Suzanne Wright
Health Coach - Blood Sugar Management
Copyright 2025. All Rights Reserved.
How Do You Break The Habit Of Snacking?
Want to stop snacking?
Read on to understand the reasons behind the urge to snack, and practical tips to break the habit.
Jump straight to:
Step 1 in how to stop snacking, is learning to be mindful about your snacking habits.
Notice when you feel hungriest, notice the types of foods that you snack on, and follow these 5 tips to make it easier for you to avoid mindless snacking:
- 1 - Choose low GI snacks
Low GI snacks means Low Glycemic Index snacks. The glycemic index is a handy measure of what a food will do to your blood sugar. A low GI food is likely to be gentle on your blood sugar, meaning it's unlikely to lead to weight gain, and can help to keep your snack cravings under control too.
- 2 - Prepare snacks ahead of time
No-one starts their day planning to eat 3 donuts, 2 packs of crisps and handfuls of honey-coated peanuts. But if you know you're likely to feel peckish between meals. have some healthy snacks prepared, so that you will find it easier to make a healthy choice when the snacking instinct strikes.
- 3 - Prepare to say no
If you're surrounded by people who just love to tempt you with snacks that you know you'll feel guilty eating, you may need to come up with some lines to make it easier to refuse. A simple "I'm good thanks, but that looks lovely, enjoy!" can help to ease a difficult moment.
- 4 - Pick snacks that boost nutrition
A lot of snacks are high in sugar and other refined carbs, but low in vitamins, minerals and protein. Take a look at food labels so that you can educate yourself on what you're eating, and widen your range of snacks to include more nutritious options.
- 5 - Plan WHEN you'll eat
If you know that you usually feel hungry for a snack at 11am, then plan to eat at that time. If you know that skipping lunch leads to snacking on biscuits at 3, then make time to stop at 1 for something more nutritious. Drifting through the day without a plan puts you more at risk of mindless eating.
Remember - snacking isn't "wrong" or "bad", but by snacking mindfully you can make healthier choices.
Want some help with your snacking habits?
A craving is there for a reason -it's your body's way of telling you that something's out of balance.
And if you understand WHY the cravings happen, you can take steps to REDUCE them.
So rather than
- giving in to the urge to snack, or
- going through the pain of denying yourself when you're hungry,
Suzanne will show you how you can LET GO of the cravings altogether.
In this fun, interactive session, you'll learn the 4 simple steps to break that snacking habit!
Want some help with your weight loss strategy?
If you're putting the effort in, I want you to be in the BEST position to achieve your weight loss goals.
Download your free guide, where I'll show you the 5 things to get in order BEFORE you start your diet.
(And no, I'm not going to tell you to clear your fridge out, or download a calorie counting app. There's a lot more science to it than that!)
- 1 - Hormone imbalances
Hormones influence a lot of our snacking instincts and behaviours - and I'm not just talking about sex hormones here. Yes, people do report a greater desire to snack when they are pre-menstrual, or during the menopause. But there are lots of other hormones in the body, and many of them play a part in how your metabolism runs. Stress hormones, reproductive hormones, and especially digestive hormones - they all interact to create a symphony of actions - some of which lead you to snack!
- 2 - Ancient survival instincts
The human body is essentially the same as when we humans lived in small hunter-gatherer groups. And running out of food in those days was a threat to survival. Our bodies have an amazing network of survival instincts, and one of those is to eat food when we see it, just in case it's a while until we find more food later. In short, snacking would have helped our ancestors to survive!
- 3 - Influence of micro-organisms
There's been a huge amount of research into gut microbes in recent years, and it's become clear that many of our desires for food, and reactions to foods, are driven by the tiny bacteria, viruses and fungi that live in our digestive tract. So if you're feeling like a snack, perhaps it's due to the brain-altering chemicals being released by one of the symbiotic creatures that calls your body its home!
Gut microbes are the feature of lots of research at the moment. Check out the British Medical Journal if you want to read more about it.
- 4 - Blood sugar obstruction
If your blood sugar is running low, you are likely to feel like reaching for a snack to pick you up again. But did you know that there are some chemicals in your body that make it more likely that your blood sugar will tend to drop low? You can train your body to avoid these drops, so that you feel the need to snack less often.
Understanding how your body works is the first step to making changes that can help you to be healthier.
Feel like if you could just get more regular, you'd feel less bloated, have a slimmer tummy and maybe lose some KGs?
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- 1 - Oxytocin - social snacking
Oxytocin is the love hormone. It makes us feel good. And it can be activated when we feel socially accepted. So any time you take action that makes you feel less "part of the gang" can risk a small drop in oxytocin. So how does that apply to snacking? Let's say it's birthday time in the office and you say no to cake. Or you don't go out for coffee with the others. Or you refuse a chocolate from the Quality Street tin when it's offered to you. All these snack-related things can contribute to a disruption in your oxytocin, and it gets harder and harder not to say yes!
- 2 - Cortisol -stress snacking
Cortisol is released in times of stress. It causes an increase in blood pressure, difficulty sleeping, and increased food cravings, especially for carbohydrate-rich snack foods. So if you are stressed, and finding yourself thinking about snacks all the time, it could be that cortisol is to blame.
- 3 - Dopamine - habitual snacking
Dopamine is the reward hormone. It's linked to all kinds of addictions, as it's released whenever you complete a thing that you get a thrill out of. You might not think that snacking is particularly thrilling, but even bite-sized thrills like scrolling through one more video on social media can lead to mini releases of dopamine. So if you find yourself compelled to have just one more biscuit. And then another one. It could be because your body is craving the dopamine that it gets each time you "reward" yourself with a snack.
Although hormones can influence how you feel about snacking, you can actually influence how some of your hormones behave by changing your habits.
Find other ways to boost your oxytocin, reduce cortisol and balance dopamine, and you might just find that your snacking urges reduce.
Considering Ozempic/Semaglutide to help suppress your appetite?
Read my take on it....
SWEET TOOTH?
- 1 - Satisfied, satiated and free of cravings for hours
This sounds pretty good, doesn't it? This is what can happen if you make positive decisions about snacking. Keeping your body in balance so that you have less urges for unplanned snacks, and choosing positive snacks that suit your body - these behaviours can lead to great feelings!
Notice when you feel like this, and the exact feeling you get.
Some people like to anchor that feeling by squeezing the thumb and forefinger together.
Then, when you are faced with another snacking decision, you can squeeze your thumb and forefinger together again, to remind yourself of that feeling, and make a conscious decision about whether you'd like to feel that way again.
- 2 - Guilty, stuffed, but hungry again soon after
If you recognise this feeling, it's likely that you are in a pattern of eating snacks that don't suit your body. You're on the carbohydrate rollercoaster, and it's not much fun.
It may help you to explore this - write down how you feel physically and emotionally after eating those unfulfilling snacks, and make a conscious decision to try a different approach. Wouldn't it be great not to be thinking about your next snack all the time?
You get to choose how you feel!
Want some help with your weight loss strategy?
If you're putting the effort in, I want you to be in the BEST position to achieve your weight loss goals.
Download your free guide, where I'll show you the 5 things to get in order BEFORE you start your diet.
(And no, I'm not going to tell you to clear your fridge out, or download a calorie counting app. There's a lot more science to it than that!)
The number one reason why we snack is...
Because we aren't eating foods that suit our bodies.
Each and every one of us has our own unique reactions to foods.
For some, a bacon sandwich, or a smoothie, or 3 weetabixes can fill us up and keep hunger at bay for hour.
For others, that same meal will lead to intense hunger cravings that make snacking almost impossible to avoid.
If you are finding that the snacking urge hits day after day, and you just can't stop, then that's a sure sign that your body isn't responding well to the foods that you are eating.
It's probably just a handful of the foods that you include in your day, but identifying what those foods are, and switching them for something that suits you better will make your snack cravigns MUCH easier to manage.
If you'd like to stop snacking, come along to my next free Snackbuster webinar, where I'll outline the 4 simple steps to kick the snacking habit.
Click HERE to find out more and book your free spot.
Want some help with your snacking habits?
A craving is there for a reason -it's your body's way of telling you that something's out of balance.
And if you understand WHY the cravings happen, you can take steps to REDUCE them.
So rather than
- giving in to the urge to snack, or
- going through the pain of denying yourself when you're hungry,
Suzanne will show you how you can LET GO of the cravings altogether.