DIVINE
  • English
    • Français
  • Fashion
  • Beauty
  • Food
  • Family
  • Health
  • Travel
  • Living
  • Reviews
  • About Us
  • Advertise
  • Contact us
  • Instagram
  • Legal
Stay Connected
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram
Pinterest
DIVINE
  • English
  • French
DIVINE
  • Fashion
  • Beauty
  • Food
  • Travel
  • Living
  • Family
  • Health
  • Reviews
  • Health

Intuitive Eating Principle Two: Honour Your Hunger

  • October 6, 2020
  • 3 minute read
  • Gail Kardish
Hunger: Empty Plate
Photo by Thought Catalog on Unsplash
Total
1
Shares
0
0
1

The second principle of intuitive eating is honouring your hunger. Your body needs to have adequate energy and nutrition to function properly so when it is running low, it’s designed to tell you by giving you physical hunger cues. This sounds so simple and yet this very natural and biological process has been ruined by the diet industry and the society that we live in.

The diet industry has most people believing that hunger is a sign of weakness and therefore listening to these cues makes you weak as well. Wherever you look, you always see tips to trick your body into thinking that it’s no longer hungry. This is actually dangerous and counter-intuitive for many reasons. When a person ignores their hunger it sets off a biological cycle that affects a person physically as well as psychologically.

A build up of hunger results in something called “primal hunger”. When primal hunger sets in, a person’s need to eat is urgent and intense and often leads to overeating. The best example of this is given by the authors of The Intuitive Eating book, who compare this hunger to holding your breath under water. After a while, you can no longer hold your breath and when you come up for air you take a big gasp of air rather than a normal inhalation.  Our body is designed this way in order to compensate for what it is lacking. In other words, after letting yourself go hungry for a while, when you do eat, you will tend to eat larger portions, eat more quickly and eat more nutritionally dense foods.

Psychologically, not listening to hunger can decrease concentration levels and can affect a person’s mood. It has been so common to ignore hunger that a new word has been invented to describe this mood: “hangry”. Hangry is a mix of hungry and angry and refers to acting grouchy because a person is hungry.

This primal hunger happens every time there is a hunger build up, but a chronic dieter does not see these signs and after some time learns how to ignore their hunger cues completely. As a result, there is a disconnection between them and their bodies and they may lose the ability to feel hunger at all. This can be very frustrating for someone who is learning to eat more intuitively because they no longer trust their body and need to relearn what hunger feels like. This can be a longer and more difficult process than most diets but also produces much more rewarding results.

Therefore, honouring your hunger is not about knowing the nutrition information of food or listening to eating rules, but more about learning to listen to your body’s cues. It is the best form of self care and helps you develop a good long term relationship with food and with your body.

As a reminder, there are ten principles of intuitive eating:

  1. Reject the diet mentality
  2. Honour your hunger
  3. Make peace with food
  4. Challenge the food police
  5. Feel your fullness
  6. Discover the satisfaction factor
  7. Cope with emotions without using food
  8. Respect your body
  9. Feel the difference movement makes
  10. Honour your health with gentle nutrition

In this series, each principle will be explained so stay tuned. To learn even more and dive deep into this subject, check out The Intuitive Eating book and workbook by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Total
1
Shares
Share 0
Tweet 0
Pin it 1
You May Also Like
Level of Antibodies: Man holding test tube
    • Health

How to Check Level of Antibodies Against Covid-19

  • divine.ca
  • January 18, 2023
Hearing Loss: woman with a hearing aid
    • Health

6 Ways to Prevent Hearing Loss

  • divine.ca
  • December 19, 2022
Caroline Elie in front of a mirror
    • Beauty
    • Fashion
    • Food
    • Health
    • Living

16 Ultimate Holiday Gift Ideas From Our EIC

  • Caroline Elie
  • December 14, 2022
Healthy Diets: Salad Fixings
    • Food
    • Health

5 Healthy Diets to Try In 2023

  • divine.ca
  • December 11, 2022
Related Topics
  • Diet Industry
  • Diets
  • Eating Principles
  • Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch
  • hanger
  • hangry
  • Hunger
  • Intuitive Eating
  • Intuitive eating meaning
  • Intuitive Eating Principles
  • The Intuitive Eating book
  • weight loss
Gail Kardish

Gail is a registered dietitian (Bsc. Nutrition, BSc. Biology) who received her degree in dietetics from McGill University. She worked at the Ottawa Hospital at the Regional Centre for the Treatment of Eating Disorders where she helped develop and implement the out-patient program as well as being the main dietitian for the symptom interruption hospitalization program. In 2014, she moved to Toronto and started working at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH). She continued working with clients struggling with eating disorders, as well as helping clients struggling with anxiety, depression and addictions. In 2016, she started a private practice.and is currently working on becoming an Intuitive Eating Counsellor.

Previous Article
Garlic: Turkey Recipe
  • Food

Garlic Brown Sugar Dry Brine Turkey Recipe

  • October 6, 2020
  • divine.ca
View Post
Next Article
  • Living

How to Set the Perfect Table for Thanksgiving

  • October 7, 2020
  • Jill Schneiderman
View Post
Search
Featured Posts
  • Canada's Walk of Fame: Matt Dusk with Andy Kim

    Michelle Levy Spotlights: Canada’s Walk of Fame’s Annual Music Under the Stars Soiree

    • 2 min
    View Post
  • Apple Watch Series 7: Two Watches Intertwined

    DIVINE Reviews: Apple Watch Series 7

    • 5 min
    View Post
  • French Onion Soup

    Traveling Taste Buds: 15 Park Bistro French Onion Soup

    • 3 min
    View Post
Get in on the Fun
Top Posts
  • Atlantic City: Shops and Restaurants on the Boardwalk 1
    Atlantic City: Discover the Real Boardwalk Empire
    • 4 min
  • Breitling Watches 2
    Outstanding Features of Breitling Watches
    • 3 min
  • Boukan: Outside of restaurant with the three partners 3
    DIVINE Dines at the Opening of Boukan
    • 2 min
Stay Connected
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram
Pinterest
Featured Posts
  • Drugstore Dupes: Makeup in a mini-shopping cart

    4 Drugstore Dupes Versus High End Makeup Favourites

    • 5 min
    View Post
  • Married Couples: Couple embracing near Christmas Tree

    The Best Gift Ideas for Married Couples

    • 4 min
    View Post
  • Andre De Grasse Helps Launch Food Innovation CHEEZMADE

    • 3 min
    View Post
about
DIVINE Magazine

Canada's Online Women's Magazine

DIVINE Magazine is the bilingual online destination for Canadian women. Bringing you trending features that are relevant and interesting to Canadian women, DIVINE is the place to visit for useful, practical and entertaining content.
Subscribe
Partner Network
SWAGGER Magazine, North America’s
Online Men‘s Luxury Lifestyle Magazine.Ohlala.ca, Canada’s Destination for Everything You Need to Know About Dating & Sex.
about
Stay Connected

Follow along on Instagram @DIVINEdotca

Kick your feed up a notch with the hottest beauty, style trends, recipes and more! It's not too late, follow along today and you might just catch the behind-the-scenes of our next shoot or even a contest. You can thank us later. ;) #Divinistas
Follow Us
DIVINE
  • About
  • Advertise
  • Contact
  • Privacy
Making your life a little more DIVINE.

Copyright © 2022 Divine.ca · All Rights Reserved

Input your search keywords and press Enter.