The second principle of Intuitive Eating is to Honor Your Hunger. If you have a history of officially dieting or dieting behaviors, then you have had to override your hunger cues. Biological hunger refers to the physiological cues from your body that let you know you need food.
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Sarah Tronco, CMHIMP, is a Philadelphia Nutrition Coach specializing in mental nutrition. Sarah offers individualized mental health nutrition coaching that empowers you to make sustainable changes to improve your overall well-being.
In an effort to fool our bodies into thinking we have eaten, sometimes people will drink large quantities of water or eat foods known as “Air Foods.” Air Foods are foods that have a low-calorie content, but make us feel full. In the moment we feel satisfied because our belly may be full, but our body derives little benefit in terms of energy. While Air Foods may be beneficial as a quick snack to hold us over until we are able to eat, when used as a way to override our body’s need for nutrition, our hunger cues are undermined.
When we ignore your biological hunger cues, we also risk activating our body’s primal hunger. When we are experiencing primal hunger, we are no longer able to restrict our eating. Our body needs food. Now. And so we may experience what is often called a binge eating episode, but may really be our body responding to being starved. It is not a lack of self-control, it is our body going into survival mode. Primal hunger has an urgency that can make us feel desperate, and it can even feel painful.
When dieting behaviors are chronic, we may lose faith in our ability to know when and how to eat. Our body has undergone the trauma of experiencing food scarcity, and we are no longer able to interpret our hunger signals because we have cut ourselves off from our bodies. One of the first steps to honoring your hunger is to reconnect with your body.
Nutrition Coach Philadelphia Sarah Tronco, CMHIMP, is a Philadelphia Nutrition Coach specializing in mental nutrition. Sarah offers individualized mental health nutrition coaching that empowers you to make sustainable changes to improve your overall well-being.
References:
- https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/quick-guide-intuitive-eating#history
- https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/do-diets-make-you-gain-weight#success-rates
- Tribole, E., & Resch, E. (2019). The Intuitive eating workbook: Principles for nourishing a healthy relationship with food. Brattleboro, VT: Echo Point Books & Media, LLC.
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