me how I am falling out of practice with the plan. I'm having a ton of sabotaging thoughts like, "I know I shouldn't eat this, but it's okay because . . . it's a celebration . . . I'm tired . . . I'm hoping the calories really won't count because I eat so many vegetables."

Really, Wendy? Come on! Do you know what that is? DENIAL. And I'm starting to regress into it again. Thank The Lord I know how to fix it.

I hope you are interested, and that you will enjoy reading all about it here, every day for the next however many days it takes me to complete another round of The Beck Diet Solution. Beck is not a book about food. It is a book about retraining your brain to think like that of a thin person. One who doesn't struggle with food choices and endlessly gain and lose weight. The kind of thinking that I know is required to maintain a healthy weight. You can check out what people say about this program by clicking on the Amazon link above and reading the reviews of the book.

Of course I'll still be posting lots of food ideas sandwiched in with posts about working the Beck program.

What are you struggling with?

Any body interested in doing The Beck Diet Solution with me?? Or reading about the steps as I work them?

Hop on Over to Choosing Raw and Catch My Guest Blog Post

This is Gena (pronounced Jenna). Isn't she adorable?

Good Morning! I am so excited to tell all of you that my story was published in Gena from Choosing Raw's blog series on eating disorder recovery through a plant based diet. In my opinion, Gena is simply one of the best healthy food bloggers out there. It doesn't hurt that she is a professional writer/editor and Certified Clinical Nutritionist turned med student. Or that she is in recovery from an eating disorder and one of the most gifted natural chefs on the internet. This woman is inspiring! Hop on over to Choosing Raw to check out my post!

Since most of you know my story and may not take the time to read it again over at Choosing Raw, I do want to point out to you that the comments that are being left are very, very interesting. I don't know about you, but I feel a lot better about things when I have moments of connection with other people going through the same struggles. I hope you are inspired when reading what I and others are sharing over at Choosing Raw.

Have a wonderful day!

It's Not Your Fault that You are a Food Addict and My Cute Little Herb Garden

What I'm Reading Now: Breaking the Food Seduction by Neal Barnard, M.D.

First off I want to say "thank you" to everyone who left a comment at my post, Plant-strong Success Tip #4: Get Comfortable Asking for What You Need. Making bold statements about behaviors and attitudes can sometimes feel a little scary, so it's really helpful to receive feedback. If I've said it once, I've said it 100 times, receiving comments are fuel to a blogger. They keep me going and inspired, so again, I thank you.

Next I want to talk about a book that only a few days ago did I first lay my hands on. Thanks to my dear friend, fellow warrior and frequent HGK commenter Q.B. for recommending Breaking the Food Seduction by Neal Barnard, M.D. Although I have only read 1/2 of the book, I'm so excited by its contents that I simply could not wait to share it with you.

The lucky ones reading this post have read this book already. You know that becoming an expert is a major key to success on a plant based diet. So this book is probably in your home library.

If you haven't read it and you struggle with making food choices that you know are not optimal for your health, you NEED to read this book. I cannot recommend it enough. Dr. Barnard details out all of the reasons why we get addicted to cheese, meat and sugar.

I actually don't feel guilty about my sugar fixation anymore! It's just how my brain is wired. I get that peaceful, easy feeling (think, The Eagles) . . . I know you won't let me down . . .LOL.

But it's so true, my brain chemistry makes it that sugar feels really great when I eat it. Not so much a few minutes later though, because a little IS NEVER ENOUGH. Substitute in meat or cheese or salty, fatty foods if those are your downfall. It's not your fault. There are opiates in food that work on our moods exactly the same way that illegal drugs do. No wonder I have an addiction.

Does that mean I'm going to give up? Lay down and die? No way! I'm going to follow his 8 step plan so that my drug of choice has much less hold over me. Coincidentally, his plan is basically what I have come to understand and follow over the past two years. So I know that it works. The key? FIBER, the kind found in beans, vegetables and fruits. Eat lots and lots of that and all that other junk doesn't stand a chance!



On another note, how many of you guys are into gardening? Do you grow your own vegetables? Herbs? I have been experimenting the last few years with herb gardening and I have to say, I'm not very good at it yet, but I'm still trying. I know that I've got to do a much better job with the pruning (I tend to get lazy). Here's what I've got on tap this year:

Most of my herbs are in pots. I'm thinking that when the weather gets cold I will bring them all inside near a sunny window and hopefully get many more months of joy from them.

This pot is entirely dedicated to a variety of basils: spicy Thai basil, sweet basil, spicy globe basil and opal basil. I'm growing them as much for the food as I am for how darn adorable they are!

I was very lucky to find a stevia plant and a chamomile plant at Whole Foods last weekend. Now my oldest daughter is steeping a tea from mint, chamomile and stevia that she affectionately calls "Backyard Tea."

Cilantro, sage, oregano, and thyme. The tarragon grows really well in the ground in another spot in my garden, along with chives.

I don't do much with rosemary, but it's so easy to grow I got some anyway. Rosemary just seems like such a chicken compliment, but you know, it goes really well on herb roasted potatoes . . . ummmmm, I'm going to have to make a big pan of them as soon as my oven is hooked up. Sans the oil of course!

Have you read Breaking the Food Seduction? Do you want to?

How to Experience Body Euphoria

Have you ever heard of the condition "body dysmorphia"? Wikipedia describes it like this: "Body dysmorphic disorder (BDD), sometimes referred to as body dysmorphia or dysmorphic syndrome, is a (psychological) somatoform disorder in which the affected person is excessively concerned about and preoccupied by a perceived defect in his or her physical features (body image). The sufferer may complain of several specific features or a single feature, or a vague feature or general appearance, causing psychological distress that impairs occupational and/or social functioning, sometimes to the point of severe depression and anxiety, development of other anxiety disorders, social withdrawal or complete social isolation, and more."

Yesterday on the blog Medicinal Marzipan, a blog about body image and unconditional self love, there was a guest posting entitled "Creating Bonds Around Self-Love Instead of Negative Self Talk" by Emilie Littlehales, of the blog I Came to Run and the Embrace: Me Project.

In it she makes an observation that is so true, so powerful, I just had to share it here: "From an early age, we [women] learn to dislike our bodies. There are a variety of factors that play a role in this, but we have to be careful not to underestimate the degree to which our interactions with other girls and women influence us in this regard. Sooner or later, negative body image becomes a common feeling over which we learn to bond, and a sisterhood that centers on sharing our thoughts on how much we dislike parts of physical selves develops. It�s a disturbing phenomenon when you take a step back to look at it: you can�t walk into a room one day and declare how good you feel about your thighs, doing so might result in you being the victim of silent, seething resentment. But say that you feel fat or disgusting, and you will find that the entire room knows exactly how you feel."

What Emilie is describing is pervasive in our society today. Just the other day a friend came up to me and asked me for advice on how to get in shape. I asked her what her current fitness program was and she said she was working out every day . . . every day! . . . doing the Insanity videos in her basement.

I said, "That's amazing! So what is it that you would like to improve upon?"

And she said, "Well, I'd like to lose ten pounds" and I was thinking "If you lose ten pounds you might need to be hospitalized." I told her flat out that she was suffering from Body Dysmorphia but she didn't seem to care. It's just like Emilie described. We are conditioned to hate our bodies when there is nothing wrong with them. We feel that we must vocalize this dissatisfaction or we won't be accepted into the club.

So afterwards, my husband, who was also present at the conversation, came up with a new condition that we are calling "Body Euphoria."

Here's our definition: It is the state of mind that you are in after treating yourself well for an extended period of time. Conditions include (1) participation in moderate exercise that you truly enjoy, (2) eating  nutritious, unprocessed, plant strong food and (3) achieving your happy weight, where even though your body has no resemblance to a model in a magazine and never will, you are thrilled with how you look, and more importantly, how you feel.

That's the state I am in today. Body Euphoria. Strong, balanced, healthy. Sure, I don't look like any model, but I'll take it! And I want to share it with you.

What is your current state of mind?

Do you think you can let go of your own negative self talk?

What do you hope to achieve?