food cues

Jean,

I just finished reading NT & I want to start living by the principles, but because of my lifetime of yo-yo dieting, followed by binge eating, I feel like I’m hungry all of the time, but I think it is mental hunger. I don’t know how to distnguish between actual hunger and mental hunger except when my belly growls at me, and in the book you said to catch hunger at an earlier stage . Do you have any suggestions as to how to become more attuned to my actual hunger.

And on the flip side, I never know when I am full, unil I’ve eaten too much. How do I determine this by reading my body? I know in the book you talked about how the speed of eating doesn’t matter, and I’m a speed eater, but should I slow down my eating since I know they say that it takes 20 minutes for a person to feel full?

Thanks for your assistance in helping me start my journey; I really felt that your book “spoke” to me,

Jill

discerning hunger and fullness

Dear Jill,
Your complaints are common among long term dieters.  This is because you have violated you body’s normal cues for so long, and have trained your body to need to store fat as an adaptive response to going hungry so much.  It takes time and work to reconnect with your body’s signals for food and fullness but you can do it!
First, work on never, ever going hungry but keeping good food with you at all times and eating in response to hunger signals.  This will reassure your body that you are not going to starve anymore. Gradually, your hunger cues will become more distinct.  Do not wait to eat until you are starving, faint, weak, craving sweets or irritable.  Pay attention!  Eat quality food that you are hungry for until you feel satisfied, not stuffed, overful, uncomfortable, needing to loosen your belt.  Pay attention.  There is no formula for this.  It’s your body, your signals.  You will learn by listening and responding with sensitivity and discipline.
Stay in touch!
Sincerely,
Jean Antonello

Couple more weeks and I’m done with my Ph.D. thesis writing. I feel thrown out of a regular cycle, I’m sitting at my computer for hours and my whole body is stressed. And I’m going hungry sometimes, that’s what I’m really upset about it…if only I knew how to manage stress times…I’m trying to be on track, it’s not working consistently. I’m hanging on.

stress

Managing stress takes discipline and foresight.  It helps to anticipate it and plan for it and usually we can.  We get stressed when our priorities go out of whack, or life takes us there in a surprise or disaster. 

When we are in charge, it is so important to be in charge.  Take breaks, lie down for three minutes, walk around.  Go outside if possible.  Eat.  Drink water.  Breathe, sit up straight.  Stretch.  Call a friend.  Stand on your head.  Whatever. 

We get so stuck in place and forget about our options and about our poor bodies.  The paper or book or project or design or edit will wait for us to finish.  How big a price are we willing to pay to make our bodies wait instead?

Sincerely,
Jean Antonello