Weight Loss Basics - Hunger

Hunger is a very scary word for people who are about to commit to a weight loss program. I know because I hear the fear all of the time. My new clients implore me to tell them that they will lose weight without feeling hunger pangs, and I get that. However, you need to understand that what you perceive as hunger is not what you think it is. Bear with me for a minute and let's explore the sensation you label as "hunger."

What, I wonder, do you experience when you say that you are hungry? For instance, when I feel hungry, I feel... well...hungry. My stomach sometimes growls, and I experience a sort of empty feeling that tells me it's time to eat something.

Now your turn: When I feel hungry, I feel ______________?

My clients fill in this blank with words that sound nothing like mine. I had a client once casually say to me that if she had to eat smaller portions she would "turn into a bear" and her family might leave her. I had to explain to her, over many sessions, that simple hunger was not the larger issue. For her, hunger gave rise to major emotions. One was anger, and we needed to explore why she was angry. Why did the lack, or emptiness, within her bring up anger? Why did it turn her into a bear?

So, when I encourage my clients to go a bit deeper to describe what they experience, they area able, with some effort, to speak of feelings on a more visceral level. These feelings exist deep within us and we feel them physically in our stomachs. Coincidence? Is the gnawing feeling we have in our gut, which we perceive as hunger, really the emptiness we feel within our selves? Does the fruitless attempt to fill the void with food make the real emotions come up tenfold, tempting us to eat more, since we have no intention of dealing with them now?

My clients' answers gradually become more telling. They feel sad, deprived, angry, lonely, abandoned, anxious, and unloved. Well, this surely differs from what I experience as hunger, which is a physical sensation in my stomach! Interesting. Nobody ever reports feeling the simple physical sensation of a growling stomach. So, I must ask: Are you eating because you feel hunger, or because something else is going on?

While I would love to be able to tell you that you don't have to be hungry to lose weight, I cannot honestly do so. Here is the truth about hunger: If you want to lose weight, you must experience hunger. I'm sorry. However, you will not feel hungry all of the time. Does that help? Good. I can also tell you that you will rarely feel very hungry, and you will never, ever feel as if you were starving!

Okay, so the truth is out. Now that we have acknowledged it, we can discuss it without fear. Simply put, the time to experience the physical sensation of hunger is just before going to bed at night. By bedtime, you should feel as if you could have had a bit more to eat. You should feel just about satisfied, but not quite.

You see, the way you feel at night is the key to controlling your weight loss progress. For instance, if you go to bed feeling stuffed for 3 or 4 consecutive nights, the outcome of that feeling will be weight gain. If you feel satisfied for 3 or 4 consecutive nights, the outcome will be maintenance. And, if you feel a little bit hungry for 3 or 4 consecutive nights, the outcome will be weight loss! Therefore, if you monitor how you feel before going to sleep, the number on the scale will never again be a mystery. You will never again get on, fingers crossed, hoping to have lost weight. You will know what the number will be because the scale merely reflects back to you what you have felt throughout the week. If there has been a little bit of hunger all week, I guarantee the scale will reflect weight loss!

Wow! Can I really be bold enough to make such a guarantee? Yes, I can, because this is truly all you have to do. The question now becomes: How do you do it without feeling anxiety at the thought of feeling a just a little bit hungry? Well, that's the rest of this story. We make it so very difficult in our minds, when it is actually very simple. And this is where I would like to help. I can show you how to do this. I can be a resource for you to turn to as I break down the process of weight loss and show you the simple steps that will bring you to your goal. Know that I always will tell you the truth, and this is the truth.

I hope that this week you will decide to explore your experience of hunger. When you begin feeling hungry, sit for a second and try to determine if there is an emotion rather than a physical sensation that you are interpreting to be hunger. Are you perhaps feeling sad, anxious, lonely, unloved and unsupported? If you are, then that is what I want you to think about. Focus on the emotion and journal about it. Write exactly what you are feeling and keep writing until you understand that you are not physically hungry, that food is not what you crave. After a few journal entries, I'm certain you will discover that it's usually not hunger that you're feeling.

But what if it is actually hunger? You might want to ask. Ah! If it really is, then I want you to say to yourself, Good! That's the way I am supposed to feel if I want to lose weight! I need to feel a little bit hungry every night to get the results that I am looking for.

Embrace the sensation! Let it empower you! This is not deprivation! You are not being abandoned! This does not mean that no one loves you!! It's simply you making the choice to feel that physical sensation and tolerate it for the purpose of bettering yourself. This is a gift you give yourself: a gift of love, and of strength, and of perseverance, and of the occasional grumbling stomach! From now on, if your stomach grumbles, smile!

So, let me ask you again: What does hunger feel like?

Ah. Your answer is correct: It feels like weight loss!!