Recognising Hunger/Full

IonaEllen123

Hi,
I never feel full or hungry. I had a tough year and food was the first thing I went for & alot of it. Alot of advice when dieting is only eat when your hungry & stop when your full...I don't recognise either. A women gave me advice (it's what she did) to basically starve myself, she did it for 4days...It doesn't sound the healthiest of ways & I love food to much lol.
Any help/advice?

Thanks

kommodevaran

There is more than one way to Rome.

1. Look up "the hunger scale" (Google it). Read about mindful and intuitive eating. Practice some of the exercises.
2. Plan and schedule meals at regular intervals, and sit down and eat at those times.
3. You don't have to "feel" hungry and full. You just have to eat what your body needs every day. MFP helps you do that, by setting calorie/nutrition goals and logging intake.

jenilla1

IonaEllen123 wrote: »

Hi,
...A women gave me advice (it's what she did) to basically starve myself, she did it for 4days...

She gave you bad advice. What exactly was that supposed to accomplish?
I like the advice given above. Take that instead.

ladyreva78

kommodevaran wrote: »

There is more than one way to Rome.

1. Look up "the hunger scale" (Google it). Read about mindful and intuitive eating. Practice some of the exercises.
2. Plan and schedule meals at regular intervals, and sit down and eat at those times.
3. You don't have to "feel" hungry and full. You just have to eat what your body needs every day. MFP helps you do that, by setting calorie/nutrition goals and logging intake.

This is good advice.

My hunger/full cues are completely messed up - I think a few wires got crossed somewhere along the lines and as a result mis-communicate. If I followed those, I'd be back at 115kg before the year's over. I have to relearn how to interpret that communication and learn exactly what it means in the context of my body. One year in, I still get it wrong (did a test run over Christmas... not very conclusive yet).

Meal planning (and sticking to the plan/schedule) is helping a lot. It takes the guessing out of eating and even if it feels silly sometimes, I'll sit down in the evening and sketch out the meals for the next day, taking into account what I have in the fridge/pantry, where I'll be when I'm planing to eat and whether I need to stop at the grocery store on the way home.

Oddly enough, being somewhat rigid with my planning/scheduling also means I can be more flexible when I eat out (about once a week) as I can allocate the necessary calories for that and not worry about my nutrition in general for that one meal. If I want chocolate cake for that meal... then I'll have chocolate cake (happens sometimes, one of the places we go to tends to have sinfully good desserts that are totally worth the splurge).

Sheisinlove109

Eat healthy, balanced meals and your hunger/full feeling should kick back in. Make sure you are eating the right amount of calories for your height/weight and activity levels.

TimothyFish

I've heard of people with this condition. It can be dangerous because they forget to eat and can end up starving themselves. If you aren't forgetting to eat then my guess is that you probably do experience hunger but you may not have associated the sensation with the word "hunger." It could also be that you eat so much that you simply haven't experienced it in a while. I find that fasting once in a while helps remind me what real hunger is.

kommodevaran

I forgot to mention - if you are eating at maintenance or slightly under, and splitting your daily intake into two or more meals per day, you will never experience any hunger or fullness beyond slightly feeling the one or the other. Healthy hungry and full aren't very far apart. The feelings are very subtle, and "hunger" (a joke, really, a tasteless joke when you consider what hunger is) can be confused with appetite or cravings and ignored for hours without any problems. This is actually a bit important, because we aren't supposed to spend hours obsessing over "is it time to eat now, or now, am I hungry, or just a bit peckish, or". I'm guilty of this myself, so I don't feel too bad criticizing this habit, lol.

I also agree that appetite will tend to be more in line with actual needs when you eat properly, when you get in enough of good, varied, nutritious and fresh food every day.

annacole94

Decide that the next thing you're going to eat is an apple.

Wait until that sounds delicious. Congratulations! You're hungry!

FitBody3

I think its different for everyone. For example , i realize that I am hungry when I cant concentrate on the things I am doing and all I can think of is food . I realize I am full by eating REALLY slowly and I know that I am full when my stomach no longer feels empty .
However when I eat at home , I usually measure everything so that I know that I will eat the whole thing and not waste half of it. I have been doing this for years now so I know how much my body should eat etc.

GottaBurnEmAll

kommodevaran wrote: »

There is more than one way to Rome.

1. Look up "the hunger scale" (Google it). Read about mindful and intuitive eating. Practice some of the exercises.
2. Plan and schedule meals at regular intervals, and sit down and eat at those times.
3. You don't have to "feel" hungry and full. You just have to eat what your body needs every day. MFP helps you do that, by setting calorie/nutrition goals and logging intake.

I agree with this.

My hunger signals are messed up from years of emotional eating.

When I first started on MFP, I employed the strategy of prelogging my day, and having that plan in place along with learning to eat slowly and mindfully was instrumental in getting past the need to feel stuffed to shut of my eating.

I also employed the thinking of "this is what my body needs in that first year.

As time has gone on, I've added more of a schedule to my eating and no longer prelog, but I have a loose idea in my head of what I'm going to eat and a general idea of the calories involved.

Ming1951

It took me some time to recognize real hunger, even today after being on my weight loss for 5 months. Before each meal I drink 10 oz of water. When I finish eating if I think I am still hungry for more I drink another. Then I find something to do preferably outdoors even If its just walking around a bit looking at all the work I have to do this Spring. I like to snack after dinner so I usually save my snacks/extra calories for late afternoon or evening . It seems to work for me.

GottaBurnEmAll

kommodevaran wrote: »

I forgot to mention - if you are eating at maintenance or slightly under, and splitting your daily intake into two or more meals per day, you will never experience any hunger or fullness beyond slightly feeling the one or the other. Healthy hungry and full aren't very far apart. The feelings are very subtle, and "hunger" (a joke, really, a tasteless joke when you consider what hunger is) can be confused with appetite or cravings and ignored for hours without any problems. This is actually a bit important, because we aren't supposed to spend hours obsessing over "is it time to eat now, or now, am I hungry, or just a bit peckish, or". I'm guilty of this myself, so I don't feel too bad criticizing this habit, lol.

I also agree that appetite will tend to be more in line with actual needs when you eat properly, when you get in enough of good, varied, nutritious and fresh food every day.

Also? Sleep. If you're not getting enough sleep it will mess up your hunger signals.

FitBody3

GottaBurnEmAll wrote: »

kommodevaran wrote: »

I forgot to mention - if you are eating at maintenance or slightly under, and splitting your daily intake into two or more meals per day, you will never experience any hunger or fullness beyond slightly feeling the one or the other. Healthy hungry and full aren't very far apart. The feelings are very subtle, and "hunger" (a joke, really, a tasteless joke when you consider what hunger is) can be confused with appetite or cravings and ignored for hours without any problems. This is actually a bit important, because we aren't supposed to spend hours obsessing over "is it time to eat now, or now, am I hungry, or just a bit peckish, or". I'm guilty of this myself, so I don't feel too bad criticizing this habit, lol.

I also agree that appetite will tend to be more in line with actual needs when you eat properly, when you get in enough of good, varied, nutritious and fresh food every day.

Also? Sleep. If you're not getting enough sleep it will mess up your hunger signals.

This is so true !! I had a week where I was literally only sleeping 5 hours every night and during the day I could not stop eating.

Rogstar

annacole94 wrote: »

Decide that the next thing you're going to eat is an apple.

Wait until that sounds delicious. Congratulations! You're hungry!

Ha! My mother repeatedly said "If you're not hungry enough to eat a banana, you're not hungry!"

That was really just to get us to stop snacking on chips and cookies after school. I still don't like bananas all that much...

TimothyFish

Rogstar wrote: »

annacole94 wrote: »

Decide that the next thing you're going to eat is an apple.

Wait until that sounds delicious. Congratulations! You're hungry!

Ha! My mother repeatedly said "If you're not hungry enough to eat a banana, you're not hungry!"

That was really just to get us to stop snacking on chips and cookies after school. I still don't like bananas all that much...

I must be hungry all the time.