How can I stop the hunger when dieting?
“You can learn to live with it, work through it, talk a walk or drink a big glass of water.”
This was the advice I heard over the years.
It never worked for me!
I hated going to bed hungry and waking up ravenous. Sheer torture!
Often, I could not sleep, and at breakfast time I would race to the kitchen as if I had been on hunger strike for a month.
Because I could never get a grip on it, I would berate myself.
Yep, that dump truck of shame came rolling in.
“What is the matter with you, why are you so weak-willed?’ my demon would scream at me.
Every diet ended, because I was always starving.
The challenge is that we have grown up with Portion Distortion.
When I came from Britain in the late 80’s a cheese sandwich in the UK was two thin slices of buttered bread and a small piece of cheese. In the US it came with a hunk of bread (almost jaw breaking) filled with more trimmings than a salad bar and a wheel of cheese.
At first, I could only eat half of it, but gradually I adapted, as did my waistline.
In the 90’s a portion size of spaghetti with meatballs was 500 calories, now it comes in at over a 1000 calories.
We demanded bigger portions and now feel ‘cheated’ if a restaurant doesn’t give us them. Hard to eat out, and not to succumb to the normality of super size portions.
To suddenly reduce our intake is almost impossible. Our stomachs have adapted.
My goal was to differentiate between emotional hunger and physical hunger: To get to a place where I had not visited since a child, before I started dieting. To try and find that inner voice that says” feeling full now, can’t eat another bite”.
I had not heard that voice for years. I had no idea whether I was hungry because I was physically hungry or there was an emotional charge.
In the beginning it all felt the same.
When I became a Dieter in Recovery, I stopped this, by giving in to the hunger.
Confused?
I made a promise: I would never get to that ravenous hunger stage again.
By giving myself permission to eat, I took away the shame and the pressure. The internal bully had nothing to attack. Without the attack, there could be no further binge eating to quell the shaming voice.
There were some guidelines:
I could not eat junk food or trigger foods (more about that in other posts).
I could eat fresh fruit and produce in any quantity.
And I did!
Many times, I ate numerous baked potatoes and bowls of fruit salad and a ton of veggie curry.
Feeling stuffed instead of satisfied had become my norm.
To change that I allowed myself to be stuffed with the veggies and fruits.
Gradually it changed. Feeling bloated no longer felt good. The enjoyment of the food disappeared when I consumed too much.
Calorie counting, or restricting myself, or shaming myself, did not work.
But observation and check in’s with myself and my body did.
Being mindful and aware shifted it and I could hear the voice that told me (with no shame) that I had eaten enough.
Another step in getting rid of the dieter mentality.
Take Care of yourself… You are so worth it.
Thanks for reading,
Christina
For the next few days, just notice your portion sizes. Could you make them smaller and if you are still hungry eat some veggies and some fruits. Remember the goal is not to starve yourself, but to listen to your body, to find the place where you can recognize the different types of hunger.