Intuitive Eating has 10 key principles. If you haven’t checked out my previous post that covers the first principle of Intuitive Eating, you’ll want to start there! It is all about rejecting the diet mentality, and you can find it here!
This post is all about Intuitive Eating principle #2: honoring your hunger.
What is hunger?
Before we talk about honoring our hunger, we first have to discuss what hunger is.
Merriam-Webster defines hunger as an uneasy sensation occasioned by the lack of food.
In more simple terms, hunger is our body’s natural way of telling us that it needs sustenance in the form of food and nourishment.
What is primal hunger?
If you’ve ever been on a diet or went without food for too long, you may be familiar with the feeling of primal hunger.
Primal hunger is an intense and urgent need to eat, and often leads to overeating as a way to compensate for your hunger going unanswered for too long.
People who are on diets often come across primal hunger. They try to deny themselves food even if they feel hungry, and hold off for as long as they can.
But inevitably when they can’t take it anymore, they give in and binge.
Here’s an example in real life. Let’s say you eat breakfast, but it isn’t super filling. An hour later, your stomach starts rumbling.
You think to yourself “there’s no way I’m hungry because I just ate. I’m going to try to wait until lunch” even though lunch is hours away.
You gulp down a glass of water in an attempt to quiet the hunger, but it doesn’t help. Soon, you can’t focus on your tasks at work because your mind is preoccupied with thoughts about hungry.
Some might call this “hangry” which is a combination of hungry and angry.
Lunchtime comes around and you wolf down the salad you packed, along with 3 slices of pizza and two doughnuts from the breakroom.
This is the power of biology.
Why do we binge on the worst foods?
Do you notice that you tend to make “healthier” food choices when you’re feeling “peckish” than when you’re feeling hangry?
This is another example of the power of biology.
When we’re in a semi-starvation mode, AKA a diet, your body doesn’t crave the “healthy” protein rich foods like chicken breast and eggs.
It doesn’t even crave the calorie dense oils like avocado and olive oil.
Instead, you crave pizzas, pasta, and chips. These foods are high in carbohydrates, which is our bodies’ preferred source of energy.
Let me repeat that: your diet is leading you to crave junk food.
It has nothing to do with your lack of willpower or control. You can’t outsmart your biology.
How did we become out of touch with our hunger?
One of the biggest challenges in learning how to honor your hunger is to recognize when you’re hungry.
This is a lot more complicated than it sounds, especially if you’ve been avoiding it or not listening to it for a while.
Some ways we’ve become out of touch with our hunger and our bodies is:
Reasoning: You may have gotten used to telling yourself you can’t be hungry because you just ate, or telling yourself you can wait to eat again.
Dieting: Purposely restricting yourself or ignoring your body’s hunger signals in an attempt to lose weight can lead to a silencing of your hunger signals.
Numbing techniques: Eating foods full of air like popcorn, rice cakes or gelatin or drinking water or tea. These are diet tricks that expand the stomach and trick you into thinking you’re full.
Stress: Chronic stress and a chaotic work schedule can also play a role in your hunger cues. Stress can suppress hunger temporarily, leading to the potential to overeat as a compensatory mechanism.
Medications or Illnesses: In some circumstances, your hunger cues may be thrown off because medications or Illnesses are interfering with your body.
If this is the case, you may have to eat even if you do not have hunger signals.
For example, a lot of patients with anorexia nervosa genuinely don’t feel hungry but still benefit from eating to get proper nutrition. This is what is known as “nourishment as self-care” in Intuitive Eating.
Attunement Exercise
The best way to do this is to take some time to reflect on the physical sensations that arise from your biological cues and body states.
For example, the next time you’re hungry, thirsty, or full, it can help to answer the following questions:
How does my head feel: Do I feel light-headed? Is my thinking clear or cloudy?
How does my mouth feel: Do I have a dull ache? Am I gnawing at things?
How does my stomach feel: Is it rumbling or gurgling?
How do my legs feel: Am I weak and buckling over?
Personally, when I’m thirsty, I notice that my mouth feels very dry and my head may start to throb.
This is usually the tell tale sign for me that it’s been a little too long since I’ve reached for a sip of water.
As you practice and become more familiar with your body’s sensations during certain states, you may notice that you enjoy some experiences more than others.
Some of my clients have noticed that they don’t feel hungry or full until it’s “too late”, and then the experience is super unpleasant (primal hunger and over fullness).
Get to know your hunger
Hunger looks different from person to person and thus can impact each person differently.
A ravenous state of hunger is generally not fun. But, when you’re mildly hungry, it may actually be a pleasant experience.
Think of it like “hmm what am I in the mood for? Ooh that sounds good” vs “I need to eat now or I will kill someone”.
Hunger-Fullness Scale
Mild hunger is what we’re striving for. A great way to check in with your hunger throughout the day is by using a rating scale from 0 to 10.
Hospitals like to use this scale to rate subjective feelings like pain. This is because there is no right or wrong answer to how you are personally feeling.
On the 1 to 10 hunger fullness scale, 1 indicates primal hunger and 10 indicates painfully full to the point of nausea.
The numbers are:
1- ravenous, difficulty concentrating, past the point of comfortable hunger
2- very hungry, stomach growling, need to get food now
3- moderately hungry, thoughts about food increase
4- light hunger, curious, thinking about what sounds good to eat
5- neutral, neither hungry nor full
6- lightly full, will need to eat again within 1-3 hours
7- comfortably full and satisfied
8- slightly stuffed, maybe overdid it a bit
9- stuffed and past the point of comfort, stomach may hurt
10- uncomfortably full and feel sick, nauseous
Generally, you want to stay within the 3-7 range, where 3 is hungry and ready to eat but without urgency and 7 is comfortably full and satisfied.
Types of Hunger
A lot of people mistake Intuitive Eating as just “eat when you’re hungry stop when you’re full”.
It’s important not to make Intuitive Eating another set of diet rules to follow, as there are instances when hunger and fullness doesn’t apply.
One example is when you want to eat because the food looks good and not because you’re actually hungry. This may be a birthday, anniversary or office potluck. This hunger is known as taste hunger.
Another example is when you want to eat because you know food won’t be available to you for a little while. You may be eating strategically in an effort not to overeat later. This is known as practical hunger.
Finally, you may want to eat because you’re feeling a certain emotion. This is known as emotional hunger- more on this when we cover principle #7.
Conclusion
There is sometimes a lot of shame associated with feeling hungry, but it’s just as much of a biological signal as going to the bathroom.
No one ever says “I can’t possibly need to go to the bathroom-I just went!” and yet we do this all the time when it comes to eating.
The truth is there can be a lot of reasons you’re still hungry, even if you just ate.
You may have not eaten enough the previous day, or your meal was actually more of a snack. You may be on your period. Or, you may even just be having a hungry day.
No matter the case, it’s important to approach your hunger with compassion and nonjudgement curiosity.
I hope you enjoyed reading all about Intuitive Eating Principle #2: Honor Your Hunger!
Completely new to Intuitive Eating? Click here for a breakdown for beginners!
Do you have kids? If so, you may want to check out 5 ways you can help your kids become intuitive eaters!
NOW I WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU!
Have you experienced primal hunger before? What did it feel like for you?
How do you gauge your hunger and fullness cues? Do you use the hunger fullness scale?
Sources:
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hunger
https://www.evelyntribole.com/principle-2-honor-your-hunger/
