feel like I eat a ton (of healthy stuff) but still hungry

PilatesConvert

For starters, I don't have detailed food journals but I'm going to start tracking for a week to create one. Food/nutrition/health has been a long term part of my life. I used Weight Watchers in my early 20s to lose ~40 lb and maintain for years. It taught me a lot. I'm in my 30s now and have questions/confusion/hunger.

I eat 5-6 times a day, good whole food, but often feel really hungry anyway. I feel like I'm eating a TON of food and am wondering if I'm missing something. Maybe you folks can help.

I have a semi-desk job. I sit 5-6 hours a day and walk up/down stairs between the floors I work on, and walk/stand for part of my work. I also bus commute so that's another 40 min of walking up/down hills total per day. 2ish months ago I added pilates to the mix because I wanted to strengthen my core and improve stability. I do a 50 min class 2x per week (mornings before work).

I think I typically eat
* 1st breakfast when I wake up (always hungry when I wake up) ~8 am of ~ 1 C/ crispix in whole milk with a banana.
* if I have pilates I'm starving afterward and at 10:30 am eat 1 C/ scrambled eggs & coffee
if I don't have pilates I'll still eat a morning snack of yogurt , string cheese or an apple
* Lunch around noon is often giant spinach salad with egg whites, beets, garbanzo beans, baby corn, and a drizzle of regular dressing (drizzle!)
* I usually eat another snack in the afternoon sometimes a Luna bar or equivalent or hummus & pita
* Dinner is around 7:30 pm - either a chicken pot pie, meatloaf, 3-4 oz steak + salad - usually home made
* Before bed I usually want string cheese or yogurt or something else because I'm hungry again. Sometimes too much to sleep.

I'm not actively trying to lose weight but I do want to be healthy. I DON'T like feeling so hungry but I don't want to overload my body with more calories than it needs. I feel like I'm eating until I'm full. Thoughts? More info I could supply that would help? TIA

Chief_Rocka

How many calories do you eat?

cbrrabbit25

i am hungry all the time too. You definetly should log everything you eat to get a better idea of if you really are eating a lot or maybe you aren't eating as much as you think. I eat a LOT of calories but i also work out a lot. I think if you know what you are eating, you will be able to know how much exercise you need to do to keep up with your food intake. On the days that i am super hungry I have found its at the same time every month (hormone fluxuation around ovulation time :-), I usually try to keep a lot of lean protein nearby on those days because i eat a lot and carbs are not a good thing to eat too much of since they make you fee/look more bloated.

melsinct

That doesn't sound like a whole lot of food but I could be wrong, as your version of a "big salad" may be different than mine. We also have no way of knowing exactly how much hummus and pita, chicken pot pie, etc. you are eating. Track what you are eating in MFP and the answer to your question will probably be readily apparent.

Akimajuktuq

Most people would consider your diet healthy and would say just stick with it.

However, battling hunger didn't work for me in regards to losing weight, and no matter if I ate all whole foods, basing my diet on complex carbs, I was SICK and getting sicker. Through research and trial and error, I found out that many so-called "healthy" foods weren't so healthy for me. But they may be fine for you; my point is just that battling hunger was futile and unnecessary for me.

Also, though I have lost weight and will continue to lose more, and that's nice, it was finally becoming sick of being sick that led me to commit to a supposedly "restrictive" diet that I now LOVE.

jofjltncb6

For starters, I don't have detailed food journals but I'm going to start tracking for a week to create one.

If only there was a convenient way to do this...like, say, a website and/or a smartphone app that let you track this.

But this is just crazy-talk...an unreasonable dream.


But seriously, it sounds like you need to start from the beginning by gathering more *data* and *then* you can figure out what's wrong.

sjohnny

Most people would consider your diet healthy and would say just stick with it.

However, battling hunger didn't work for me in regards to losing weight, and no matter if I ate all whole foods, basing my diet on complex carbs, I was SICK and getting sicker. Through research and trial and error, I found out that many so-called "healthy" foods weren't so healthy for me. But they may be fine for you; my point is just that battling hunger was futile and unnecessary for me.

Also, though I have lost weight and will continue to lose more, and that's nice, it was finally becoming sick of being sick that led me to commit to a supposedly "restrictive" diet that I now LOVE.

Awesome. What does that have to do with anything remotely connected to the OP's question? She's not trying to lose weight and didn't say she was sick.

Maybe she should eat some broth.

Brendajo510

I agree with a lot of the comments, it’s hard to pin point the problem when there is no hard data. It could be your sodium intake is high. I've heard arguments that diet pop makes you hungry. I find that if I eat something especially yummy, I think I'm hungry when I'm not because I want to eat more. I would check the daily nutritional values and log if you work out. Check the percentage of fat, protein, and carbs you are eating. Carbs can make us feel full and then hungry an hour later. That's where protein comes in. It's just a matter of tracking and finding the amount you are actually eating in a day. It's like eating a salad from a restaurant. You may think you are eating healthy only to find out that salad has more calories than a burger.

JesterMFP

You're probably going to need to experiment a bit to find the right number of calories so that you maintain your weight and don't feel hungry. It's hard to do that without knowing exactly how many you're eating now, and the effect that has on your weight. I'd start by tracking for a week or two and going from there.

In the meantime, foods that are high in protein and fibre should help with hunger.

SanteMulberry

For starters, I don't have detailed food journals but I'm going to start tracking for a week to create one. Food/nutrition/health has been a long term part of my life. I used Weight Watchers in my early 20s to lose ~40 lb and maintain for years. It taught me a lot. I'm in my 30s now and have questions/confusion/hunger.

I eat 5-6 times a day, good whole food, but often feel really hungry anyway. I feel like I'm eating a TON of food and am wondering if I'm missing something. Maybe you folks can help.

I have a semi-desk job. I sit 5-6 hours a day and walk up/down stairs between the floors I work on, and walk/stand for part of my work. I also bus commute so that's another 40 min of walking up/down hills total per day. 2ish months ago I added pilates to the mix because I wanted to strengthen my core and improve stability. I do a 50 min class 2x per week (mornings before work).

I think I typically eat
* 1st breakfast when I wake up (always hungry when I wake up) ~8 am of ~ 1 C/ crispix in whole milk with a banana.
* if I have pilates I'm starving afterward and at 10:30 am eat 1 C/ scrambled eggs & coffee
if I don't have pilates I'll still eat a morning snack of yogurt , string cheese or an apple
* Lunch around noon is often giant spinach salad with egg whites, beets, garbanzo beans, baby corn, and a drizzle of regular dressing (drizzle!)
* I usually eat another snack in the afternoon sometimes a Luna bar or equivalent or hummus & pita
* Dinner is around 7:30 pm - either a chicken pot pie, meatloaf, 3-4 oz steak + salad - usually home made
* Before bed I usually want string cheese or yogurt or something else because I'm hungry again. Sometimes too much to sleep.

I'm not actively trying to lose weight but I do want to be healthy. I DON'T like feeling so hungry but I don't want to overload my body with more calories than it needs. I feel like I'm eating until I'm full. Thoughts? More info I could supply that would help? TIA

You probably need to eat a bit more fat. As we age, our body doesn't handle carbohydrates as well as it used to, so we need to avoid simple carbs (sugar and refined grain---anything "white") entirely and cut back on the total amount of carbs along with eating a bit more fat to even out blood sugar swings. Very low fat diets are unhealthy and lead to deficiencies in essential fatty acids. Our population is not fat and unhealthy because we eat too many fats (our ancestors ate way more fat than we do, but were quite slender). Even now, the average diet contains only about 1% more fat than it did back when the low-fat craze started. The difference in calorie consumption comes from eating lots of sugar and starch. That is what is causing the epidemic of blood sugar anomalies, obesity, Type II diabetes, high blood pressure, etc. Some researchers now believe that high sugar consumption may lead to cancer, as cancer cells appear to thrive in the presence of high blood sugar, which is, in turn, caused by the large consumption of sugar and simple carbs. Try to keep your total carbs to around 300 to 400 grams per day, depending on your activity level (and you should concentrate on getting the bulk of your carbs from vegetables--especially starchy veggies like corn, potatoes, and squash---and fruits) and then fill up the rest of your calories with fat (especially good fats like that found in nuts, olives and avocados) and lean protein. You have lots of activity so that's really good from that angle--you just need to adjust your diet.

krickeyuu

As others have said, you really need to log daily for a while to get good data. My question is: are you sure you are actually hungry and not just bored, anxious, etc.? Most of us have never known real hunger so we think we are hungry when we are just having a craving or need something to do with our hands or maybe we are actually thirsty and interperating it as hunger. When you start loggin your food you can also log how you feel when you are "hungry." As someone else posted on one of these forums--if you are truly hungry even raw broccoli sounds good.

SanteMulberry

As others have said, you really need to log daily for a while to get good data. My question is: are you sure you are actually hungry and not just bored, anxious, etc.? Most of us have never known real hunger so we think we are hungry when we are just having a craving or need something to do with our hands or maybe we are actually thirsty and interperating it as hunger. When you start loggin your food you can also log how you feel when you are "hungry." As someone else posted on one of these forums--if you are truly hungry even raw broccoli sounds good.

I agree and the way to combat cravings is to make sure that we are properly nourishing our bodies. It is not healthy to eat calorie- dense, nutrient-light food. It leads to obesity and food cravings as our bodies search for nutrients. In this country, we are frequently over-fed but under-nourished. I find that I make MUCH better food choices when I am firm in holding to my "no empty calories" pledge.

PilatesConvert

Thanks for the thoughtful replies. I drink 3-5 L of water a day (I've tracked that) and am not a boredom snacker. So far today I've already eaten ~1700 calories and it's not even dinner time yet. That was a bit more food than usual, but not uncharacteristic for me. I've been slowly losing weight eating like this (clothes are looser, I'm not tracking weight). Maybe I have just developed a crazy high metabolism. I'll check back in after a week of tracking and see what people think then.