Originally Posted by :
I never know what to do when I'm hungry but nothing looks good.

I pass on food in that situation. I NEVER eat anything that doesn't look good to me. I figure being hungry for a while is not going to kill me, and if I really WERE in danger of starving any kind of food would look good to me.

Thanks, Fiddler. The hunger I'm speaking of is the ravenous kind associated with prednisone but my dose is so low now I hardly think that is it. But that's what it feels like. When I'm stessed or worried I lose my appetite. Yes, it is restaraunt eating I am talking about but it could be applied to eating at other peoples houses, too. Oh, and I just hate eating in the night. Then I feel like I need to brush my teeth. ha! Oh, Fiddler, when I get really hungry I feel nauseous and my stomach hurts......it's pretty uncomfortable. This morning when I woke up I drank some water and that helped a little.

Carol. I have hardly been home for several days and just skimmed through these posts quickly but wanted to let you know I've been thinking about what you said.

You do need to eat when you're hungry and if you're not, you're really breaking the major premise of intuitive eating. Are you getting enough protein? That makes a big difference for me - if you're ravenous like that, get up and fix some eggs or something or better yet just have them before you go to bed as part of a routine (or whatever something that sounds good to you). It's amazing to me if I have eggs and toast for breakfast, I just seem to feel better all day.

I have an early meeting at work and will be flying out tonight - I'll check in tomorrow and read this more thoroughly and respond more thoughtfully. :-)

Cindy, I have been on prednisone for over a year and I also take atenelol, norvasc and fosamax. I wonder if the meds might be causing some of the problems. Dr. usually don't give a lot of info just meds. I am trying to just stick with my local dr. even though Mayo is a great place. Yesterday, I started to take a little B6 because I read somewhere it helps with nausea and it did seem to work. I hope this might help with that ravenous hunger that sometimes feels like nausea.

Carol,

All of the meds you are on can cause nausea and/or stomach pain. You really should look up the side effects for yourself. You can find them on the internet if your doctor isn't telling you. Fosamax in particular has some very serious side effects that are currently generating a lot of lawsuits.

Things have been going good since I got this hunger/nausea under control. I can even ignore hunger if I'm busy and it feels good not to be a slave to hunger. I was able to post this morning before eating and that is a victory for me. I have lost the little weight that I had gained back.

That's great, Carol!

Not being a slave to hunger is one of the things I really like about my life now. Part of the reason I gave up on diets is because with all the counting points/calories, weighing, etc., they made me more preoccupied with eating, not less. And for some reason when I was on a "diet" being hungry was a really terrible thing, but now it just doesn't bother me to be hungry now and then. It's kind of like when I was a kid and if I was doing something really interesting I wouldn't want to come in for dinner. It's different when it's your own choice to be hungry instead of some diet making you hungry.

I over did it at lunch yesterday but got back in the groove with little supper. Probably it is good just to accept it and learn. We have a lot of company for the next 2 weeks and they have brought all kinds of food gifts......carmel popcorn, candy, homemade chex mix. I'm not bothered by any of it but the carmel popcorn and it's already loosing its pull.

Just received this free newsletter from the Normal Eating website:
Here's what doesn't work: Sit all tensed up, yell at yourself for again wanting to eat when not hungry, and try to force yourself to not want to. That's like telling yourself to not think about an elephant. Try it. Are you thinking about an elephant? Of course!

What does work is gentle acceptance and mindfulness. When you want to eat when you're not hungry, it means that something is bothering you - that something is causing you discomfort, and you don't know how to fix it. It does not mean that you're hopeless, that you'll never get this, that you can't do it, and that you should give up on Normal Eating. When you talk to yourself in a disparaging way, you just increase your desire to eat. For one thing, self-abuse makes you feel bad, and eating is what emotional eaters do when they feel bad. For another, trying to force yourself to not think about something or not do something just makes you want to do it more.

The first thing to do is calm yourself down. Often just sitting quietly and focusing on your breathing is a very effective way to do this. Some people use other ways to calm themselves down - draw a picture, play soothing music - whatever works for you. Note that if you say mean things to yourself, you will not be able to calm down. You'll just feel more agitated. Treat yourself as you would a child who is freaking out - your inner child. First you calm her down, then you ask her what's wrong.

When you're feeling less anxious and tense, you can think more clearly about what is setting off your desire to eat when not hungry. Think about what you're doing in that moment (or what you had been doing when the urge arose), what's going on in your life. Don't just sit and think, however. That's usually not very effective. It's better to think actively - for example, write in a journal, post in the Normal Eating forum, or call a friend. Thinking through writing or speaking improves your ability to stay focused on the issue, and you'll often realize things you wouldn't otherwise.

What's bothering you doesn't have to be a major emotional conflict requiring therapy (though sometimes it is). Perhaps you tend to eat in the evening after dinner because you don't know how else to relax, or because your partner isn't paying attention to you, or because you feel guilty relaxing and not being constantly productive. Perhaps you just had an argument with someone, and don't know what to do with your anger, or you feel guilty for being angry. Perhaps you have something to do that you don't want to do, and you're using eating as a means of procrastination. Perhaps your desire to eat comes from wanting a break from what you're doing, and you don't feel entitled to take one unless you're "doing" something. Or perhaps you're anxious about your ability to do well at something - for example, making a huge Thanksgiving feast for a large gathering of relatives!

Often when you realize what's behind the desire to eat, and accept that this underlying problem is making you feel bad, that alone is enough to quell the desire to eat. This is because a frequent reason for non-hunger eating is to avoid feeling bad or even acknowledging that you feel bad about something. But pretending that you never feel any unhappiness or discomfort doesn't make it so - the feelings just come out some other way. When you stop running from your feelings and let them surface, often the urge to eat will go away because the reason for eating has gone away - you're facing your feelings and sitting with them.

Other times, as you sit with your feelings and try to understand them, actions you can take will occur to you - things you can do to address the problem that are more effective than eating. For example, you might ask for help with an overwhelming project, assert your desire to not do something unpleasant or that you don't have time for, accept that you feel angry sometimes and that's okay, realize that you don't have to do everything perfectly to enjoy Thanksgiving with your family.

Over time, you will get better at calming yourself down, getting to the heart of the problem, and finding new ways to cope. As your ability to sit with discomfort increases, the frequency of your food cravings will diminish, your pauses will turn into stops, and you will become a Normal Eater.

Most importantly, be kind and gentle with yourself. Non-hunger eating urges are just signs of distress. You wouldn't berate a loved one for showing signs of distress, and neither should you berate yourself for showing signs of distress. If you yell at a child to stop crying, it makes her cry more, not less.

Don't expect to get instantly better, then berate yourself when you don't. Long-term change is incremental, not something that happens all of a sudden. If people could stop emotional eating by a simple decision, this wouldn't be such a widespread problem. In order to stop you must first be able to pause, so start by learning to pause and use that pause well.


Something to Try...
The next time you have an urge to eat when not hungry, take these steps:

Say to yourself, "I notice that I have a desire to eat, though I'm not hungry. Something must be bothering me. I need to pause and take care of myself." Accept the desire to eat; don't try to force it to go away. See it as a signal that something needs attention.
Spend a minimum of 5-10 minutes doing something calming and soothing that focuses your attention outside yourself. Focus on your body (for example, your breathing), what you see, what you hear, or what you feel on your skin. Get your attention out of your head, and into the present moment.
When you feel less agitated, spend 5-10 minutes writing or speaking about what's going on in your life at this moment, and how you feel about these things. Often in thinking about the situation, you will gain insights that suggest actions you can take to improve the situation.

I found another interesting email this morning. Thought you might like to read it. What do you think?

By Diana Lipson-Burge, RD

You've certainly heard several or all of these before. The question is, were you fooled? Don't feel bad if you were: when it comes to weight management, these are the biggest - and most commonly believed - myths around.

Are you willing to spend hard-earned dollars to maintain or improve your health? If so, you are a prime target for the modern day health and fitness quack. If you're interested in managing your weight (and how many people can say they aren't?) you're even more of a target.

Webster's dictionary defines "quacks" as those "whom with little or no foundation pretend to have skill or knowledge in a particular field." Today, quacks are alive, well and thriving in the health industry, eager to take advantage of our natural human tendency to want quick answers. Fraud and abuse now account for $50-$80 billion out of $800 billion spent annually on health care!

When it comes to weight loss, "quick fix" myths are the order of the day for quacks, who can appear in the form of anything from multi-million dollar corporations to well-meaning friends who have been sold a bill of goods by some other well-meaning source.

Here are the top 10 weight management myths that have been pounded into the heads of American consumers. Start un-learning them now, and you'll do yourself (and your weight) a big favor.

Myth #10 Fat makes you fat.

Fact: The only way a human being scientifically can gain 1 pound of fat (aside from metabolic disorder) is by eating 3500 calories on top of the calories used for their basal metabolic rate (BMR) and daily activities. It is irrelevant whether the calories are from carbohydrate, protein or fat. It can be 3500 calories of pure carbohydrate or pure protein or pure fat: it still adds up to the same thing. 3500 calories is 3500 calories, regardless of the source. Americans are more obese today than they have ever been in history, and we are all eating fat-free.

Myth # 9 We become toxic and gain weight if we combine carbohydrate and protein.

Fact: The idea of food combining has been around for over 100 years. Harvey and Marilyn Diamond popularized it in 1985. Proponents of food combining claim that if you eat carbohydrate and protein together, it will rot in your stomach and thus you will gain weight. If this were true, why are we not all overweight and dead from toxins? We have 3 different metabolic pathways that release different digestive enzymes so all food is digested. The only part of food that isn't digested is the fiber, and this is excreted into the colon and eliminated.

Myth # 8 Your stomach gets stretched out when you overeat and shrinks when you undereat.

Fact: It is true that your stomach expands when more food is in it, but once digested, your stomach returns to the original size. The reasons you feel your stomach "shrink" when you undereat is because when you are mindful about what you are eating, you become more conscious of the true amount of food you really need to get satiated, which isn't as much as most of us are conditioned to eat.

Myth # 7 If you eat after 6:00 or 7:00 pm, you will gain weight.

Fact: Once again, you can only gain 1 pound of fat by eating 3500 extra calories. If your total excess calories in a given period of time doesn't exceed 3500, how can food consumed in the evening be "chosen" to put fat on your body?

Myth #6 While dieting, vitamin and mineral supplements will give you more energy.

Fact: The only component that can give a human being sustained energy is a calorie - and calories are only found in food, and possibly some herbs. Since vitamins and minerals do not contain calories, they cannot give you energy unless you are severely deficient. This is unusual in the United States since most of us overeat. Vitamins and minerals are useful, however, for various health conditions, such as osteoporosis (calcium), anemia (iron), etc.

Myth #5 Sugar or carbohydrates make you gain weight.

Fact: Again, only if your overall caloric intake exceeds your output. But sugar and carbohydrates do burn off very quickly, making you hungrier and potentially leading you to eat more food. If you eat sugar or carbs with a little protein or fat, these will buffer the carbohydrate from burning off so quickly and keep you satiated longer (3-4 hours).

Myth #4 If you eat breakfast, you'll be hungrier all day and not lose weight.

Fact: Your body is like a furnace if you don't feed it fuel in the morning, it will never heat up and start burning calories until you eat. By not eating until noon, you have missed burning off 200-300 calories. This is why you could be hungrier on days that you eat breakfast: you are burning more calories.

Myth #3 Vegetables are a "free food". You can eat unlimited quantities and not gain weight.

Fact: This philosophy promotes many people to binge. While vegetables are low in calories and do not have fat, every food on earth has calories. Many vegetables have a low satiety level, which can lead to eating more quantity (calories) of other foods, and thus cause excess calorie consumption and weight gain. One of the most common binge foods that cause my clients to gain excessive weight is baby carrots.

Myth #2 Fast food is bad for you.

Fact: In this day and age of health and weight consciousness, fast food restaurants are being forced to decrease the fat content and improve the type of fat they're using by changing to unsaturated fat. They are providing more fruit and salad bars. Now, if we could get all restaurants to decrease the portions they serve us, we might really make progress toward better weight management.

Myth #1 The number one Myth... Restricting foods such as desserts or alcohol will help you lose weight.

Fact: This may be the #1 reason people gain rather than lose weight. It's been called Diet Deprivation Backlash (from Intuitive Eating by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch, St. Martin's Press, 1995). This is what happens when we restrict certain foods and then when we do have a cookie, we subconsciously think we're never going to have one again, so we eat the whole box, planning to "start our diet tomorrow." We end up gaining weight from all the calories we consumed in our "backlash" thinking - not from eating that cookie!

Diana Lispon-Burge, RD, is owner and found of The Energy Resource is El Segundo, California. She works one-on-one with clients to reach their nutrition goals and also teaches workshops and lectures throughout California. She lectures on weight management to the Motion Picture and Television Fund, on disordered eating to adolescents and their parents, and on sports nutrition to a variety of professional sports teams. She can be reached at (310) 643-9016 or at: [email protected]

Health & Fitness Journal / BENNING'S - March/April 1999

Thanksgiving dinner went good. I stopped taking the B6 and the nausea came back but other than that the day was normal. The kids all seemed to have a great time. They always play football and basketball with whoever comes over. Quite a game but now I am really tired. I suppose I should expect that..........not getting any younger. I skipped my exercise this morning for the first time in a long time. Hope to get it done later though I know that it's better to do it first thing.

Thanksgiving was ok for me, I didn't bring home any left overs which was good. I didn't excercise as much I should have last week and my body is complaining...got back to it this morning so that is cool. I think I havebeen eating when I'm not hungry. Needed to say that....so back to the grind. Happy Holidays.

Feeling peppier today, though I have a slight sore throat. A lot of our company had various illnesses.........colds, diarhhea, vomitting. Hope we can stay clear of most of it. I found out last night at supper that my DIL knows about The Overfed Head. She was talking to my other DIL telling her that her SIL had taken the Thintuition course at the health club where she works in Chicago (she's in the BA part) and has lost weight. I never thought she had much to loose but my DIL seems really interested in it even though she's pg. Hope I can get her to compare notes. I was really flabbergasted when she brought it up. She's (my DIl) about 50lb overweight and very short......she was adopted from Korea. They have one little girl age 1 and are expecting in April 07.

Obi, I wish I could get rid of some leftovers but at least the meat is gone.

I have decided that I really like IE and will stick it out. I have read a few other diets but can't bring myself to cut out food groups, especially thing like fruit that are good for you. Just recently read part of the Sonoma diet and for the first 10 days they cut out fruit. That just seems so foreign to me. I still make mistakes like today when I ate a warm cookie in the afternoon and felt yuck after. But for the most part, I stick with small protions of food I like and usually it's good for me, too. That's what I crave.