Eat when you're hungry or on a schedule?
 

Saw this on another forum but wanted to see what my chicks do! :)

Personally, I have to eat at pretty regular scheduled times... I'm still no good at telling when I'm really hungry. I try to eat my meals/snacks 3-4 hours apart.


What about yall?

A schedule worked well for me when I was retraining my palate and appetite. But now I try to eat according to hunger when I can.

When I first started I ate strictly on schedule until I re-learned to tell when I'm hungry. A year later the schedule is sort of habit but I'm not as strict as I used to be, because I 'know' when I'm hungry. :)

I eat when I am hungry I guess. How do you tell when you're really hungry anyway? I guess I was not aware that there is a way to tell if your hungry or not.

dundun1021 it's not always easy to tell when you're hungry but it is possible. Before I started my journey I had 'food issues' and was an emotional/overeater, basically anytime I felt something (stress, happy, bored, anxious, ...) I would eat because I was 'hungry.' Similarly, because I always felt 'hungry' I never felt full (hence me weighing so darn much). After years of this behavior I couldn't tell the difference between physical hunger and 'emotional/mental hunger.' A huge part of my weight loss has been about retraining my brain to know when I'm physically hungry or just want to use food to feed some emotional need.

Nowadays I know when I'm hungry when I 'feel' hungry, it's pretty much the same feeling as 'emotional hunger' but the reason behind the hunger is different. It's hard to describe, but basically I look at the motivation behind my hunger (if it's been a few hours then I'm hungry, if I'm stressed then it's me seeking comfort). :)

I also still have problems differentiating between "real hunger" and "emotional hunger" so basically i eat breakfast 30-1hr after i wake up. Lunch 12.30pm-2.00pm and dinner not before 5.30pm.
I do allow for 1-2 snacks a day which i eat when i really think i'm hungry. but i still find it difficult to tell.

I sort of do both. Sometimes I am just irrationally hungry so I'll have a snack and know that should be enough, any hunger left over just has to wait for next meal time :lol: Other times, i eat pretty regularly, but its not like "omg 11 o'clock is snack time, must eat even if not hungry". If im not hungry, i usually dont eat

I eat en a schedule. I have my phone tell me when it's time to eat. Because otherwise I'll just forget to eat if I'm busy, and I tend to eat when I'm bored so it keeps me from eating when I wander into the kitchen.

i eat on a schedule. if i waited until i was hungry, i would literally only eat one meal a day, and that is not good for weight loss, because i've tried it. since i've started eating three meals a day, the weight has been coming off pretty steadily.

I eat when I am hungry... though I tend to get hungry around the same times every day... so kind of on a schedule? haha.

I ate on a schedule at first, and wish I hadn't. That schedule got SO cemented into my brain that I started feeling like I HAD to eat at certain times, regardless of whether I was hungry. Still struggling to break out of that now.

I don't necessarily eat on a schedule, but I try to eat something every 3-5 hours, even if it's just a light snack. I definitely can tell the difference now, only after 12 days, between my psychological hunger and my physical hunger, however. Sometimes I'll wait for it, but usually it's in the time frame I think I should eat again anyways.

I don't know if I started eating on a schedule or just eating when I was hungry and that became my schedule, but I do have set times that I like to eat, usually hunger based. I pretty much graze throughout the day, if I don't eat like this, my metabolism just stops, so I just have to make sure that I'm eating good stuff.

This is my usual schedule:

8 - Breakfast 1 - protein shake
9:30 - Breakfast 2 - cottage cheese
11 - Fruit
12:30 - Lunch, whatever that may be.
2 - Veggies
4 - Coffee
7-8 - Dinner

However, if I'm not hungry, I don't eat, I just make sure I get in at least 1200 calories a day and try not to have all of them be later in the day...

I eat when I'm hungry, though that does seem to be on a pretty predictable schedule. ;)


____________________

:drinkup: ~*~ Will See the 180s by St. Patrick’s Day 2010 ~*~ :drinkup:

Mini-Goal 1 :: Under 200
Mini-Goal 2 :: Under 190
Mini-Goal 3 :: Under 180
Mini-Goal 4 :: Under 170
Mini-Goal 5 :: 165 lbs
Mini-Goal 6 :: Under 160
Mini-Goal 7 :: 154 lbs
Mini-Goal 8 :: Under 150
G O A L ! ! ! :: 145 lbs

I prefer schedule (most likely I'm hungry then as well). This way it's must easier to eat "right" :)