BHC Hunger Signals and Food Tracking

BHC Hunger Signals and Food Tracking:

 A few tips to regain control of a healthy diet

As a trainer, I’ve encountered a lot of questions about nutrition and have often heard clients talk about the new changes they are making to their diet. After boiling all of that info down, I’ve come up with a few tips that I feel will be of benefit to just about anyone looking to take some simple, actionable steps towards having a healthier relationship with food.*

Hunger Signals:

Here is a pretty common sentence you’ll hear when someone wants to discuss nutrition or eating habits: “I feel like I eat enough, but I’m still always hungry.” Been there. So many things can go into making a person feel hungry. Hunger signals could be influenced by hormones, blood sugar levels, stress, how empty your stomach and intestines are, medical conditions, activity level that particular day. The list goes on and on.

We often are told to just “listen to our bodies”, but it doesn’t  stop there. If I listened to my body last night I would have had an entire box of “Annie’s Organic Bunny Grahams”. Somehow I managed to hold back, but even if I had indulged in that snack binge, it wouldn’t be the end of the world. Maybe that is what I needed mentally more than physically that night. But if we are looking to create consistent, long term healthy changes and habits, we need to listen AND understand what our body is trying to tell us so that nights that should be once in a blue moon don’t turn into regular, unhealthy patterns. 

To scratch the surface of what it takes to understand our hunger signals, let’s look at the more common causes of false hunger signals. Lack of sleep, stress, dehydration, what is in your diet (satiating protein or fiber filled foods vs. low nutrient, often high processed carbohydrate based foods), and boredom are some of the big ones. 

True hunger signals will likely come in the form of a rumbling stomach, low energy and even problems focusing. Sometimes we might feel those same things from our false hunger signals, so what we can do to begin to learn from our body is to journal our experiences with food and hunger. 

The next time you’re feeling that “still hungry” feeling coming on, take a second to write down or at least think through some of these false hunger signals to see if one sticks out as a cause. Did you get enough sleep? Have caffeinated or sugary drinks replaced water too much today? Are you eating complete meals, or processed foods? It’ll take some willingness to be self aware of possible poor nutrition habits, but as an exercise it could help to shed some light on areas where a small amount of attention could create lasting change in your day to day health. So, step one, trying to stay in touch and in tune with what your body is telling you could help to create lasting, healthy habits. Not by saying no to cravings or hunger signals and avoiding food, but by making your own interventions at the original source. 

Food Tracking/Journaling:

One more action item you can add to the beginning of your nutrition journey is to start food tracking and journaling. After we’ve learned to tune into our bodies needs, we can start to record and track to see if what we consume is meeting those needs. There are many resources available for free online such as myfitnesspal and myplate that allow you to keep close watch on your meals. The goal here is not to obsessively track each tiny detail and ingredient forever. We’re here to create healthy habits. Give yourself a reasonable goal of tracking meals for one week. By the end of that week, whether you’ve tracked on one of the above sites or just written in an actual journal, you should have a pretty decent baseline outlook at trends in your eating patterns. Take a close look at whether you are getting enough protein, fiber, healthy fats and complex carbs. Where are those nutrients coming from? Is a disproportionate portion of your intake coming during a certain time of day? Use that week of info to take a step back and ask yourself some questions. Sometimes that makes the big picture a little more clear. 

*Everyone is built differently and these are some general areas to do a little self-check with. If there are other medical concerns or conditions affecting your diet and/or lifestyle, a doctor or registered dietician should be your primary source of information. For the purposes of this article, these tips, in my opinion, will cast a wide net and cover the more common roadblocks, offering solutions to try as you work towards or start new goals.