Extreme hunger suddenly after losing respectable amount of weight??

Helloidentitycrisis
Helloidentitycrisis Posts: 64 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
So I have been losing about 0.2-0.5kg a week for 10 weeks and have now lost a total of 4.2kg (yay). I struggled at first to figure out what worked for my kcals, but eventually knew what would and wouldn't keep me satiated... For me it was keeping my fats/dairy right as well as loads of veg that really helped. I actually ate far too much protein.

Except suddenly I am starving! All the time! I started out trying to just get to maintenance instead of eating at a deficit... then when I wasn't feeling any more full I just thought, "To hell with it, I'll have a blowout*! Sure, I'll lose a few days of work, but I'll feel full and be back to the deficit after - I'll log what I'm eating in excess and it'll motivate me back on track!"

Wrong. In fact at one point that day I recall I chose to eat butternut squash and roasted red pepper soup, with a GF low sugar brownie on the side which (because I missed not feeling hungry and I recently genuinely feel starving like I am completely running on empty) I ate until I was so full I was struggling to keep myself from being a bit sick. Then within an hour I was eating the leftover brownie and ravenous again!?!?!?!?!?

...

The fact is I have had issues with "sort-of binges" when dieting, but once logged I often found scarily almost to a T I'd have eaten whatever deficit I'd created that week - I never seemed to eat much more than my TDEE even when I only actually knew the calorie values long after I'd stopped eating. As if my body was satisfied as soon as it had wat it was missing. Now, however I seem to just be eternally ravenous - I even hungrily gobbed down my friends chips and curry last night because I was starving and had a lapse of "I give up!" even though I don't really like chippy style chips...

And in case anyone might think to suggest my poor eating habits are returning/I got fat somehow I wasn't technically overweight when I decided to lose some weight for my 21st - just had a slightly high body fat percentage, which I blame on inactivity since I was put on/then took myself off anxiety medication months ago ...plus I wanted to look nice and slim on my birthday! :sweat:

*****I guess something that really seems like the opposite of my problem is that once or twice early in the diet I had hypos (very low blood sugar) which were tested for and then monitored as I'm experienced in dealing with them from when I was 16 - I was a few stone underweight because I was stupidly skipping meals and had issues forgetting to eat.*****

I know the difference between hunger and boredom eating, and when I'm so starved I've been happy just to allow myself a few tomatoes (because at first I was very scared to go beyond my maintenance), I'm pretty sure it's real!
...

So I guess I'm wondering what you all think might be causing this? I can't see a Dr for a few days and tbh I'm still a bit terrified of them so I'm dreading having to see them... If anyone had even a suggestion I might not look like a bumbling idiot to my Dr...

Replies

  • Veryana
    Veryana Posts: 122 Member
    Are you sleeping enough? I had same kind of problem, I would get hungry after an hour even when I ate a lot and it felt like I haven't eat anything for weeks. And before that I couldn't sleep more than 5 hours in 2 days and a day later only 1 hour so I really was exhausted. It returned back to normal once I started to sleep full 8 hours and take naps during day.
  • Helloidentitycrisis
    Helloidentitycrisis Posts: 64 Member
    @Veryana Funnily last night I probably only got 6 or so hours when I'm used to 8 or even 9, but before then recently other than waking up in the night because I was so huuuuungry (I think I had a bit of chicken and cheese on a cracker with a cherry tomato to try and keep kcal controlled and just get back to sleep) I've still been sleeping!

    I have noticed having some really weird, surreal dreams and am waking up sweating though?
  • punkrockgoth
    punkrockgoth Posts: 534 Member
    I've definitely experienced this too. It sucks. Part of it is your body freaking out because it thinks it's starving. Your body is happy in its usual state and seeing that you've lost weight, its concerned and trying to force you to gain it all back. Your brain is happy to see progress, your body is like "aw hell no". It sucks.

    I've managed to fight it a bit by eating smaller meals spaced out more frequently and by taking a break week every 2-3 months where I eat at or just below maintenance.
  • Helloidentitycrisis
    Helloidentitycrisis Posts: 64 Member
    edited March 2016
    @punkrockgoth it's the worst! I don't want to sound over dramatic but I feel like I'm dying! I don't tend to have problems staying in a healthy weight so I know it's harder for others who have worked so much harder than me, but I do not do well with hunger!!! I feel pathetic and just want to cry into a loaf of bread while I eat it...and then another and then another.

    In fact I actually had white bread and pizza recently because I'm a bit gluten intolerant and desperately would rather feeling queasy and bloated than as hungry as I do! Which is pretty desperate measures :(

    PS. I've opened my -recently embarrassing- diary in case anyone has a secret food I'm not thinking of that might help? And yes...I know... Crunchy nut cornflakes are literally the worst breakfast option I could have made: I weighed it as well, then just thought 'bugger it' and just kept pouring... I even had bought fresh fruit and fromage frais yesterday FOR breakfast. I intend to go to the gym and put some real effort in for the rest of today onward though :(
  • Veryana
    Veryana Posts: 122 Member
    Are you sure you are eating enough food? As in food that feels like it fills you properly. I checked your diary little bit and see sweet stuff for 200-300 calories every day and you are doing 1200 calories diet. There's not a lot of food you can eat for 900 calories only that will fill you properly. Personally I wouldn't be able to deal with this low calories used for foods which would make me feel full enough. Maybe you need to increase calories little bit to allow you to eat more food and keep your treats or leave treats so you won't have them every day (1-2 times a week?) and keep it at 1200 calories for normal food?
  • Helloidentitycrisis
    Helloidentitycrisis Posts: 64 Member
    edited March 2016
    Apart from the last week or so when I've given up, the sweet stuff was actually at the end of the day when I still often had a few 100kcal left to spare - I funnily enough didn't want to "stretch my stomach" by forcing anything more bulky in (people have warned me) and when I asked people suggested I "Have a bowl of ice cream." (I don't eat ice cream, but I sorta just took their advice and treated myself).

    I know my diary is a bit erratic - for me it's easier to just click whichever meal will actually load as my windows app is stupid and barely works!
  • CathReese33
    CathReese33 Posts: 112 Member
    I do fine when actively dieting as I cut my sugar consumption down. Once I allow myself to eat 'normally' I re-introduce sugary foods a little. It's then that my body goes woo hoo and is out of control again. I have definitely noticed a pattern that binges follow sugar. Even fairly small amounts are enough to trigger it and no amount of food can satisfy it.
    Only way to get it under control is to cut back down again and force yourself through it. Try upping your protein and fats again and eat at maintenance level but with these higher percentages.
    Good luck xx
  • Helloidentitycrisis
    Helloidentitycrisis Posts: 64 Member
    Thank you btw, I should have said - I literally have a pen and paper to note down your advice (cut out sweets; make sure I'm sleeping etc.) and I know I am probably doing this all wrong aha, don't think you can't be harsh - I will take all advice or rows you can give me! I am a dieting mess ahahaha
  • Veryana
    Veryana Posts: 122 Member
    Maybe you could move something more filling to evening and have that nice snack during day? If you are waking up hungry during night it's usually because you didn't eat enough for last meal of day. I had same kind of problem with waking up hungry but it got fixed with better dinner with more fibre and protein for me. :)
  • Helloidentitycrisis
    Helloidentitycrisis Posts: 64 Member
    Veryana wrote: »
    Maybe you could move something more filling to evening and have that nice snack during day? If you are waking up hungry during night it's usually because you didn't eat enough for last meal of day. I had same kind of problem with waking up hungry but it got fixed with better dinner with more fibre and protein for me. :)

    I probably could! I am so grateful for this community part of mfp right now! Thanks so much because I really felt lost, so I probably would have just continued to let my eating get worse again and been one of those cases where the person tries to lose 10kg and ends up gaining 50! I was really scared to open my diary/admit I had no idea what I was doing once it got a tiny bit difficult, but you're all so helpful and supportive!
  • Veryana
    Veryana Posts: 122 Member
    To make it easier you could plan your food diary a day before, you probably already have an idea what you want to have that day. Leave that 200-300 calories for that nice treat you want and you can freely choose what you want for it when you just leave that specific amount of calories to use for it. Add something filling for evening 2-3 hours before you go to sleep, I like to do oven vegetables myself (usually potato, carrot, sweet potato etc mixed with spices and food oil and heated in oven until they are cooked, making thin slices makes them nearly like fries) and have protein with it like chicken. Sometimes I do mashed potatoes and replace half of potatoes with carrots, cauliflower or other similar nice stuff (test what kind of stuff you like, start with replacing quarter of ingredients with cauliflower for example). Smoothies are very nice, for me it's like having a treat. It's so sweet and fresh and depending on ingredients you can have quite a lot of it sometimes. Adding unsweetened yoghurt makes it more filling as well.

    Hopefully that gave you some ideas to try out :blush:
  • Helloidentitycrisis
    Helloidentitycrisis Posts: 64 Member
    Thanks! I know I just need to buckle down and I think I'll probably start trying to have like a square of dark choc with strawberries instead of a biscuit. I should have known when they said "ice cream" it was all going to go a bit downhill because I do get a reckless sweet tooth if I start indulging in moreish foods!
  • Helloidentitycrisis
    Helloidentitycrisis Posts: 64 Member
    Have had a go at planning out tomorrow with meals I know I like and mostly have the ingredients for, with a bit of help from one of those online macro planners! I think it looks much better! My sugar is a bit high, but I assume it's not so bad due to most of my sugars coming from milk?
  • Veryana
    Veryana Posts: 122 Member
    Yea, I drink a lot of milk as well and have higher sugar because of it. If it becomes a problem later for you you could always change half of the milk into almond milk or soy milk, they have nearly half less sugars in them. Ofc the taste is little bit different but a lot of people like almond milk so it could be worth trying. But I don't really see a problem with it :smile:
  • ClaireLK1987
    ClaireLK1987 Posts: 22 Member
    You say you are a bit gluten intolerant...could you actually be full on coeliac?
  • chattycathy42
    chattycathy42 Posts: 30 Member
    I find myself that when I eat a good bit of sugar I am starving later! Took me forever to figure that out
  • Maxematics
    Maxematics Posts: 2,287 Member
    I've been at this since the end of June. I started out at 139 pounds. For about a week in December, I had this insane amount of hunger; it came out of nowhere. I'm talking going from my usual 1900 per day to around 2500 to 3000 calories per day. I couldn't understand why and I was worried that I was going to gain weight back. I was around 116 at this time. I tried to fight it off, but I just felt like I was going to gnaw my own hand off, so I let myself eat. I didn't lose anything of course, but I didn't gain weight either. I still do not understand it, but I just didn't gain anything. I ate at maintenance for a while, then all of a sudden at the beginning of January, my hunger levels decreased and between then and mid-February, I went from 116 to 109.

    I'm bulking now so I'm around 112 at this point. Yesterday, the same thing happened to me. I'm eating at a 250 caloric surplus, but yesterday I wasn't full until I ate 4000 calories. It's very unlike me to ever "binge" so to speak, but remembering what I did from December I just let it happen and decided to move on. You may just need a diet break, honestly.
  • Helloidentitycrisis
    Helloidentitycrisis Posts: 64 Member
    synacious wrote: »
    I've been at this since the end of June. I started out at 139 pounds. For about a week in December, I had this insane amount of hunger; it came out of nowhere. I'm talking going from my usual 1900 per day to around 2500 to 3000 calories per day. I couldn't understand why and I was worried that I was going to gain weight back. I was around 116 at this time. I tried to fight it off, but I just felt like I was going to gnaw my own hand off, so I let myself eat. I didn't lose anything of course, but I didn't gain weight either. I still do not understand it, but I just didn't gain anything. I ate at maintenance for a while, then all of a sudden at the beginning of January, my hunger levels decreased and between then and mid-February, I went from 116 to 109.

    I'm bulking now so I'm around 112 at this point. Yesterday, the same thing happened to me. I'm eating at a 250 caloric surplus, but yesterday I wasn't full until I ate 4000 calories. It's very unlike me to ever "binge" so to speak, but remembering what I did from December I just let it happen and decided to move on. You may just need a diet break, honestly.

    I actually got on the scale this morning and had lost 0.4kg! But I don't really want to take a break until at least my birthday which is just a few days more, just out of stupid fear of somehow swelling up like a balloon (which at the no of kcal I appear capable of eating atm, doesn't actually seem totally impossible - with so little to lose, every lb looks huge to me now! I've worked 10 weeks to lose about 1.4inches from my belly and it's exactly where any gain goes first! Even if I'm being a bit silly!)

    @ClaireLK1987 I guess I could be, I never considered my intolerance to be that bad because I don't have any of the swelling/hives that I've actually seen be caused by full gluten allergy!
  • sallygroundhog
    sallygroundhog Posts: 133 Member
    Helloidentitycrisis wrote: »

    I have noticed having some really weird, surreal dreams and am waking up sweating though?

    I wake up sweating if I'm hypoglycemic during the night. I have to avoid anything sweet a few hours before bed.
  • dabry05
    dabry05 Posts: 14 Member
    edited March 2016
    TL:DR, sounds like it's caused by refined sugar/flour - it was for me.

    I eliminated all refined sugar/flour from my diet (except for the odd day where I hang out with friends and eat the food I used to eat), this fixed everything for me. I'm not enough of a nutritionist to know if that was the root cause, but my brain says yes. Depending on whether or not you are doing a low carb diet, I switched from any refined sugar/flour to oatmeal and coffee (and some peanut butter/will replace with peanuts when the jar is done waste not want not), and a fruit smoothie for lunch. I am almost never hungry, and I'm limiting myself to 2100 calories a day in a renewed effort to lose the last 5 lbs I need to lose to get my BMI into that happy green zone doctors love so much. I wouldn't make drastic changes overnight, your brain and body will reject them, but I've slowly worked myself into minimizing processed food in my life and the more that I get away from processed foods, the better my body responds.

    I will say sleep helps a ton, this is easier if you work a job that has a set schedule that allows you to sleep at the same time every night, I always feel a ton better if I can get at least 7 hours in. :)
    sallygroundhog wrote: »
    Helloidentitycrisis wrote: »

    I have noticed having some really weird, surreal dreams and am waking up sweating though?

    I wake up sweating if I'm hypoglycemic during the night. I have to avoid anything sweet a few hours before bed.

    Yeah, I do any fruit and such earlier in the day, as far as coconut water for rehydration during workouts latest I do that is 5pm (at least 4 hours before sleep). Minimizes the crazy dreams, most definitely.
  • Helloidentitycrisis
    Helloidentitycrisis Posts: 64 Member
    sallygroundhog wrote: »
    Helloidentitycrisis wrote: »

    I have noticed having some really weird, surreal dreams and am waking up sweating though?

    I wake up sweating if I'm hypoglycemic during the night. I have to avoid anything sweet a few hours before bed.

    I usually have something like milk, warm milk with a tsp of nesquick or "hot ponyo" which is hot water, cinnamon and milk before bed...but I've been drinking it for the entire ten weeks and before then? Surely this couldn't affect it?
  • dabry05
    dabry05 Posts: 14 Member
    What I've noticed since kicking a lot of sugar is that it affects me a whole lot more than it used to, since like most American "normal" diets I was swimming in the stuff. Possibly you have gotten rid of some other sugar habits and this is the case?

  • karenlwashburn
    karenlwashburn Posts: 123 Member
    I had that happen once years ago. I was exercising twice a day a total of about 3 hours. I would even wake up very hungry in the middle of the night so I'd eat a small amount and drink some milk and I was okay. My body adjusted to the weight loss. It was the one time I was in excellent shape (as an adult).
  • Helloidentitycrisis
    Helloidentitycrisis Posts: 64 Member
    karenlwashburn wrote: »
    I had that happen once years ago. I was exercising twice a day a total of about 3 hours. I would even wake up very hungry in the middle of the night so I'd eat a small amount and drink some milk and I was okay. My body adjusted to the weight loss. It was the one time I was in excellent shape (as an adult).

    OH JEEZE I struggle to exercise (other than walking and yoga stretches) twice a week!
  • MissJay75
    MissJay75 Posts: 768 Member
    I find I am more satiated when I get lots of protein in a day. I aim for 80-100 grams per day. Sometimes though, I just get extra hungry. Like stomach-growling-loudly-enough-to-be-embarrassing hungry. For me, it's usually hormone related. (I get extra hungry around ovulation for example). When this happens, I try to eat really bulky low calorie foods to help feel fuller, and sometimes I give myself an extra few hundred calories for a few days. Eventually my appetite goes back to "normal".

    If it persists, you may just slow down your weight loss down to .25 kg per week. Since you don't seem to have much left to lose, many people would suggest you do so anyway.
  • Helloidentitycrisis
    Helloidentitycrisis Posts: 64 Member
    edited March 2016
    MissJay75 wrote: »
    I find I am more satiated when I get lots of protein in a day. I aim for 80-100 grams per day. Sometimes though, I just get extra hungry. Like stomach-growling-loudly-enough-to-be-embarrassing hungry. For me, it's usually hormone related. (I get extra hungry around ovulation for example). When this happens, I try to eat really bulky low calorie foods to help feel fuller, and sometimes I give myself an extra few hundred calories for a few days. Eventually my appetite goes back to "normal".

    If it persists, you may just slow down your weight loss down to .25 kg per week. Since you don't seem to have much left to lose, many people would suggest you do so anyway.

    My weight loss is set to 0.25kg and has been since I started mfp! Sorry for not saying - the first few weeks were done using a different calculator, but I found it was inaccurate and had me losing 0.4/0.5kg even though again I'd set it to 0.25kg. I assume that weight lifting is responsible for my usual loss (almost every week) being 0.3kg, but until the last 7-14ish days I was always satiated. Then I had a -for me at least- "huge" loss of 0.5, after "cheating" on mothers weekend with carrot cake and a flapjack... And then in the last 4 or 5 days I apparently lost another 0.4kg by this morning: even though I was eating over and I went to the gym only once instead of twice, DURING WHICH I was too weak to lift more than 4kg each hand (I usually use 12.5kgs and managed to again today)!

    Of course I hadn't seen or expected the loss when I posted this, but just because i lost doesn't mean I should stuff my face and allow bad eating habits to form
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,371 Member
    edited March 2016
    PMS?

    That was me until I figured out that during the 2 weeks before my period, refined flour and sugar were causing it (although it's ok if I have some after dinner). Same with artificial sweeteners (Stevia is ok). If I have even a slice of toast with my eggs and bacon, I'll be starving all day. It sucks.

    It's my second month now avoiding refined flour and sugar until 6pm or something and it's going much, much better (they don't affect me at all once TOM shows up though).

    And yeah it only started when I got within 4 pounds of my goal weight.

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