Always Feel Hungry? Perhaps That’s Just Emotional Hunger.

Do you always feel hungry?

Do you always want to eat?

Does COVID-19 lockdown lead you to eat more?

However, does the hunger you feel really indicate you need to eat now? Are you truly hungry?

This article will tell you.

Two Different Types of Hunger

There are two different types of hunger, physical hunger and emotional hunger.

As you feel physically hungry, you want to eat because there’s nothing in your stomach that sends hunger signal to your brain, letting you know you need to eat food for energy.

As you feel emotionally hungry, your stomach isn’t empty but you still want to eat something possibly because you feel boring, depressed, distracted, irritated or nervous. Sometimes you feel like eating something just because you’re thirsty.

physical vs emotional hunger 800

Emotional Hunger Often Happens to You, but You May Not Know.

Emotional hunger doesn’t only take place as you come across emotional issues.

One of the classic pictures on TVs is a girl eating chocolate and crying since she broke up with his boyfriend. That’s truly emotional eating or hunger.

However, the emotional hunger in our daily life doesn’t look like that.

When you feel bored at home, have you thought about snacking yourself?

When you feel nervous before an important meeting or interview, have you ever fed yourself with food and drinks?

When you feel no taste in your mouth, have you had a thought of chewing something in mouth?

If you have such situations from time to time, it’s quite possible that you’ve embraced emotional hunger.

Simple Tips to Tell the Difference between Physical and Emotional Hunger

#1. How your hunger comes

Emotional hunger abruptly arrives while physical hunger gradually arrives.

#2. When your hunger comes

Emotional hunger arrives not long after your meal while physical hunger only averagely arrives about 6 to 8 hours after your meal with your meal digested.

#3. Does your belly roar?

When emotional hunger arrives, your stomach won’t roar since it’s full. If you hear your belly roar, it indicates you’re really hungry, which is physical hunger.

#4. What food you crave for

As you are having emotional hunger, the food you crave is nothing but a certain type of food normally like refined carbs or sugary snacks. If you’re having physical hunger, you want to eat anything.

#5. How you eat food

When you eat food to kick your emotional hunger, you’ll possibly eat very quickly. You just chew some food in your mouth and swallow it with little taste. However, as you eat food to beat your physical hunger, you usually taste your food slowly and you don’t rush to eat it.

#6. How you feel as you eat

When emotional hunger occurs, it’s quite difficult to kick it off even if you’ve eaten so many things. It’s quite possible for you to find it’s getting difficult to fill up your stomach as you swallow so many things into your mouth. However, it’s very easy to feel full if you try to fill yourself to beat physical hunger.

All in all, let your body tell you which hunger you’re going through, not your mouth or brain.

snacking

How to Stop Emotional Hunger

Emotional hunger seduces you to overeat and feel food guilt since you’ll never know what happens unless the violent eating comes to an end. Here are three ways to help you stop emotional hunger.

Track Your Diet

Have you ever tracked your diet? If you don’t, then do it now.

Tracking the time of your meals is useful for you to know how much time exactly passes since your last meal, which helps you distinguish emotional hunger and physical hunger. It usually takes about 6 to 8 hours to get your meal digested in your stomach in average. If your hunger arrives before such time or just after your last meal, then you’ll know whether you need to eat or not.

Use a Hunger Scale

Familiarizing yourself with your hunger pangs before, during and after eating can also help you understand emotional eating more deeply. In the long run, this can help you with your overall health and weight loss.

Remember, hunger is a completely natural feeling, not something to be afraid of. A hunger scale can help you describe the level of hunger and determine when it’s best to start and stop eating for the day.

A hunger scale describes your hunger situation based on a rating from 0 to 10. Refer to the descriptions and you’ll be aware of which situation you’re in and whether you need to eat food or not.

Listen to Your Body

“Listen to your body” is the golden principle when it comes to your health. If you feel hungry next time, try to ask your body a question “Are you truly hungry?” and see how your body reacts.

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Reference

https://www.healthline.com/health/how-long-does-it-take-to-digest-food#digestion-process


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