Great tips, Jan W (as usual). Margaret, my little tip workes for me. I bought 6 little entree plates for Xmas dinner in 09. I find if I serve my breakfast & lunch on these, it seems as if I'm having more, a trick of the eye, so to speak.
I too have had to tweak my eating regime, almost cut out bread, have not had pasta now for about 8 weeks, and cut rignt back on the basmati rice. Still haven't managed all that well with the potatoes, but am aware of it, wish I could educate my partner. I too don't seem to have the 'when to stop eating' signals yet, nor has my hunger abated. I read somewhere that a glass of iced water before your meal helps, but it must be very cold. As I have had gallstones in the past, I gave up ice in my drinks over 25 years ago, plus cut right back on the ice-cream, but just before I went sugar free, was eating caramel ice creams, (not Magnum, the other one!) sorry, having a senior moment....anyway I was having one after dinner about 3-4 times a week, plus having caramel in my coffee, PLUS a caramel flavoured coffee powder additive in it as well. But I have been using sucralose (Splenda) for about 5 years now, I used to have 5 pills in my daily (large cup) coffee....have now got it down to 2....I started off with 1 coffee per fortnight, from Gloria Jeans, then when I could no longer afford that, ($5.50 per large one!) started to make my own in the microwave, this then got me up eventually to 2 per day, so just think of all that sugar I stopped putting in to my body. (Thanks Gloria Jeans for getting me hooked on the coffee!! lol)...Other things weren't as much of a problem, I was self-depriving myself of most cakes & was never a big biscuit eater, but would have a Tim Tam once or twice a week, the ones with dark choc on, yummmmm. Still crave those, now & then & I've been fructose free now for just over 6 months now, now my weight has dropped back to 105.00, from 111.4 to 104.00, then back down now in 2011. So, I am now happily going along, but still feeling deprived of my wholegrain bread & pasta. I am contemplating using brown rice, but it's only just a thought at the moment.
So Margaret, don't give up, just start to tweak your eating regime, also check out the net for info on hormone imbalance stuff, it will affect most of us women eventually, here is a link to get you started. It's a lot of reading, but informative. Link:-
http://www.womentowomen.com/
Good Luck with it all, as you have read, we all have our little problems, you are not alone.
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Silver Angel