Principle #2 Honor Your Hunger
Long term dieters seem to have an interesting relationship with hunger. In my practice, I work with individuals who are working on healing their relationship with their body and food and let me tell you I have heard some interesting things about hunger.
I’ve heard things like:
“When I feel hunger I am proud of myself because it means my body is burning fat and I’m losing weight.”
another perspective I hear often, “I”m scared of hunger and do all I can to avoid it.”
I want to provide some support, reassurance, and education around the subject of hunger whether you are struggling with not eating enough (dieting) or overeating to avoid feeling hunger.
DIETING & HUNGER
If you are dieting you might find yourself extremely hungry. No matter what you eat it doesn’t feel like enough and you are still hungry even though the diet said to eat THIS certain amount of food. It wasn’t enough. It isn’t enough.
Scientifically speaking if you have been dieting for a long period of time you might be starving. All the water or carrot sticks in the world aren’t going to make that feeling of hunger go away. Your brain might go into a place of primal hunger where all you ever think about is food. If you are an avid avoider of carbs you might be avoiding the types of foods your body needs. If we don’t have enough carbs in our diet the body has to turn to other mechanisms of fueling including taking energy from the protein in muscle.
Maybe you have gotten to the point where you just can’t handle the hunger and deprivation any longer and you have a binge. I want to reassure you this is a normal response to chronic hunger. Your body is trying to compensate and make up for the calories you have been missing out on.
BINGING & HUNGER
Maybe you find yourself in the camp of being fearful of your hunger. You are not alone. This is a common narrative for many many people. If you don’t feel hunger you can begin and to feel hunger again. Some of the reasons you might not be feeling hunger include:
Chronic Dieting. Maybe you have figured out how to divert hunger pangs by drinking water, calorie-free drinks or tea, but it doesn’t really make you feel full. You think you are full but you still feel tired, fatigued, get frequent headaches and experience other problematic symptoms.
Busyness. I have talked with so many people who are so busy then they don’t eat regularly because they don’t feel hungry. This might be that your hunger is ignored. If you are looking to work on the most basic level of self-care it would be to fuel and feed your body.
What is getting in the way of you feeling your hunger?
HELPFUL HUNGER TIPS
It can be helpful to think about hunger and fullness in terms of a scale. Where on a scale of 0-10 a 10 is you are so full you are literally sick and a zero is your stomach is so empty you are beyond hunger pangs and feeling ravenous whereas a 5 on the scale would be considered neutral you are neither hungry or full. When we are over hungry or overfull it can be painful.
Begin practice tuning into your hunger. Hunger will not hurt you but it is extremely important to respond to it and eat. Here are some of the symptoms of hunger that you might be experiencing.
Symptoms of Hunger:
Gnawing in the stomach, mild gurgling
Growling noises
Headache
Difficulty concentrating
Uncomfortable stomach pain
Irritability
Feeling faint (low blood sugar)
Preoccupation with food
In my own experience as an intuitive eater, there is a sweet spot of hunger and fullness. I find when I am at a 3 or so on the scale and I am experiencing some symptoms of hunger from the list above my food tastes better and is more satisfying to me.
If you find yourself preoccupied with food and thinking about it all the time it is likely because you are depriving yourself and you aren’t eating enough food. Our bodies are amazing and they have this incredible ability to tell us what we need to eat, how much we need to eat when we need to eat and even regulate our weight.
There is often a lot of fear around hunger because there is fear around eating and eating too much and possibly gaining weight. This is a process of beginning to trust and listen to your body like you maybe never have before. We will talk more about fullness in a few days, but for now, begin reflecting on how often you feel hungry, when do you feel hungry, when you feel hungry what do you do about it and what do you think about your hunger.
In freedom,
Chelsea
Sources: Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program that Works by Evelyn Tribole & Elyse Resch
Encounter Counseling offers in-person counseling in Grand Junction and online counseling state-wide in Colorado including Denver, Boulder, Ft. Collins and Colorado Springs.