How much hunger do you consider acceptable?

CattOfTheGarage

Jeyradan wrote: »

I often find that - despite not feeling hungry - I get weak, shaky, or can't keep up my normal walking pace and have to slow down... I occasionally get it after what I'd judge to be a perfectly adequate meal, too.

If it was me, I'd consult a doctor about that. It's the fact it sometimes happens after you've eaten, when there's no reason to be hungry, that would make me wonder if it needed investigated. Maybe your blood sugar fluctuates more than normal for some reason?

Derpy_Hooves

Years ago a friend, who's always been slim, said to me that a she doesn't mind being a bit hungry when it wasn't dinner time yet.
This was such an eye opener for me! To me a rumbling stomach meant I had to get food. Fast.
Now I know I won't die or faint if I have to wait a little longer. I'm actually getting a bit pekish right now, but it's a little early for my mid-morning snack (green smootie), so it's fine to wait.

akf2000

This blog post really helped me identify/ categorise and confront hunger. It's a kind of.. err.. freeform poetry I guess and may not be to everyone's liking.

bluetrumpet01

none, i don't find hunger to be acceptable. it is way too easy to have a banana or some other ~100 calorie snack that'll curb my appetite so that i don't want to devour everything the next time a meal comes around

bvff35

CattOfTheGarage wrote: »

Ah, but food is ALWAYS on my mind, hungry or not. If I'm not eating it, I'm cooking it, reading about it, boring people with food history lectures or making up recipes in my head.

If I took food related thoughts as an indication of hunger, I'd never stop eating.(Come to think of it, maybe that's what got me into this mess).

Ahh yes I am the same way. My coworkers make fun of me for how much i can eat...and I am ALWAYS eating. I'm on here trying to eat healthier but it is so tough when I really feel like im starving ALL THE TIME. I'm just now trying to get back to this and hunger is by far the worst. If you find anything that helps you besides the usual stuff like getting enough protein, fiber, staying hydrated, etc please let me know. I feel like my body only has 2 hunger settings: starving & stuffed.

slaughtermonique12

I'm having a problem with eating the 1440 calories recommended by mfp. I'm in ketosis and don't really get hungry. When I do feel hungry, I eat a high fat, low carb meal and then I'm full and my hunger doesn't really come back. I don't feel any ill side effects, on the contrary, I feel great!

dykask

A few years ago when I dropped about 12 kg, I was painfully starving all the time. I was still very hungry after eating. Nothing worked, coffee, many light meals, different foods or distractions. The only thing that stopped the raging hunger was enough calories. At least I was able to still sleep so it wasn't 24/7, only when I was awake. To me the calorie deficit stretched out the pain.

Finally I sort of gave in and added enough healthy snacks to stop the hunger, mostly nuts. I also started allowing myself an ice cream bar when I had a good work out. I switched my focus to trying to lose by working out. The result was a weight plateau, although I did trim down some I slowly gained weight. But I only gained back about 2 Kg over two years, still down 10 kg.

About a month ago I started getting serious and decided it is time to move my weight from around 93 kg to more towards 80 kg. I cut the snacks and the deserts and the hunger came back but at more manageable level. Instead of feeling like I must eat I feel like I could eat more. Something has changed. Maybe two years of hard workouts, maybe something else. Now the hunger is at a level I can handle, a little uncomfortable but not over-whelming.

CattOfTheGarage

bvff35 wrote: »

CattOfTheGarage wrote: »

Ah, but food is ALWAYS on my mind, hungry or not. If I'm not eating it, I'm cooking it, reading about it, boring people with food history lectures or making up recipes in my head.

If I took food related thoughts as an indication of hunger, I'd never stop eating.(Come to think of it, maybe that's what got me into this mess).

Ahh yes I am the same way. My coworkers make fun of me for how much i can eat...and I am ALWAYS eating. I'm on here trying to eat healthier but it is so tough when I really feel like im starving ALL THE TIME. I'm just now trying to get back to this and hunger is by far the worst. If you find anything that helps you besides the usual stuff like getting enough protein, fiber, staying hydrated, etc please let me know. I feel like my body only has 2 hunger settings: starving & stuffed.

My food obsession isn't really like that, it doesn't make me crave food particularly, I just see everything through a food lens. I've always been like that. My clearest childhood memories are food related. I'm not trying to change that, it's just how my mind works, and means I know A LOT about food and cooking! Not always a bad thing, but when food is a passion like that it's hard not to be overweight. I do want to eat most of what I see, but it's not hunger or even cravings. It's like Everest - it's because it's THERE. I want the experience.

But I do know what you mean about going from stuffed to starving. I've gone through phases like that. For me it's been related to periods of overeating, so I think it meant my stomach was stretched a bit big and after a while of eating less it shrank down and the feeling went away. The other time I had it was after childbirth, the weirdest hungry/full feelings that made no sense at all - I think my stomach was springing back into shape after having been squashed up for so long. It took a week or so to settle.

If it's been going on for a while, could it be emotional hunger ? I've had that a lot and it follows that starving/stuffed pattern, although it is a different feeling from actual hunger and I've learned to distinguish them.

Otherwise, try changing the meal size and spacing. Some like to eat little and often, others stay more satisfied with one big meal and a couple of light ones (me). You can go further down that route and it becomes intermittent fasting (IF). What keeps you satisfied is very individual to you.

Katleskin

I have no problem feeling mildly hungry, I find it makes whatever I end up eating taste better. I do plan and space my meals and snacks to best avoid being utterly starving though. Primarily because, if left for too long, my hunger manifests itself by making me feel faint/dizzy/sick. Often I don't even feel the need for or crave food, I just feel ill, and that's how I know I'm hungry.

I genuinely think people feel hunger differently. My husband could easily go 48 hours without eating (though he doesn't now he lives with me!) and wouldn't even notice it, if I go more than 4 to 5 hours without at least a piece of fruit or nuts or something I can feel utterly wretched. Tummy grumbles are fine, nausea isn't. I think that's probably one of the reasons I ended up overweight - if you feel poorly and it can be fixed with food, you're gonna eat, aren't you? I probably snack more now than I ever did but it's the right stuff at the right time.

TehLaughingDog

I honestly rarely feel hungry and feel like I'm eating a ton. But if I ever do get hungry my first sign is a splitting headache.

I think it's about the types of foods. If I drink my water (12+ cups), eat high fat and eat high protein I'm never hungry. When I eat carbs (which right now is moderate carbs) I'm eating veggies and fruit to ensure I'm getting in that fiber. Rarely I eat packaged foods and if I do want a treat then I let myself have it if it fits my macros. Oh and eating back some exercise calories really helps too since I only feel hungry after intense cardio.

girlinahat

I like the feeling of being not quite full, and as one of the posters above said, being hungry half an hour before mealtime is good, and anything up to an hour is okay.

I try and have full meals when I eat, with no snacking between. I KNOW I can last without eating until my next mealtime, and for me snacking is a path which leads to me not keeping tabs on how much I eat. Three meals a day, three proper meals with enough protein and fat (and sometimes carb heavy if that's what I need) to keep me satisfied is great. Being hungry before a meal is a good thing as it makes me really appreciate what it is I'm eating, but being too hungry before a meal makes me gorge.

but there is a point where hunger gets too much - yesterday I had meetings in two different locations, and didn't get lunch, with breakfast having been around 8am. Rather than stop and eat at 4pm I kept driving to get home before the traffic got too heavy, meaning my 'lunchtime' was around 5.30pm. I had headaches, I felt rubbish, and the upshot was I ended up eating toast for dinner a couple of hours later - which isn't what I class as a proper 'meal'. In the end I just went to bed as I felt so awful. I don't want to be in a situation like that where eating or not eating properly makes me feel bad.

Kaitou

0 hunger is acceptable for me. If I'm hungry, I eat. That will never change. If deliberate hunger were a requirement for weight loss, I wouldn't bother with it.

Francl27

I think it's different for everyone. It's different for me depending on the time of the month. On a normal day, hunger doesn't bother me. Before my period, I got straight from a little bit hungry to HANGRY and feeling sick if I don't eat.

Heartisalonelyhunter

I honestly don't care about being hungry. I think it's because in my old job I never had time to eat lunch and I never eat breakfast anyway so I got used to not eating until later in the day. I guess I trained my body that way. But even now if I get hungry and I'm somewhere that it's not practical to get food (or there is no food I want to eat) I am fine to wait a few hours. It wears off after a bit.
I will say that I am often very tired (I only get about 5 hours right now)but am not able to nap during the day and have to wait until all my kids are asleep to go to bed at night. And sometimes I want to rip my husband's clothes off but I have to wait until an appropriate time! To me being hungry/tired/horny are all physical impulses/demands and dont need to be gratified immediately . No one ever starved to death from not eating for a few hours or even a whole day.

Angierae75

For me, unless my stomach is grumbling, I figure I'm just at "I could eat". I leave work at 5:30 and we usually eat dinner around 6:30-6:45, so if I'm leaving work and my stomach is rumbling, that's fine. I also space out snacks, though - I eat at 9, 11 (very small snack, usually fruit or veg) 12:30, 3ish and then dinner at 6:30-7 and a snack around 9 or 10. The only time I ever really get a grumbly tummy is between lunch and dinner.

When people say "stomach pangs" do you mean actual pain, or just a grumbly rumbly tummy?

endlessfall16

Larissa_NY wrote: »

I don't really care about feeling hungry. It's a minor annoyance that goes away as soon as I eat anything and I'm never more than ten or twelve hours away from a meal (if that) so I honestly don't get what the big deal is.

Pretty much the only time I consider it unacceptable is when I get dizzy and shaky, and that doesn't feel like hunger, it just feels like dizziness and shakiness. Other than that, it's extremely rare that I make it past "slightly hungry" on that scale.

This post could have been written by me. It identifies how my body "feels" and my approach to eating. Funny thing is..I bet Larissa_NY and I are probably world apart (background, location, gender..) but this goes to show that two persons, however different, could be very alike in "weight" behaviors.


@Larissa_NY, I'm just curious. Where are you in your weight progress?

(I am sitting at 24.7 BMI, which is made possible by the approach in question.)

Dove0804

Larissa_NY wrote: »

I don't really care about feeling hungry. It's a minor annoyance that goes away as soon as I eat anything and I'm never more than ten or twelve hours away from a meal (if that) so I honestly don't get what the big deal is.

Pretty much the only time I consider it unacceptable is when I get dizzy and shaky, and that doesn't feel like hunger, it just feels like dizziness and shakiness. Other than that, it's extremely rare that I make it past "slightly hungry" on that scale.

I agree! If I feel weak, dizzy, shaky or actual stomach pain at all, that's completely unacceptable to me and I will have a small snack no matter how many calories I was aiming for that day. Otherwise, I'm okay with hunger, but it took a while to get there.

I think I've had to re-train my brain about how it perceives hunger. I think especially in the U.S. we've kind of become afraid of feeling anything remotely like hunger, so we snack all day long and eat until we're uncomfortably full. I've had to teach myself "You're not dying. You're not even close to dying. You are totally okay with not eating for another 30 minutes." Then when I do eat food, it usually is so much more satisfying.

I definitely can't eat as much in one sitting as I used to be able to, and I'm satisfied much more easily, to the point where I am surprised when I calculate the calories because I am always sure I ate a lot more than that. I attribute a lot of that to letting myself just "sit" with hunger sometimes and trying to be more patient. It's almost like my body started saying "oh.. yeah, I guess you're right. I don't need THAT much food. I'll take it down a notch".

CattOfTheGarage

Angierae75 wrote: »

When people say "stomach pangs" do you mean actual pain, or just a grumbly rumbly tummy?

I've never had stomach pain due to hunger, and I've always been puzzled by the phrase "hunger pains". The hunger feeling I get can be intense, but it's nothing like pain. If I'm getting pain in my stomach, it means I've got indigestion or a tummy bug, and it makes me less inclined to eat, not more. If I let hunger go too far I'll get headaches and nausea, but not stomach pain. So I always assumed "hunger pains" was figurative - is it? Or do others get actual pain when hungry?

abatonfan

I don't find hunger to be too bad for me. More recently, I tend to get it around 10AM-noon(ish) on days where I have clinicals, but I know that is because I eat breakfast at 4:30AM those days. I start getting those stomach gurgles, but they tend to fade within 2-3 hours if I cannot pull myself away to eat lunch yet (unfortunately, there's times where I'm so busy that I don't get the chance to eat again until 3-3:30PM). One of the things I'm trying to work on now is finding out if I need to eat a snack before I report in around 6:45-7:30AM (even though I am still satisfied from breakfast) in order to prevent the 10AM gurgles.

The big thing for me is identifying hunger hunger versus emotional/boredom hunger versus out-of-target blood sugar hunger. I get hungry if my BG high or low. If I am hungry again 1-2 hours after eating a meal/snack, 95% of the time it's because the meal is spiking me into the 180-200s+, or I am epicly low. Typically, treating low-BG hunger is simply me eating a few grams of rapid-acting carbs to bring myself back into my target, while high BG hunger would be treated with water, some correction insulin (if appropriate), exercise (to further help bring me down), and maybe a low-carb snack if I am still ravenous after trying the above strategies.

akf2000

Embrace the gurgles! (The message brought to you by Big Gurgle)