Starving one day, feeling full the next

[briped]

Isn't it funny how on some days I feel so hungry and end up raiding my pork scratching/dark chocolate/ nut drawer, while other days I feel so full all day without having had that much to eat? Today is a feeling full day. I've had about 85g of smoked mackerel, 26g of coconut and a portion of keto coconut porridge for lunch. It's now 7:30 pm, and I'm still feeling full. Too full to contemplate an evening meal. That's no problem, of course, I'm just surprised and puzzled.
Am I the only one who's noticed this?

 

[Listlad]

What I have often found is that if I am busy then I am less inclined to eat as much.

You also?

 

[briped]

What I have often found is that if I am busy then I am less inclined to eat as much.

You also?

True, but that's a psychological issue, I find. A question of eating for other reasons than being hungry.
I'm talking feeling hunger. Right now I feel like I just finished Christmas dinner, even if I haven't eaten since lunch time. Yesterday was quite the opposite.

 

[Goonergal]

@briped what you describe is very familiar. Learning to follow the signals is the difficult bit.

 

[Pipp]

Can you describe how hunger feels for you, @briped?
I don’t feel it, or indeed that I have eaten enough as a full tum. More by how my head feels. If I need to eat I get a headache on left side. If I have eaten more than I need to I get a different headache, across forehead.
Weird, I know.

 

[briped]

Learning to follow the signals is the difficult bit.

Not if the signals say "full", but certainly if they keep going 'hungry'. That's the tricky bit. I've tried drinking more water and tea because I know that hunger and thirst signals can be confused, but I'm just wondering what the biological, perhaps sans the logical, explanation is.

 

[briped]

Can you describe how hunger feels for you, @briped?
I don’t feel it, or indeed that I have eaten enough as a full tum. More by how my head feels. If I need to eat I get a headache on left side. If I have eaten more than I need to I get a different headache, across forehead.
Weird, I know.

Hunger, that bad old hollow even slightly painful sensation in my tummy. The funny thing is that even if I've had the same breakfast some days I'll feel hunger, but other days not.
What you're saying about how you feel it in your head must be very unusual ...? Have you always felt hunger that way?

 

[Pipp]

Hunger, that bad old hollow even slightly painful sensation in my tummy. The funny thing is that even if I've had the same breakfast some days I'll feel hunger, but other days not.
What you're saying about how you feel it in your head must be very unusual ...? Have you always felt hunger that way?

I vaguely remember feeling a bit of emptiness in my tum as a child. That was in the good old days when food was put in front of you and if you didn’t like it there wasn’t an alternative, and so you waited until next meal. Nothing in cupboards to snack on. I do have some damage from multiple abdominal surgeries, so perhaps that is why I don’t get that empty tum feeling. As long as I can remember I always had ‘head hunger’ just wondered if it affects anyone else.

 

[Spl@]

I wonder if the hungry feeling is a construct of the mind.

I get the same, sometimes don't need an evening meal. Do have a couple of bulletproof coffee's through the day though.

 

[briped]

I vaguely remember feeling a bit of emptiness in my tum as a child. That was in the good old days when food was put in front of you and if you didn’t like it there wasn’t an alternative, and so you waited until next meal.

Not so in my home. If we didn't like it we'd have to eat it anyway. Hmm, interesting. Could that be part of the reason why my relationship with food is a bit less than relaxed ...? We didn't get many sweets back in the 60es, and I do remember thinking that when I grow up I'll live on custard! Obviously I didn't learn much about nutrition either

As long as I can remember I always had ‘head hunger’ just wondered if it affects anyone else.

You're the first I've heard it from. I understand the headache from hunger thing, sort of, but it's more of a general dull headache, and could have more to do with dehydration.

 

[briped]

I wonder if the hungry feeling is a construct of the mind.

Interesting. If I could only find the pattern I'd make sure that I felt full all the time. So cheap as well

 

[Chook]

I used to work with autistic adults and a couple of them used to get hunger headaches which often affected their behaviour. I used to think of it as the brain misrouting the signals.

@briped - was it the Diet Doctor coconut porridge recipe because when I tried it it felt like a big heavy stone in my stomach for some hours after eating it. No idea why. I won't be having it again though because I didn't like that 'weighed down' feeling.

Mr C says he seems to have lost any hunger signals since I started low carb even though he still has carbs with most meals. He tells me he sometimes feels he has to force himself to eat because he doesn't want to lose any more weight.

As for me, I find the hunger I get is often at normal meal times and is often just psychological. I fasted for four days last week and found that when I really get hungry it is still mainly psychological and still mainly at times I would normally have been having a meal but with a hollow, empty physical sensation in my stomach. I found It comes in waves and goes away if ignored.

 

[briped]

was it the Diet Doctor coconut porridge recipe because when I tried it it felt like a big heavy stone in my stomach for some hours after eating it. No idea why. I won't be having it again though because I didn't like that 'weighed down' feeling.

That's the very one, and I love it. I had it again today, and yesterday this time of the day I felt full. Today I'm beginning to feel ready for the 3 drumsticks defrosting on my work top. Funny, isn't it?

Mr C says he seems to have lost any hunger signals since I started low carb even though he still has carbs with most meals. He tells me he sometimes feels he has to force himself to eat because he doesn't want to lose any more weight.

It sounds as if you're coping with a non-low carbing OH in much the same way as we do it. My husband hasn't got a clue what it's like to not be normal weight, and what it's like not to be able to eat anything he fancies. So I'll eat my LCHF diet, and he'll have the same as me, but with carbs, much like your Mr. C. My husband hasn't lost weight, and has much the same appetite as he's always had. Well, not two bodies are alike, I suppose.

 

[Chook]

My husband lost about 15kg when i started low carb (he decided to join me on low carb to be supportive). He really enjoys low carb but I keep having to prompt him to eat carbs to stop him losing any more weight. (At the same time, but eating less low carb food, i lost just a couple of kilos.)

I have yoyo dieted throughout my life and on rare occasions I've felt my weight was 'normal' but, goodness, i had to work hard to keep it down to that 'normal' level. On the other hand Mr C has always eaten what he liked, when he liked and has often struggled to keep his weight up to a healthy level. Literally any emotion causes him to lose weight - happy, worried, sad, stressed - any emotion at all and the weight falls off him. I often feel like one of those people raising foie gras pate geese.

 

[zauberflote]

Interesting discussion!! I feel hunger as a literal bellyache that gets worse until I eat. I used to get hunger headaches as a child, or that’s what my mother told me they were. We didn’t snack much if at all after school in the 50’s/60’s until junior high when we had a little spare $$!
I raised a child who is now an autistic adult. I don’t remember his frequent headaches and stomachaches being anything but either stress or “time to use the bathroom for a while, bub!” He and his slightly Asperger’s brother were lean mean machine kids until they hit late teens/early 20’s. One was, he finally stopped being an angry young man and decided to settle down forever with the grade 10 sweetheart(now wife of 5 yrs!); the other started gaining weight on antidepressants. So he’s obese, got fatty liver at 28... most likely preD as well but Lord have mercy on the mother who tries to boss her autistic adult around when it comes to his picky picky eating!!

 

[Member496333]

It is fascinating but I wouldn’t overthink it. Learn to trust your appetite. As I like to keep saying - eat when you’re hungry and stop when you’re not. If you’re eating the right foods then your appetite is no longer hijacked by carbohydrate dependence, and it will tell you when it needs food, or won’t when it doesn’t. No effort required.

I tend to experience this, also. I am fat adapated but my BMI is a rather lean 18.6 which means my body tends to want to hold onto the fat that it does have. The upshot is that it is not shy in telling me when I need to add fuel. Some days I will barely think about food, but others I will have a very hearty appetite. For me, weight training seems to be the hinge point. If I’m lifting weights then I will get the hunger signals sometimes almost the moment that I put them down. Biochemistry rocks

And there I was saying don’t overthink it

 

[Diawara]

It is fascinating but I wouldn’t overthink it. Learn to trust your appetite. As I like to keep saying - eat when you’re hungry and stop when you’re not. If you’re eating the right foods then your appetite is no longer hijacked by carbohydrate dependence, and it will tell you when it needs food, or won’t when it doesn’t. No effort required.

I tend to experience this, also. I am fat adapated but my BMI is a rather lean 18.6 which means my body tends to want to hold onto the fat that it does have. The upshot is that it is not shy in telling me when I need to add fuel. Some days I will barely think about food, but others I will have a very hearty appetite. For me, weight training seems to be the hinge point. If I’m lifting weights then I will get the hunger signals sometimes almost the moment that I put them down. Biochemistry rocks

And there I was saying don’t overthink it

in the year since i signed up for this thing and mainly eat lo carb .. i eat a breakfast at about 6 am...coconut porridge just now..generaly some almonds or pecans about oneish then evening meal.. never hungry during the day... myprevious workday diet was the traditional packed lunch ofwhite bread sandwiches few biscuits some fruit etc. and always starving at end of workday ( cue raid cake tin before evening meal ) .......