Eating on a schedule vs when you're hungry
LyndaBSS
Posts: 6,964 Member
Hi guys. So, I am retired and don't venture out of the house much due to anxiety.
That means, I can eat whenever I want to. Thanks to logging in the food diary, I end up with 3 meals and maybe 1 snack per day. No problem with water intake.
My situation is this. I'm not sure how hungry I should feel before I have a meal. I used to eat on a schedule when I worked. Now, that I'm not, I sometimes look at the clock and even though I had breakfast two hours before, my brain is sometimes saying "it's lunchtime".
I ask myself if I'm hungry and then have to address the different levels of hunger. How do you judge when your body actually needs food?
Any and all opinions welcome. Thanks!
That means, I can eat whenever I want to. Thanks to logging in the food diary, I end up with 3 meals and maybe 1 snack per day. No problem with water intake.
My situation is this. I'm not sure how hungry I should feel before I have a meal. I used to eat on a schedule when I worked. Now, that I'm not, I sometimes look at the clock and even though I had breakfast two hours before, my brain is sometimes saying "it's lunchtime".
I ask myself if I'm hungry and then have to address the different levels of hunger. How do you judge when your body actually needs food?
Any and all opinions welcome. Thanks!
4
Replies
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I work as a teacher—so I have summers free to do the same. I honestly stick to a schedule regardless...
I think that also might be due to the fact that my lunch at school is 10:37am-11:00am, and I don’t free up for a snack or meal until 3-4 pm during the year—so I have to make that 20 min lunch count!2 -
For me personally I do better on a schedule. I eat "brunch" between 10:30-12:00. This meal is either breakfast foods or leftovers depending on what I am in the mood for. I usually eat yogurt or fruit around 3pm and then I have dinner around 6pm. This seems to be working for me and has eliminated the hunger and wanting to just snack and/or as you said...wanting to eat not long after I finish a meal. It took some getting used to however.
It also helped to kind of have an idea about how many calories that each meal consisted of so that I made sure that I ate enough to last me until the next meal.5 -
It's one of those individual things, isn't it!
I used to eat at set times. Plus extras.
I also used to eat whenever there was time available. Plus extras.
Now I try to eat when I'm only a little bit hungry or if I know I will get hungry while I'm out over the next couple of hours. But I definitely try to avoid extras!!!3 -
I usually eat on some type of schedule otherwise I will either underfuel or overdo it come the next snack or meal. If I'm not that hungry I just won't eat as much or I will sometimes skip a snack.5
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I am home or food-available most of the time. I've split my eating into meals and 'snacks' (light meals? 50% meal essentially), 3 each. I try to divide my calorie goal up between them by type and set any targets/goals I want for each individual feeding. For instance, I shoot for 20+ protein on snacks and 30+ on meals to keep protein intake on a 3-hour clock.
After that I figure as long as my calorie goal is correct, any 'hungry' signals are probably boredom, stress or exhaustion and try to manage those instead of eating. I don't trust my brain to be right on that stuff, but regimented out like how I have it I know I can trust the schedule and so I don't have to worry about validity of 'feeling'.
I will say though if I miss a meal, I really feel it.2 -
I am also retired and so is my husband. I/we do have a schedule for eating, and so far, my stomach has followed it without major problems. It also keeps the kitchen clean and in order instead of having to cook or prepare meals at different times of the day.
If I am not very hungry I will eat a smaller meal, but I still eat breakfast (husband makes it every morning), lunch and dinner. I have two small snacks after lunch and before going to the gym, and a protein drink when I return. I don't usually snack mid morning, and when I do it may be some nuts and a low sodium V8.
If I get hungry before dinner, I will add a healthy snack. I have been in maintenance for over 9 years so keeping track of my intake without much logging is not a problem. But I agree that is a matter of preference.2 -
I’ve been retired for a year and a half. Long hours on the job and long commute, so having all this time is a fairly new thing. I eat at pretty regular times. Breakfast at about 7. Mid morning snack about 10. Lunch at 12. Supper at 5. Evening snack at 8. For me, I think the timing keeps me from any real hunger, so it works well.3
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I eat when and only when I’m really hungry.
For me, as a short woman, eating to the clock is partially responsible for weight gain. I need a lot less food than others in my family so it works best for me to remove myself from the schedule they adhere to, due to habit and work commitments and choose both what I eat and when. I’m also vegetarian so it’s convenient as I’d not be eating identical dishes anyway. I’d find it really hard to plate a much smaller portion for myself when I’m dishing up if we were all to eat the same meal, but easy to cook appropriate amounts for me alone.2 -
Honestly it's better for my own sanity and satiety if I eat when I'm hungry than stay to an artificially created schedule. It hasn't hindered my ability to lose weight because I try to stick within my calorie allotment for the day.1
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You guys are helping me tremendously.
So, what about hunger levels? Do you wait until your stomach growls or do you eat when you feel the first little pang?1 -
You guys are helping me tremendously.
So, what about hunger levels? Do you wait until your stomach growls or do you eat when you feel the first little pang?
This is so subjective and I’m a little afraid to type what my truth is! When I’m aggressively trying to drop pounds rather than the part maintenance/part it’d be nice to lose a few mindset, I actually wait until I start to feel a little unwell. Lightheaded, faintly nauseous.
One indicator I use is this; if I wake in the morning without hunger pains and without that hollow stomach feeling, I know I ate too much the previous day.4 -
You guys are helping me tremendously.
So, what about hunger levels? Do you wait until your stomach growls or do you eat when you feel the first little pang?
I find that if I wait until my stomach growls I will definitely overeat because I will be so starving that whatever I eat won't satisfy. Like it takes longer for the satiety cues to kick in.
So I prefer to eat when I get the first little pangs. That way I can control intake better.
I do prefer to eat to a schedule and I find that I get hungry just in time for my meals anyway. On the weekends my schedule is different and I will have breakfast later and usually only 3 meals instead of 4, but yeah, it overall works ok.4 -
You guys are helping me tremendously.
So, what about hunger levels? Do you wait until your stomach growls or do you eat when you feel the first little pang?
I don't like to wait until I am starving. I will at times make the wrong choices if too hungry and/or eat way more than what I need to.5 -
I’m trying to remind myself that, for me, it’s ok to be hungry. I constantly think about food all day, which is nothing new (binge eater here). I’ve done the eat-every-two-hours thing but I was never satisfied and still binged. Lately, I’m always assessing my hunger levels, and am now trying to only eat my pre-portioned foods when my stomach growls and feels empty. It’s soo hard for me to distinguish between “head hunger” and true body hunger.3
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Thinking about it, I will basically wait an hour if it's lunch or dinner and I'm at home or have an appointment that would get in the way of me being able to sit down and eat. If I already have dinner plans (going to a restaurant or to a friend's house) I'll potentially eat something low calorie like an apple. Today I think I waited 45 min to an hour because eating dinner at 4:30 wasn't actually something I wanted to do. For reference, I typically try to go to bed at 9:30 and will generally have a snack/dessert an hour or so after dinner.You guys are helping me tremendously.
So, what about hunger levels? Do you wait until your stomach growls or do you eat when you feel the first little pang?
If it's a snack in the middle of the day I typically won't wait more than half an hour (again, unless I have an appointment or meeting that is getting in the way) but I will take the time to figure out what can and can't fit calorie wise and might change what I was planning on eating for dinner to take into account the snack that I end up eating.
I won't wait at all for breakfast. I exercise fasted 5 days a week and I need to eat afterword. The fasted bit is due to needing to be there early in the morning, not because I think it's somehow better.2 -
You guys are helping me tremendously.
So, what about hunger levels? Do you wait until your stomach growls or do you eat when you feel the first little pang?
It really depends on what I'm eating that day and my calorie intake. I will try to stick to my schedule to make sure I am getting enough protein and calories. I can usually ignore my hunger so I have to be careful. However I usually have very large dinners so sometimes I ignore it and save calories for that.2 -
I am also retired and we eat more or less on a schedule. I do this partly because my husband and I have different hunger times (I'm always hungry, he rarely is) and it is easier to just keep to regular hours for meals. I pay attention to my hunger levels mostly to decide whether or not I should eat a snack before bed and whether I should eat lunch before I run or if I can wait until after I'm done.1
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It might be a little chicken and egg for some people. Are you hungry because you have consistently eaten on a particular schedule or did you create the schedule because you were hungry?
Considering that most people had no choice as kids when to eat their meals it could be that hunger is a conditioned response instead of a physical need. If you were raised to eat at 10am and 3pm maybe your body would have adjusted to it and then you would start getting hungry at 9am and 2pm.
I don't really know. The above is just speculation. I doubt a really active person has a lot of choices though. For energy management they would need a set distribution of calories to meet the demand.
5 -
It might be a little chicken and egg for some people. Are you hungry because you have consistently eaten on a particular schedule or did you create the schedule because you were hungry?
Considering that most people had no choice as kids when to eat their meals it could be that hunger is a conditioned response instead of a physical need. If you were raised to eat at 10am and 3pm maybe your body would have adjusted to it and then you would start getting hungry at 9am and 2pm.
I don't really know. The above is just speculation. I doubt a really active person has a lot of choices though. For energy management they would need a set distribution of calories to meet the demand.
You’ve said this is just speculation but I think you’ve actually hit the nail resoundingly on the head!
The ‘conditioned eating’ is something I consciously reprogrammed my brain away from as soon as I left home (slightly overweight parents and I’d struggled through my teens to avoid extra pounds). I worked to instil an ‘eat when you’re hungry, not when the clock says you should’ mindset into my children as they grew up. None of them have ever struggled with their weight and all are resilient and healthy.
My husband who is a dyed in the wool clock watcher for mealtimes (and incidentally quite overweight) is another matter! He genuinely thinks that if you don’t eat every 4 hours something dire will happen to you. Makes for some interesting conversations! 🙄5 -
BarbaraHelen2013 wrote: »It might be a little chicken and egg for some people. Are you hungry because you have consistently eaten on a particular schedule or did you create the schedule because you were hungry?
Considering that most people had no choice as kids when to eat their meals it could be that hunger is a conditioned response instead of a physical need. If you were raised to eat at 10am and 3pm maybe your body would have adjusted to it and then you would start getting hungry at 9am and 2pm.
I don't really know. The above is just speculation. I doubt a really active person has a lot of choices though. For energy management they would need a set distribution of calories to meet the demand.
You’ve said this is just speculation but I think you’ve actually hit the nail resoundingly on the head!
The ‘conditioned eating’ is something I consciously reprogrammed my brain away from as soon as I left home (slightly overweight parents and I’d struggled through my teens to avoid extra pounds). I worked to instil an ‘eat when you’re hungry, not when the clock says you should’ mindset into my children as they grew up. None of them have ever struggled with their weight and all are resilient and healthy.
My husband who is a dyed in the wool clock watcher for mealtimes (and incidentally quite overweight) is another matter! He genuinely thinks that if you don’t eat every 4 hours something dire will happen to you. Makes for some interesting conversations! 🙄
Ultimately calories not food distribution is what really matters. You can overeat having less meals and undereat having more. Your husband's additional weight is because he lacks the ability to eat intuitively which many people can do during 3 meals or more a day. Whether or not your children have a better sense of intuitive eating because they were not on set schedules with 'clean their plate' parents is unknown to me. They may have been fine either way.4 -
I do better with a schedule -- not a strict schedule, but I eat after my morning workout and before leaving for work (so like 6:30), roughly at noon, although it depends based on my work schedule, can vary from 11:30 to 2 or so, and then when I get home and cook -- which ends up being around 9. If I were not hungry at all, I suppose I'd not eat (this occasionally happens with breakfast or I eat lunch later), but usually it's not an issue.
On Fridays and weekends I often eat my first meal later (lunchtime) and dinner earlier, and just adjust cals (I started doing this because I often workout a bit later on weekends, although not so much in the summer, like to have a more leisurely morning, and often go out to dinner before going to the theater or a concert, and that means dinner is both earlier and larger than my usual).
I tend to find my hunger signals match when I am used to eating, which I find helpful. What does not work for me is snacking or thinking I need to eat because I feel hungry, which is often a response to food being available when I am not eating to a schedule (no snacking). I find it's not something I experience as much when I have a regular pattern and planned meals.
I control how many cals I eat by how large the meals are.2 -
BarbaraHelen2013 wrote: »It might be a little chicken and egg for some people. Are you hungry because you have consistently eaten on a particular schedule or did you create the schedule because you were hungry?
Considering that most people had no choice as kids when to eat their meals it could be that hunger is a conditioned response instead of a physical need. If you were raised to eat at 10am and 3pm maybe your body would have adjusted to it and then you would start getting hungry at 9am and 2pm.
I don't really know. The above is just speculation. I doubt a really active person has a lot of choices though. For energy management they would need a set distribution of calories to meet the demand.
You’ve said this is just speculation but I think you’ve actually hit the nail resoundingly on the head!
The ‘conditioned eating’ is something I consciously reprogrammed my brain away from as soon as I left home (slightly overweight parents and I’d struggled through my teens to avoid extra pounds). I worked to instil an ‘eat when you’re hungry, not when the clock says you should’ mindset into my children as they grew up. None of them have ever struggled with their weight and all are resilient and healthy.
My husband who is a dyed in the wool clock watcher for mealtimes (and incidentally quite overweight) is another matter! He genuinely thinks that if you don’t eat every 4 hours something dire will happen to you. Makes for some interesting conversations! 🙄
Ultimately calories not food distribution is what really matters. You can overeat having less meals and undereat having more. Your husband's additional weight is because he lacks the ability to eat intuitively which many people can do during 3 meals or more a day. Whether or not your children have a better sense of intuitive eating because they were not on set schedules with 'clean their plate' parents is unknown to me. They may have been fine either way.
Of course. But I do think that there are people who struggle more than others when they begin to be mindful and track their intake. Some of the struggle is down to their conditioned expectation of food at set times along with possibly not really recognising hunger. If you eat even a little too much at one meal then eat 4 hours later just because that’s your habit, you’re more than likely not hungry in any way, but you’re still putting calories into your body because your schedule (not your body) dictates that you should.
Breaking away from the timetable and allowing yourself to learn what hunger feels like and, as importantly, how much food you actually need to assuage that hunger is possibly a step in the right direction for many, living as we are, in an ‘ever present’ food culture.4 -
For others, finding other ways to deal with the ever present food culture rather than trying to decide if you are really hungry or not or really hungry enough to eat can be more helpful.
I don't think humans really had to think about when they wanted to eat during much of historical time human history, as even apart from food scarcity it was common to have communal eating times and to eat at those times.
Absolutely nothing wrong with preferring to eat when hungry and varying the number of meals/cals daily, but for those of us who prefer more planned meals and meal times (I sometimes get the sense that when people are eating when hungry they are grazing or snacking and don't have the same sense I do of what a meal entails, although I'm sure that varies too), there's nothing wrong with a schedule either.
For me, eating every 4 hours would drive me mad (and mean my meals are smaller than I like), but having a regular schedule makes it more likely I don't eat between lunch at, say, noon and dinner at, say, 9, just because I'm kind of hungry at 5 or having a bad day or stressed at work or just happen to see something tasty. It's easier for me to wait until I can have my planned dinner, as I'm not going to be as satisfied by a little snack and then a smaller dinner in that circumstance.
I have trained myself to be a good judge of servings even when I feel hungrier than usual, but I also find that my willpower is less if I am extremely hungry. When I first started I tried fasting all day before dinner out to be a possible option and ended up eating the bread on the table, which I normally never do, and justifying more caloric choices than I otherwise would have. I now find it easier to have some meal in advance (which I will be hungry for anyway), and then to control portions more if I go out. (Controlling portions when not out is easier since I tend to eat pretty similar meals on a daily basis -- I mean there's variety, but I have a good sense of what a reasonable amount to eat for me is.)3 -
Hmm, adding to that, when I started having a more structured schedule was helpful for me rather than the opposite. I had a pretty standard breakfast, a few different lunch options (like leftovers), and then a dinner template. If I happened to eat a giant breakfast (as on the weekends occasionally), it wasn't too hard to understand I should have a lighter lunch (or skip it), but because I had a plan in my head it was pretty rare I ended up overeating an an earlier dinner. Occasionally I'd decide to have a larger lunch and lighter dinner intentionally (it's not hard to have just protein and veg at dinner to make up for a big work lunch).
The ability to vary calories based on what you eat earlier in the day is not something that people who have a standard eating schedule lack. I do think some are more or less attuned to hunger signals, but it's not clear to me that this is something that can be taught. I know if I choose to skip dinner because I go to a cocktail party and eat the equivalent of dinner in the food that is available/handed out there, I will be able to skip dinner, but I also am likely to feel less satisfied and even a little hungry later, even if the cals consumed were more than I'd normally have at dinner. I think this is because what you eat and the timing in which you eat it absolutely can make a difference for hunger for an individual (although people will vary on what works best for them).2 -
I try to use a "hunger scale" to determine if I am genuinly hungry, just bored, or if it's just habitual hunger. Basically it's a scale of 1-10. 1 being ravenous, starving, willing to eat anything that is put in front of me as soon as possible. 10 being so stuffed I feel ill.
I try to avoid waiting until I get to a 1 to eat. As this causes me to overeat. And of course on the other side I try to avoid eating to a 10, because I dont like to feel sick after I eat. I try to listen to my body and eat at around a 3 or so. When I'm good and hungry but not starving. This sometimes means skipping my scheduled lunch because I'm not hungry enough yet. I'll grab a snack from home while at lunch and eat it at my desk when I finally get hungy enough.
I also try stopping at around a 7 or so. Full and satisfied, but not stuffed like a thanksgiving turkey.
I'm not sure if this is relevant or not, but I'll throw it out there anyway. I tried out intermittant fasting on for size a while back. Due to my lunch schedule, and when I usually quit eating for the night, this put me at an 18/6 sort of eating pattern. I learned a few things. I am not going to die if I stay hungry, I can actually be hungry for a suprisingly long time. . (I used to be the type to eat a snack "just in case" so I wouldn't get hungry later, even though I wasnt hungry now.) 18 hours is a little too long for me however. I still follow this pattern, but my sweet spot is 14-16 hours fasted. My appetite seems to kick off right after breakfast, no matter when I eat it. I'll be hungry a few hours later. So I delay breakfast as long as possible. For me this means if I eat breakfast at 7am I'll be hungy by 10, and have to eat a snack before 12(my lunch hour). If I delay breakfast until around 10, then I wont need to eat until 12, eliminating the need for a morning snack. Seems to keep the appetite under control.
So to come back around to my point, and OP's question: I guess I do both. I eat on a schedule and use hunger cues. It's not always exactly the same. But I tend to eat around the same times of day. I use how hungry I am to guage how much to eat I guess. I tend to eat around 10, 12:30, 3(as needed snack) and 7ish. But it fluctuates by an hour or two depending on how hungry I am. Like yesterday I skipped breakfast entirely as I just wasn't hungry until lunch time.3 -
@Crafty_camper123
Thanks for sharing your hunger scale info. It really helped me make more sense of my own.
I'm grateful to all of you for sharing your thoughts.1 -
BarbaraHelen2013 wrote: »BarbaraHelen2013 wrote: »It might be a little chicken and egg for some people. Are you hungry because you have consistently eaten on a particular schedule or did you create the schedule because you were hungry?
Considering that most people had no choice as kids when to eat their meals it could be that hunger is a conditioned response instead of a physical need. If you were raised to eat at 10am and 3pm maybe your body would have adjusted to it and then you would start getting hungry at 9am and 2pm.
I don't really know. The above is just speculation. I doubt a really active person has a lot of choices though. For energy management they would need a set distribution of calories to meet the demand.
You’ve said this is just speculation but I think you’ve actually hit the nail resoundingly on the head!
The ‘conditioned eating’ is something I consciously reprogrammed my brain away from as soon as I left home (slightly overweight parents and I’d struggled through my teens to avoid extra pounds). I worked to instil an ‘eat when you’re hungry, not when the clock says you should’ mindset into my children as they grew up. None of them have ever struggled with their weight and all are resilient and healthy.
My husband who is a dyed in the wool clock watcher for mealtimes (and incidentally quite overweight) is another matter! He genuinely thinks that if you don’t eat every 4 hours something dire will happen to you. Makes for some interesting conversations! 🙄
Ultimately calories not food distribution is what really matters. You can overeat having less meals and undereat having more. Your husband's additional weight is because he lacks the ability to eat intuitively which many people can do during 3 meals or more a day. Whether or not your children have a better sense of intuitive eating because they were not on set schedules with 'clean their plate' parents is unknown to me. They may have been fine either way.
Of course. But I do think that there are people who struggle more than others when they begin to be mindful and track their intake. Some of the struggle is down to their conditioned expectation of food at set times along with possibly not really recognising hunger. If you eat even a little too much at one meal then eat 4 hours later just because that’s your habit, you’re more than likely not hungry in any way, but you’re still putting calories into your body because your schedule (not your body) dictates that you should.
Breaking away from the timetable and allowing yourself to learn what hunger feels like and, as importantly, how much food you actually need to assuage that hunger is possibly a step in the right direction for many, living as we are, in an ‘ever present’ food culture.
I am almost 67y/o and I never ate on a schedule even as a child. I became 100lbs over weight because my body/hunger cues told me that I was hungry most of the time. Now that I have a structure eating schedule after a couple of weeks I began to realize that I wasn't always hungry...I just thought I was. I eat two main meals a day and a light mid-day meal usually consist of yogurt, fruit, roasted veggies just depending on what I am in the mood for...usually around 200 calories. That is enough to hold me over until dinner at around 6:30. It has been one of the best changes that I have made for myself. I stopped snacking in between meals. I am no longer "sitting and waiting" for the next meal. I have also learned to eat what will hold me over and how many calories and types of food will do that.
For me...having a meal time has taken my food intake from "snack" foods to healthy well balanced meals. Each of us are different...all we have in common is that to lose weight we must eat at a deficit. All the rest of it is individual to as what works for us.4 -
In the past listening for my hunger could easily mean undereating for one or two days and then overeating afterwards. This cycle helped me gain weight.
If I eat breakfast I find it hard to be satisfied the rest of the day. If I skip it I have such control that if I wanted to most days I could just eat lunch and nothing more. There is, for me, something very mentally unsatisfying about OMAD so I prefer to eat a small snack-sized dinner of mostly protein. This distributes my protein which I hear but haven't verified is important.
For me it was just about finding out how to make my quirks work in my favor which I believe I have done. I have to eat my lunch on a schedule, I have to ignore hunger in the morning on the rare days it visits me, and I have learned by listening to my hunger or lack thereof I can eat little to no dinner which is helpful for controlling my acid reflux.6 -
I'm aware that I use to eat out of habit and I would often eat just because it's 8pm and I always eat at 8pm regardless of hunger. So now I have a rough schedule but if I'm hungry or not outside of the window I don't worry about it. Some days I eat every 2 hours, others I only eat 1 big meal and a snack or two.1
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I pretty much eat on a schedule...I'm usually hungry on schedule.4
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