Is being hungry part of it?
celiah909
Posts: 141 Member
Do you think learning to be a little hungry is part of weight loss in the beginning?
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Replies
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Being hungry is part of being alive. You're not supposed to be more hungry while losing weight. Your body stores and uses energy in a continuous cycle; losing weight is just about slightly shortening the storing periods and slightly lengthening the expending periods. Learning to handle hunger sensibly is very smart. Trying to ignore hunger sensations when you're in fact undereating, is stupid.18
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of course. Takes alot of practice for sure. Overall being starving and unhappy and feeling deprived is not necessary, But its healthy and very beneficial to learn that hunger isnt the end of the world. I got fat when i started getting shakey non stop from constant blood sugar rises and crashes, I literally didnt know anymore what actual hunger felt like. Learning to feel hunger was a true win for me. Started the entire journey.7
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Yes but not only in the beginning. Learn to live with some hunger in your life, you'll be better off for it.13
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Agree with all comments. My understanding is it's helpful to tune into what degree of hunger you're feeling. Low-level hunger does not have to be answered by extra food. When I have strong hunger, I do eat something, trying to choose well, before my hunger drives me to make a poor choice. I'm learning about mindfulness and eating (essentially awareness and focus of everything related to eating) and this thread makes me think bringing "mindfulness" (awareness) to the experience of hunger will be helpful.2
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Ironandwine69 wrote: »
Yes, I agree. I think a lot of mine is mental. I’ve gotten used to eating past being satisfied
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Perhaps eating different foods say like veggies or lower calorie higher volume foods will help. This is how I approached it.4
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Yes. Feeling like Hunger is bad and something to be avoided is a first world problem. Most people in the world get hungry and stay hungry until they are able to get their next meal. Here is the United States food is so easy and fast. That is why we have an obesity problem. We feel hungry, we grab some chips, or stop at McDonalds. The hunger we know is not our bodies saying we need nourishment to live, it is our body saying our tummy is empty.
It is OK to feel hungry until your next meal time. It is OK to not feel completely satisfied after you eat. That is how most of the world lives, it might even be good for us.6 -
It took me a while to differentiate between what I call "mental hunger" (I wanna eat something because I'm bored/stressed/used to eating in front of the tv) and "body hunger" (grumbling stomach gnawing feeling or shaky/tired).
My rule of thumb is eat something if it's body hunger, or set a timer ant wait 10 minutes if it's mental hunger. Often 10 minutes later I'm no longer "hungry."
My sister uses the "broccoli rule." If she's hungry enough to eat raw broccoli, she's really hungry, not just bored or whatever.8 -
I'm down 27 pounds and counting and am only hungry because I usually wait to eat breakfast until I do feel a little hungry. Usually this means I am naturally doing intermittent fasting as I am generally not hungry until 10-11 am. I just go with what my body says. Depending on what I ate for lunch (and if I am saving cals for a big dinner) I may get a little hungry before dinner but that is rare. So I don't think hunger is a necessity to lose weight. But, I do think every body is different.1
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Of course you are going to be hungry. You are eating less than your body needs to maintain weight. You are going to be hungry.7
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It may sound weird, but I actually feel better now when I go to bed somewhat hungry. Back in my overeating days, I had to be full to feel good.
After maintaining now for going on to two years, I sleep better and feel better in general when I’m not stuffed with food. I’ve also a love-hate relationship with baked goods.... I love to eat them, but when I do, they make my belly feel bloated and heavy. I don’t think I’m gluten tolerant. It’s more a head thing. But I feel more energetic and my mood is better when I focus my diet on veg, protein and whole grains like steel cut oats.....1 -
Trying to avoid hunger within your means is natural. You shouldn't feel guilty for not wanting to be hungry. It is, afterall, an unpleasant feeling and it's natural to not want to have unpleasant feelings. However, feeling hungry sometimes is also natural and learning to deal with it from time to time is a useful skill. If you know you're getting in enough calories (not undereating) you know you're fine even if you feel a little hungry sometimes. If you're hungry all the time, however, it would be smart to troubleshoot and try different things to see what helps you feel less hungry while keeping to your calories.2
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Hunger is supposed to be unpleasant, and eating is supposed to be pleasant, because we have to eat, we need the urge to find food, and to eat, to keep us alive. But hunger is not supposed to be debilitating. We can move, think and talk, even hunt (or at least cook; it will even feel more rewarding). Feeling hungry when generally safe and well-nourished is an enjoyable sensation - you are looking forward to a good meal which you are certain will come. Being hungry, and uncertain if you will be fed, maybe even malnourished - and the bizarre scenario many of us have been facing daily, for years: surrounded with free goodies and too scared to eat... that sucks. We misuse the word hunger, and we abuse food. We have access to computers and/or smartphones, right? We can afford enough good quality food, right?2
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I don't think so. I had a few goals beyond weight loss when I started and one was that I didn't want to have to go hungry. That doesn't mean I haven't been hungry in the middle of doing something and needed to get somewhere to get food or that I don't sometimes wake up in the morning hungry. It means I've never felt I couldn't eat because I was trying to lose weight, if that makes sense.
However, there's a difference between being hungry and having cravings, being bored and wanting to eat or not being full. In the beginning it can be hard to distinguish between those things. So early on it's important to practice identifying the differences and making wise choices on how/what/when to eat.
I could never accept that if I wanted to lose weight I just had to go hungry sometimes. Having said that, part of my plan involved me losing weight more slowly than I might otherwise have been able to do. I have always been ok with that because another important goal for me has been to keep the weight off permanently and I feel more confident in my ability to do so doing it the way I am.
I don't think it's the end of the world if you do sometimes feel go hungry or that it means you're doing it wrong. The truth is I'm pretty pampered and wanted to make the process as easy as possible. LOL5 -
Yes! It took me a while to learn "hunger is not an emergancy". I used I almost panic at the first signs of hunger, and always expect to feel full. Feeling hungry before you eat & btwn meals is fine, normal, and makes food even better (the French have a saying "the banquet is in the first bite" basically meaning you experience food best when you come to a meal hungry). It's all about finding where a tolerable band of hunger is, versus when you need to eat. I can actually tell the difference now between my habitual-it's-meal-time hunger and I need fuel. Partly from the foods I want, I crave veggies and protein when it's the latter and feel satisfied and happy after eating them!3
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I think you have to ask yourself if you are HUNGRY, or you just want to eat. There's a huge difference.
I try and eat every 2-3hrs. Something. So I don't get hungry, but if I get in a situation where I "skip" a snack, I'm not a nice person. LOL
But there's always those times where you've eaten and 1hr later you want something else. That is the time where I have to say NO.3 -
One thing I've learned to do is pace myself with my meals and snacks. I tend to be more hungry / want to eat more in the late afternoon and evening. So if I get up early (today it was 5:30) I didn't eat breakfast until almost 9 - I wasn't really that hungry - had some coffee, drank 4 cups of water...took the dog for a walk...all before eating my breakfast. I try to space my meals out longer stretches so that I have enough calories left for the time of day that I'm most suffering from the munchies.
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I find most of time I am not really hungry but bored. I usually eat the same thing for breakfast and then not again until lunch. I notice I am hungry when I have move around a lot more than normal or if I am simple bored. Now lunch to dinner can be different because I change my meals, but if I make sure that I have a decent amount of protein and a big amount of veg (sometimes a whole steamer bag) That I am good until 4ish then I need a snack to hold me over till dinner.0
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Yep, unfortunately I think that losing weight means learning to live with a little hunger. It's just not something your body will be used to at first, but it doesn't have to be too unpleasant.
As people have already pointed out there's a difference between mental hunger and "real" hunger. Someone gave me a good tip for distinguishing between them; basically have a nourishing but not particularly appealing snack in the fridge at all times (in this case it was the weight watchers point free soup), if you think you're hungry, ask yourself if you want the snack. If the answer is yes, then great! you're hungry, eat something. If the answer is no, then you're probably not actually hungry you're just bored, peckish, having a craving etc.
As long as you're not starving yourself, you'll learn to live with it.1 -
A lot of time, "hunger" is actually thirst. Drink more and you might find yourself less hungry.3
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I found that for my first three weeks on a serious (600-700) calorie deficit, I was often quite hungry a few hours after my last meal. I found distraction, water, and dill pickles to be the best way to deal with it, in that order: if concentrating on something important didn't help, then I'd have a glass of water; if I was still hungry 10 minutes later, I'd eat a pickle.
After about three weeks, it got a lot easier. My guess is that I had adapted to more readily using stored fat cells as energy.0 -
Feeling "not done" after a meal=yes
Nausea, light-headedness, headaches=no2 -
bronaghCPM wrote: »Yep, unfortunately I think that losing weight means learning to live with a little hunger. It's just not something your body will be used to at first, but it doesn't have to be too unpleasant.
As people have already pointed out there's a difference between mental hunger and "real" hunger. Someone gave me a good tip for distinguishing between them; basically have a nourishing but not particularly appealing snack in the fridge at all times (in this case it was the weight watchers point free soup), if you think you're hungry, ask yourself if you want the snack. If the answer is yes, then great! you're hungry, eat something. If the answer is no, then you're probably not actually hungry you're just bored, peckish, having a craving etc.
As long as you're not starving yourself, you'll learn to live with it.
I use this method but I use a salad! I hate salad and make myself eat it 1 or 2 a week, I like all the veg in a salad but something about iceberg is just yuck. We always have a salad in the fridge my husbands favorite food. I know I a truly hungry if I pull out that salad to eat. (normally I add spinach and it isn't too bad)1 -
It is. Say what you will about macros or finding foods that keep you full but at the end of the day, eating below maintenance will leave you hungry sometimes. It shouldn't be all consuming nor stop you from functioning but there are definitely points when you need some willpower to stay on track.0
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I'm sorry, but all of this is blowing my mind. Being hungry is a good thing? Who feels good when your stomach is growling non-stop? I can't stand it when my stomach growls. I get, what some may call, "hangry". When I'm hungry, I turn into a raging a-hole. I have to have food, always! Maybe that's why I can't lose weight. I struggle with it, for sure. I think I may be addicted to food. High levels of salt is also in my diet. I want to stop, but I don't know how. It scares me because as soon as my stomach growls I freak out.
I think my problem is mentality. For example, people who smoke cigarettes need nicotine to feel better when they are stressed out or angry. I need food when I feel stressed out or angry. How do I defeat this?1 -
idare_fitness wrote: »I'm sorry, but all of this is blowing my mind. Being hungry is a good thing? Who feels good when your stomach is growling non-stop? I can't stand it when my stomach growls. I get, what some may call, "hangry". When I'm hungry, I turn into a raging a-hole. I have to have food, always! Maybe that's why I can't lose weight. I struggle with it, for sure. I think I may be addicted to food. High levels of salt is also in my diet. I want to stop, but I don't know how. It scares me because as soon as my stomach growls I freak out.
I think my problem is mentality. For example, people who smoke cigarettes need nicotine to feel better when they are stressed out or angry. I need food when I feel stressed out or angry. How do I defeat this?
Practice. Youll get there
Welcome to MFP 0 -
JaydedMiss wrote: »idare_fitness wrote: »I'm sorry, but all of this is blowing my mind. Being hungry is a good thing? Who feels good when your stomach is growling non-stop? I can't stand it when my stomach growls. I get, what some may call, "hangry". When I'm hungry, I turn into a raging a-hole. I have to have food, always! Maybe that's why I can't lose weight. I struggle with it, for sure. I think I may be addicted to food. High levels of salt is also in my diet. I want to stop, but I don't know how. It scares me because as soon as my stomach growls I freak out.
I think my problem is mentality. For example, people who smoke cigarettes need nicotine to feel better when they are stressed out or angry. I need food when I feel stressed out or angry. How do I defeat this?
Practice. Youll get there Welcome to MFP
Well, at least I'm here. Baby steps.2 -
idare_fitness wrote: »I'm sorry, but all of this is blowing my mind. Being hungry is a good thing? Who feels good when your stomach is growling non-stop? I can't stand it when my stomach growls. I get, what some may call, "hangry". When I'm hungry, I turn into a raging a-hole. I have to have food, always! Maybe that's why I can't lose weight. I struggle with it, for sure. I think I may be addicted to food. High levels of salt is also in my diet. I want to stop, but I don't know how. It scares me because as soon as my stomach growls I freak out.
I think my problem is mentality. For example, people who smoke cigarettes need nicotine to feel better when they are stressed out or angry. I need food when I feel stressed out or angry. How do I defeat this?
Take up smoking?
J/K 0 -
idare_fitness wrote: »I'm sorry, but all of this is blowing my mind. Being hungry is a good thing? Who feels good when your stomach is growling non-stop? I can't stand it when my stomach growls. I get, what some may call, "hangry". When I'm hungry, I turn into a raging a-hole. I have to have food, always! Maybe that's why I can't lose weight. I struggle with it, for sure. I think I may be addicted to food. High levels of salt is also in my diet. I want to stop, but I don't know how. It scares me because as soon as my stomach growls I freak out.
I think my problem is mentality. For example, people who smoke cigarettes need nicotine to feel better when they are stressed out or angry. I need food when I feel stressed out or angry. How do I defeat this?
Take up smoking?
J/K
LOL. You're funny. Actually, believe it or not, I've tried that. I hated it, so I quit.2
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