Help! Its an hour till food time!
 

I often find myself starving an hour or so before a meal. I realize its generally boredom etc. rather than actual "starvation", but unchecked, it can lead to junk food eating!
- chewing gum doesn't seem to help. Does anyone have any 'coping strategies" they can share?

chewing gum makes me hungrier. Try drinking water. Also, I keep low calorie snack items around, like raw veggies or string cheese. This helps.

I try to fill up on liquids, like hot tea or a cup of chick broth. Also skim milk, diet soda, and of course water. A small apple, clementine or pear does the trick, too.

Low-sodium V-8 juice i think 6 oz. has about 50 calories...along with a REAL BIG crunchy stalk of celery......lemon, hot sauce or pepper......you are adding both potassium and fiber....

of course some people can't stand v-8 but I'm a big fan and it's extra liquid for me, I have a hard time making sure I get enough every day.

v8 would be good, since its thick & I could count it as veggies
I drink my 2 litres of water a day always (I get thirsty if I don't) but I'm so used to it now that water doesn't make me feel full at all.
Being as I'm not a big dairy eater, I've been trying to hold myself to "no snacking until the yogurt is eaten" - its 5pm and I havn't eaten my breakfast yogurt yet - although I did eat 3 mini easter eggs from the candy jar so obviously this strategy needs work!

Charlotte -- How long do you go between meals? If I go longer than 2.5 to 3 hours I eat easter eggs too :lol:, that's not a good strategy in my book either :( ... For me after 2.5 to 3 hours of no food I will have a portion of protein (cottage cheese, chicken, protein shake) and a portion of carbs (orange, frozen strawberries, oatmeal, veggies) to hold me over till lunch or supper...

I was going to ask the same thing - how long do you go between meals? I read its not healthy to let your body go 4 hours without eating. For me a long wait inbetween meals causes me to overeat. (As if I really AM starving. hehe) I eat pretty much every 2-3 hours and make sure I'm drinking water in between all the times listed below. My bad time is making dinner. I'm usually pretty hungry at the time I'm making dinner so I'm trying to curb too many "taste tests". I'm making sure I have water with me while I cook and times when I'm just waiting for something to finish baking, etc I'll eat a small salad before dinner. Below is my normal schedule (give or take a half hour on most times)

breakfast 8am
snack 10am
lunch noon
afternoon snack 3pm
Dinner 6pm
dessert 8pm

I oscillate between clanking into work with bags and bags of food so that I can snack all day, and then deciding that I'm eating way to much, and cutting back to eating only three times a day. While I have seen the numbers that show that, e.g. endless broccoli eating is not a diet-killer, it does seem wrong to be packing a shopping bag full of food each day to take to work. I leave the house at 6am and get back around 6:30pm, so I'm looking at at least two meals at work, since I don't eat breakfast until I get to work because I'm just not hungry at 5:30 am! Eating out for some of the meals is not really an option, due to budget constraints and the lousy choices around the office.

Brush your teeth! I thought that was odd too, but when you brush your teeth, your subconcious kicks in for you not to mess up your teeth. I carry around my travel toothbrush. I have only just started getting back into the weightloss nightmare, but when I lost some weight some time ago, it really helped with the hunger pangs.

Humm... the whole 'toothpaste taste" thing would be a deterant, too. Ok, so my new plan is 1) brush my teeth and then if that fails, 2) drink V8. If I get too greedy and reach for the V8 right after the tooth brushing, it will probably taste gross thus hopefully motivating me not to do that again!

What I like to do is brush my teeth then drink a large glass of cold water, it's quite refreshing and filling....

YUCK!! V8 juice after brushing!!!! YUCK!!