25: Easy Ways To Crush Perimenopause Cravings

Struggling with cravings? As a midlife mom, you might think you've lost all willpower when it comes to food. Because when those cravings come on, they are so strong!

The good news is that you CAN do a lot to manage (and prevent!) your cravings!

In this episode of The Family Fork podcast we dig in to see what causes cravings in midlife, and how you can take proactive steps to minimize and eliminate cravings (yes, even in perimenopause!)

We explore:
- Simple nutrition strategies to combat cravings
- How to regulate hormones so that we have fewer cravings
- Easy lifestyle changes that make cravings a thing of the past

With a few simple strategies, you can finally take control over your body and say goodbye to cravings!

Links mentioned and ways to connect:

• Lock in your daily protein intake with the free Protein for Perimenopause guide
• Eat a full week of anti-inflammatory foods with Perimenopause Weight Loss for Moms
• Learn simple, fast, easy breathing techniques to reduce stress, with the Breathwrk app

Ashley Malik is a women's health and life coach, helping busy moms lose weight in perimenopause. You can learn more and discover how to work directly with Ashley by clicking here. 

*** Ready to lose 15 lbs in 10 weeks? The Method will give you all the tools to make it happen! We start April 2nd. To learn more about The Method, click here!

Transcript

Well, hello there, my friend. So we are going to kick off today's episode with a small celebration. Yay. I really want to thank you for tuning in today. We are in episode 25 of the Family Fork podcast. And just last week, we hit a big milestone of more than 5,000 downloads. I am so incredibly appreciative to you.

for tuning in each week and for just sharing this podcast with your mom friends too. The goal of this podcast has always been to support midlife moms with easier, faster, and more sustainable ways of healthy eating for you and your family. Because I know it is a challenge for so many of us. I am truly, truly grateful that you choose to spend this time with me each week. So I thank you.

very much for being a part of this journey.

So with our celebration underway, let's get into this week's episode. Now, one of the most common questions that I get when somebody downloads my free anti-inflammatory meal plan or they join one of my group programs is, what can I eat for snacks?

And when I dig in a bit more to this question, I really uncovered that that need for snacks is typically a way to deal with midday cravings. I mean, think about it. Like three o'clock in the afternoon hits and you are dragging, you have no energy. And so your solution is to just really grab for a quick snack. Now, typically you're probably going to grab something that has caffeine,

sugar or carbs or maybe you grab something that has all three like a latte with a chocolate bar. But we know this isn't necessarily going to help you crush those cravings or to have more energy. Now, I know also, and this is me, some people really struggle with snacking and cravings in those morning hours, sort of between breakfast and lunch. That's always been a trigger time for me.

And I also know that cravings can hit really, really hard after dinner. This is when so many women crave sweets. And I know for me, this is definitely the time that I crave chocolate.

Now, when you add perimenopause into the mix, cravings at any time of day can absolutely intensify. What's happening here in perimenopause is that obviously we know you start to lose estrogen. But interestingly, estrogen controls our hunger regulation system. And so when we have less of that estrogen, a lot of things start to go haywire.

Leptin is the one hormone that signals to your body that, I'm full. I don't need any more food. Ghrelin on the other hand, signals to your body, my gosh, I'm hungry and I really need to eat something. So when we have less estrogen, those Ghrelin levels, the ones that tell us we're hungry, those levels increase and that makes you think that you are hungry.

even though you might not need any fuel or any calories. And really, this is just a recipe for cravings. And unfortunately, when you have an increase in ghrelin, it likes to look for things that are high in sugar and high in fat. So no matter where and when your cravings hit, whether it's because of perimenopause or not, let's pin down a few smart strategies

so that you can manage those cravings, reduce those cravings, and ultimately so you can feel better and have more energy.

Now, when we're looking at really smart, specific strategies to crush those cravings, I find that it's really helpful to divide them into two different categories. So first, we're going to look at nutrition, and then we're going to look at lifestyle, because I think that there are some strategies that really fall into both of those categories. So when we're looking at nutrition strategies for crushing our cravings, I want you to make sure that you are eating

enough food. I know, especially if you are a child of the 70s and the 80s, decreasing calories is something that we just thought, oh, that is the thing to help us lose weight. It's not. And so in my work with women, I often find that women are eating like 12 and 1300 calories thinking that is the thing that's going to help them lose weight.

help them to stop having so many cravings, just help them to figure out their nutrition. Honestly, 1200 calories is only enough for a toddler. So if you are not a toddler anymore, you should be eating way more than 1200 calories. What happens is when you don't have enough food, this is really going to intensify your cravings because your body

is asking for food. When we think about eating enough food, let's make sure though that we're increasing our calories in really good, sustainable ways.

You really want to make sure that you are eating fats and carbs. Carbs are not the enemy, fats are not the enemy, but we want to make sure that fat and carbs are part of our daily calorie intake. Protein, protein, you hear so much about protein right now and it's true that it helps you to stay fuller for longer. And when you are eating adequate amounts of protein, it's really going to help.

reduce those cravings. Protein can be a tough one because it's hard to know where to get it and I don't really advocate for protein bars. So I'll link to my protein guide in the show notes because it's going to show you exactly how you can get more protein in every single day in a really healthy way. And I know we've talked about this before, but you want to make sure and get in about 30 to 40 grams of protein before 10 a.m.

So if you check the protein guide in the show notes, it'll give you a formula to make sure that you can get that much protein in.

Another way that we can crush our cravings, not only is we want to eat that good food, but we want to eat a better breakfast. I am a huge advocate of saying no to oatmeal and gluten-free bagels in the morning. There's nothing wrong with those foods, but first thing in the morning, they are sort of like fast burning carbohydrates and they're going to spike your blood sugar. When you spike your blood sugar, first thing in the morning,

it is going to leave you hungry by 10 a.m. And so if you are one of those women who struggles with needing snacks or getting snacky between breakfast and lunch, I really want you to change up your breakfast. Now, a lot of women will default to protein bars. And like I just mentioned, I really don't like protein bars. I think that they don't have the right

balance of macronutrients. So a typical bar is going to have like 8, 10, 12 grams of protein, but it's also going to be really high in carbohydrates. And unfortunately, this balance is really going to kick off your cravings. I also don't think that most protein bars are filled with high quality ingredients. And so it's just starting off your day in a suboptimal way. Instead,

I want you to eat a savory breakfast. So that's gonna look like a lovely bowl of veggies and protein and carbs and a small amount of healthy fat. This kind of bowl is absolutely gonna fill you up. It's gonna help you feel satiated. It's gonna give your body the nutrients that it needs so you don't have cravings and that you can really make it all the way through from breakfast to lunch.

My daily breakfast bowl is delicious. I look forward to it every day. Right now, anyway, I'm using green beans or sometimes roasted broccoli. My protein is chicken or salmon, just depending on some days I want that extra fat from the salmon. And so I'll do that. I add that with brown rice. Sometimes I'll add a quarter of an avocado. And then I put a drizzle of

Bichin sauce on there. you don't know what Bichin sauce is, my gosh, it's so good. It's this like sort of runny almond based sauce. And I really prefer the Chipotle version. It is delicious. And I put it on everything. So if you haven't tried Bichin sauce, definitely check it out. But it's great for the breakfast bowl. It gives a zing of flavor with the mixture of proteins and carbs and veggies. It's so, good. So

I really want you to rethink your breakfast because I promise you starting your day with a breakfast bowl like green beans and chicken and rice and avocado, that is going to set you up for an entire day completely free of cravings. That sounds pretty great, right?

All right, another one of our smart strategies is to drink more water. And I know, you know this, right? You've heard this before. Sometimes it can just be hard to put this into practice. When you are dehydrated, this triggers cravings in your body so quickly. And interestingly, there's a biological reason for that. So when you are dehydrated,

it makes it really difficult for your body to access the energy stores that it could provide you if you need some of that energy. So your body starts craving carbs and sugar because those are the nutrients that are going to give you a really fast hit of energy. So think about a time when you might have been really dehydrated, you probably wanted something really sweet or like a bagel or something, carb or sugar.

and that's your body's biology saying, oh my gosh, I need some energy. Now, I personally really struggle to like sip my water throughout the day and get enough water in my body every single day. And so I have a trick that I use that maybe this will be helpful for you. I have a timer on my watch and

Every hour it goes off. And I know if you have an Apple watch, usually your Apple watch will like send you a little notification if you need to get up and move at the top of the hour. regardless, set your clock every hour. And when that alarm goes off, I want you to gulp eight to 10 ounces. It's actually not that much water. It's just a small cup of water. But by taking eight to 10 ounces every hour,

you are going to be very consistent with your water throughout the day. You'll stay very hydrated throughout the entire day. And you don't have to think about like, I've got to start sipping water or how many glasses have I already had? Just gulp eight to 10 ounces every hour on the hour, and you're good to go. So hopefully that helps you. And that will help you definitely to stay hydrated and to make sure that your body doesn't just naturally

start having those cravings.

All right, at the beginning, we talked about craving snacks, remember? Some people like to snack between breakfast and lunch. For some people, it's in the afternoon. For others, it's really those cravings and those desires for snacks are really intense in the evening time. One of the ways that you can combat this is to eat five meals throughout the day instead of sticking to three.

Now, there are a bunch of schools of thought on this. Some people say that sticking to three meals helps your body to rest and digest. And I personally have found that eating five meals throughout the day keeps me from having cravings, keeps me from wanting to have snacks on, especially snacking things that aren't going to really serve me or aren't going to benefit me. And so when I

I, for some reason, I get really hungry around two or three in the afternoon. So I have actually figured out what snack I'm going to have in the afternoon that really is going to fill me up. And I've been able to add that and sort of balance it into my overall calorie needs for the day. So I look at how much protein and carbs and fats I need. I look at how many calories I need.

And then I kind of divide that into five different meals. I know that I'm very hungry in the morning, so I have a bigger breakfast. I have kind of a medium sized lunch. And then I have a pretty healthy size snack at about 2.30 or three in the afternoon. I have dinner and then I have a little boost of chocolatey protein in the evening hours. And that's a great way for me to like balance out my calories. But because I'm eating five times a day,

I don't feel like I crave anything. don't need it because I've already baked it into my eating plan.

If you're new to this or if you're wondering, like, how do I sort of figure out, how much to eat and when do I eat, I want you to head to the show notes. I've put a free guide in there that's called Perimenopause Weight Loss for Moms. And grab that link and the guide is going to show you exactly how to do this. And it's going to give you some pointers because the trick here, like we've been talking about, is to actually pick

really good food options for your meals, all five of them, right? That are things that are going to help you to feel full and satiated and satisfied. And so if you are eating five meals throughout the day, they're good, healthy, whole foods. And yes, I say this on almost every podcast, that could include chocolate because there is chocolate that can be a part of this meal plan.

But if you're having these good whole foods, you're eating five times a day, you're super hydrated, you are not going to have any cravings. Your body is going to feel so satiated and satisfied. Cravings will just not be an issue for you.

All right. Along the lines of nutrition, I also want to talk a little bit about gut health. So gut health honestly has been a really big struggle for me for many, many years. For a while, it started because I had an autoimmune disease. I had leaky gut. My gut health was really bad. It was just really bad. And now, like in the last couple of years, well,

Another thing that I have really struggled with for much of my life when I sort of look back on my history is something called Candida overgrowth. And we all have Candida yeast within our gut microbiome, but sometimes it gets really thrown off balance. And when it does, it really, really increases your cravings. So I know I talk to women a lot where they say,

I have this insatiable, unnecessary need to eat sugar and fast burning carbohydrates. I don't know where it comes from. And a lot of times we look at that and we think, my gosh, I have no willpower. I have no discipline on myself to be able to not eat the sugary thing or to not eat those carbohydrates. I want to reassure you that

Oftentimes that can be a sign that your gut health needs some attention and some cleanup.

One of the best ways to get started on cleaning up that gut health is with an anti-inflammatory and whole foods approach. And again, that meal plan that I have in the show notes for you, it is all anti-inflammatory, all whole foods. And so it's going to give you everything that you need. So even if you don't have time right now to go to the doctor or you're not sure if gut health is an issue, starting with an anti-inflammatory

approach and anti-inflammatory nutrition is instantly going to help you out. I know for me, it was an absolute game changer. Part of the reason anti-inflammatory nutrition works so well is because we take out a lot of the foods that cause that dysbiosis or that imbalance in our gut bacteria. However, it also kind of forces you to eat foods

that will actually make you feel full, like foods with fiber, lots of protein. So by adjusting your nutrition to an anti-inflammatory approach, you're going to start healing your gut health, but it's also going to help diminish some of those cravings that you've been struggling with.

Now, the next time that you have a craving that strikes you really hard and really intensely, I want you to ask yourself this question. Could I eat a carrot and feel satisfied?

If not, if the answer is no, it's really helpful to look at where your nutrition might be lacking. So I want you to review those five strategies that we just talked about and see where you can do some work to kind of bolster your nutrition so that you can help reduce some of those cravings. But interestingly, aside from nutrition, there are a bunch of lifestyle changes that you can make

that will really help you to eliminate your cravings. Now you hear this all the time, but stress, chronic stress, everyday stress, it is really hurting your body in so many ways. And you probably know this, but stress can contribute. And you probably know this, but stress definitely contributes to cravings.

Just think about one of those last times where you were really stressed. Did you go grab for a snack or something? Again, there's a biological reason why this is happening. When you are stressed out, your cortisol really starts to increase. And when you have higher levels of cortisol in your blood, that sends a signal to your body to increase your appetite, especially for things like sugars and fat.

And so once you start eating, your body kind of just keeps asking for more and more, which is why if you've ever had that experience where you're really stressed out and you give into a craving to like eat some ice cream or some Doritos or something like that, and then it's really hard to stop, it's because your body is stuck in this loop of stress and high cortisol and cravings. It just keeps going. So

I get it. Stress reduction. Wow. This is like one lifestyle piece that's really difficult to tackle. I know. I struggle with it all the time, but it is also one of the best things that you can do to reduce your cravings and to benefit your overall health. One of the things that I use, I've started using recently, is called the Breathwork app. The reason I like it is because

It's like breathing in different ways for five minutes. In this season of life, five minutes feels really doable to me. I've had some other like meditation apps and breathing apps and they go too long or the cycle is too long. Five minutes I can totally do in this season of my life. So what I do is I actually schedule a breath work session into my Google calendar every day.

and I stick to it like it is a hair appointment. I don't break it because seriously ladies, like you don't break your hair appointments, right? I really find that it is helpful to have it scheduled. So I just do this breath work every single day. And I'm really finding that it is helping me to reduce my stress, which reduces cravings, which is the goal, right?

Interestingly, I'm also finding myself using a lot of these breathing techniques when I struggle to fall back to sleep when I wake up in the middle of the night. So if you're in perimenopause or menopause, you know that 3 a.m. wake up time is super annoying. But these like breath work sessions have really taught me a different way to breathe and to handle stress. And so when I use them in the middle of the night, it's really, really helpful. So

I don't have an affiliate link for this, but I will link to the app that I'm using because I have just found it really, really helpful.

Now, since we're on the topic of sleep, we know sleep is essential for so many functions in your body. When you have a really good night of sleep, you are definitely going to have fewer cravings throughout the day. On the opposite side of that, really poor sleep and a bad night of sleep, it messes with your hormones again. You know, when you're tired,

there's also an increase in cortisol, just like there is when we are stressed. And when you have more cortisol, that can increase the ghrelin, which is that hormone, if you remember, we talked about, is responsible for appetite and hunger. So when you're tired, you have cravings for high sugar and high fat foods because your body is just desperate for that quick hit of energy.

So course, the solution here is good sleep hygiene. You wanna go to bed in a dark room with a colder temperature and you wanna cut off your screens a couple of hours before you go to bed. Something that we do, we actually sleep with a box fan for white noise. We tried the white noise apps, my husband and I, and it was not loud enough for us. So we ended up putting a box fan in and it definitely helps us with

the dark room, the colder room, and turning off our screens a little bit before we go to bed.

Now, maybe you are experiencing those really strong, intense cravings during the day. And a really smart strategy here is when that craving comes on, I want you to take a walk. When you move and you move your body, it's going to shift your brain's focus away from food. And you can start focusing on what you're seeing on that walk, even if you're walking on the treadmill.

kind of look around, but if you're walking outside, even better. And especially when you're outside, the nice movement, the fresh air, the sunshine, that is definitely going to help to bring down your cortisol.

When the weather's nice, we really love taking Suraya with us on a walk. She likes to go. You can take your spouse as well and take your dog. Right. When was the last time? I know it's really easy to like get busy during the day and be tired when you get home in the afternoon and you don't necessarily want to take your dog on a walk, but your dog will love it and you will love it. And it will really help you to reduce some of those cravings. I do really encourage you when you take a walk to leave your phone at home.

There's something we are so caught up in technology and information and like the dopamine that comes from constantly looking at our notifications and our emails and everything else. Take 20 minutes and go on your walk technology free. I promise you it's going to change your brain. You're going to see things that you haven't seen before. And honestly, when you get back,

Take a big drink of water to combat your dehydration, and I bet you will find that your cravings have just sort of melted away.

And finally, one of my favorite and fastest ways to crush a craving, especially when it comes after dinner, is to brush your teeth. So with a clean mouth, you're definitely going to be less tempted to eat or snack on anything.

That minty fresh of the toothpaste, signals to your brain that you are finished with eating and it makes food less appealing. Interestingly, I've started wearing retainers or aligners at night and just, I don't know, in the last couple of months, I have become addicted to water flossing. my gosh, it feels so good. I just love it.

Once my whole routine is done that I have brushed and I have water flossed and I have done my regular floss and then I pop my aligners in, there's just no snacking for me because it is too much work to have to do that routine all over again.

So cravings, we know that they're there and I get it, they can be really hard to get rid of. But by putting some of these nutrition and lifestyle strategies into place, you can really, really reduce the number of cravings that you are having throughout your day.

Plus, you know that cravings can make you feel like you're totally out of control, especially for those of us in perimenopause and menopause when you already don't even feel like yourself. So using a handful of these strategies will actually give you some control over your own body. And by knowing how to combat those cravings, you're going to make healthier choices, which is going to help you feel lighter.

and happier and more energetic. I would love to know what you thought about today's episode. So please feel free to drop me a message on Instagram @theashleymalik and tell me which of these strategies you are going to try this week. I can't wait to hear. Have a great week and I will see you back here next Tuesday.