Breaking Down Appetite: Surrendering to What The Body Needs

What is your relationship with food?

Every day in my acupuncture office I ask people questions about their sleep habits, bowel movements, and energy levels. I also ask about appetite. More often than not, when I ask “how is your appetite?” I get the answer “too good.” What I have come to realize, within our fat shaming/fat fearing culture, we associate having an appetite with being unhealthy.

Having an appetite is a sign of health, not illness.

The sensation of hunger is your body is telling you it’s time to eat. This typically happens when the blood sugar gets low, so in order to keep going, we need to fuel ourselves and eat. When the hunger signals don’t work properly, that is usually a sign that something’s wrong. You could be sick, have a history of disordered eating, feel stressed, or other reasons.

Appetite is almost never the problem; the problem often arises in the mind in response to that hunger.

Different types of hunger

There are different types of hunger: physical hunger and emotional hunger (sexual hunger is a discussion for another day).

If you’ve ever eaten a full box of cookies (pint of ice cream, container of french fries) without tasting any of it, you were most likely attempting to feed emotional hunger with food.

Emotionally you might feel tired, bored, frustrated, stressed, anxious, depressed, happy, excited, or lots of other things. Feeding your feelings is what we do to numb ourselves and can fall under the category of addictive behaviors. This is why so many people think that having an appetite is bad.

This is not true appetite, it is emotional hunger. Appetite refers to physical hunger which goes away when you eat and comes back when you need to eat more. It is a normal, natural signal from your body and brain, and is something to pay attention to.

How can you tell the difference?

Physical hunger is sated with food, whereas no amount of food will sate emotional hunger.

I remember times when I felt “so hungry,” and kept eating. Although my belly felt full and uncomfortable, I was still “hungry.” This is emotional hunger. When you eat food and the hunger doesn’t go away, food isn’t going to be the solution for you. Neither is doom scrolling, alcohol, drugs, sex, shopping, or gambling. This particular hunger is best sated through feeling it.

I know, it sucks.

Feeling your feelings is the only way out of emotional hunger.

Try this:

Sit, breathe, and drop your shoulders. Notice the emotion’s sensation and where you feel it in your body. Give it space to exist. Don’t try to push it away or change it in any way. Keep breathing, deeply and slowly, through your nose. Keep noticing the sensation as it is.

After a few minutes, you may notice that the sensation lessens and the feeling dissipates. You will notice your “hunger” disappearing because you allowed it to make itself known. That’s all feelings really want: acknowledgment. Emotions are information, and they are trying to tell us something. It’s our job to listen.

Appetite is a good thing

When it comes to physical hunger, we often relate to it the way we relate to emotional hunger: it’s bad, I overeat, I feel ashamed when I eat too much, etc. However, physical hunger is a sign of health. It means your bodily signals are doing what they’re supposed to do!

Listening to physical hunger is key, because when you don’t, your blood sugar drops and you become cranky (anyone else? Just me?). Eating food when your body is hungry is a good thing. When you are no longer hungry, you can stop eating.

Eating intentionally is how you know how much is enough. When you apply Brahmacharya or Non-Excess/Enough to eating, eating becomes a yoga practice. You become attuned to your body and its needs, giving it exactly what it needs, no more, no less. I write more about practicing Enough in this post:

How Do You Know When You Reach Enough?

Tune in, slow down

When you connect to how your body feels, you can notice the difference between physical hunger and emotional hunger, as well as when your physical hunger is satisfied.

You feel physical hunger in the stomach, typically, but emotional hunger could be felt in the heart, throat, head, or stomach. Growling and emptiness are good signs that your appetite is physical. When they emptiness is in your heart or throat, that’s emotional hunger.

Slow down, and tune into your body. When you start to move toward the refrigerator or cabinets, take a breath and notice how your body feels.

• Where do you feel the hunger in your body?
• When was the last time you ate something?
• Does it feel appropriate that you are hungry right now?
• Did you sleep enough last night?
• Is it hunger or thirst?

When you answer these questions, you’ll be able to direct yourself to do what you actually need. Physical hunger: eat something to fuel your body. Emotional hunger: feel the feeling you are attempting to avoid.

Getting enough sleep will also help you with hunger. When you don’t get enough sleep, you upset your hormone balance. The satiety hormone, Leptin, gets replaced by the hunger hormone, Ghrelin. You are overtired so your body is trying to get you to eat more to keep going. What you really need is more sleep!

Sometimes thirst can feel like hunger until you slow down and notice. Sipping water consistently through the day can help.

Food messages

We live in a culture where “fat” is bad, and “thin” is good, so it’s common to feel shame when your body doesn’t look like a supermodel. Put aging and menopause into the equation and that is a perfect set up to hate yourself.

My stance is that “fat” and “thin” are not a measure of health. There are plenty of people with larger bodies who eat well, exercise, and have perfect blood work. There are also plenty of people with smaller bodies who eat fast food, drink soda, and don’t move at all, and have to take all sorts of medications.

It’s time to let go of what the body looks like and focus on how it feels. Notice your beliefs around your body size or shape and ask yourself, “does this change anything about who I am?” I can tell you, you are worthy of love and belonging no matter what your body composition is.

You deserve to eat foods that give you energy and make you feel good physically. Food is fuel, and starving yourself doesn’t help anyone. Especially not you. You also deserve to derive pleasure from your food. Sometimes the menu needs to include a little Ben & Jerry’s. Finding that balance is key.

Get support!

Intentional Eating: Finding Peace and Balance in Your Relationship with Food is a 6 week online program that teaches you to manage your eating habits using principles of yoga, mindfulness and brain science. This is not a diet, this is a mindset reset, where you will learn to be kinder to yourself, listen to your body, and develop a new relationship with food and yourself. For more information or to sign up, click the button below! We start October 15th, 2024!

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