28-Day Plan to Stop Cravings

Find out how to stop those pesky cravings with Dr. Mike Dow’s foolproof plan.

Cravings can be your worst enemy when you’re trying to lose weight. And what a lot of people don’t know is that certain foods can fuel cravings even more, making it harder to resist them. Luckily Dr. Mike Dow has a 28-day plan to stop you from craving the foods that make you gain weight. His plan uses techniques that help retrain your brain to desire foods that fill you up and keep you healthy, rather than empty foods that won’t satiate your hunger.

Week One: Swap Out Salt

Salt is one of the worst craving offenders. It plays tricks on your taste buds, raises blood pressure, and generally triggers cravings for unhealthy, sodium-rich foods. Instead of using salt as a seasoning, try any of these other kinds of seasonings as a healthier alternative: black pepper, basil, cilantro, curry, ginger, oregano, paprika, rosemary, sage, or turmeric.

Week Two: Pair “Booster” Snacks With “Pitfall” Snacks

Pitfall snacks are the kinds of foods you can’t get enough of, like chips and chocolate; everyone’s pitfalls are different, so be sure to focus on the foods that make you go overboard. To help wean your brain off of these addictive foods, make sure to have a booster food handy to pair with something you love. This will begin the association between the two, and help make the booster food more palatable. If you start doing this just twice a day, by alternating bites of your pitfall snacks with booster foods, your brain will start to crave the healthy booster foods, too. For a list of booster foods, click here.

Week Three: Replace 3 Pitfall Foods with 3 Booster Foods

Kick the swapping up a notch by moving from snacks to full meals. If you replace pitfall foods, like fried chicken or thick cream sauces, with booster foods, like grilled chicken and sautéed broccoli, your body will become even more used to the booster foods as you work toward eliminating pitfall foods entirely. Try to replace at least one pitfall meal and two pitfall snacks a day.

Week Four: Eat All Booster Meals

This might be the hardest week, as you’ll replace all your meals with booster meals. You can still indulge in one or two pitfalls snacks a day, but chances are the first three weeks of training won’t have you craving the same unhealthy foods you used to love. If you can make it through your final week almost eliminating all pitfall foods, you’ve successfully retrained your brain to crave all things healthy!