Hunger/Fullness Chart

I am now going to promise that I will post on this blog at LEAST once a week. Please keep reading. Now I'm doing this for me and not for you but knowing someone is counting on my posts will give me motivation.

So awhile back I posted about eating every time you are hungry - honor your hunger. This is all true and good but I forgot that I should wait until I actually was hungry. I'll explain later ...



In the book on page 72 and page 127 is a chart for tracking your hunger and fullness. J gave me a more descriptive chart and then told me to create my own with my own descriptions of each level. Here they are:

J's chart:


My chart:


Ideally you should eat when you are at a 3 and finish when you are at a 7. I tend to stop at a 7.5 and sometimes an 8. Stopping at an 8 is ok - REMEMBER this is a learning experience!!!

A lot of times people skip breakfast and then don't eat a mid-morning snack so by the time they eat lunch they are at a 2 and they stop eating lunch when they are at an 8. Or they will eat a light lunch - still not getting to a healthy fullmess level and then are at a 2 again before they eat dinner. This is a hard habit to change. J had me chart my hunger and fullness for a week - I also wrote down what emotion I was experiencing as I ate. The pattern I found was that if I ate at a 2, I would stop when I was at an 8. But if I ate at 3, I could stop at a 7. This was very enlightening. So I figured out that I should not let myself get to a 2 - no problem. That led to my next problem ...

I've been eating before I get hungry - like I thought I could talk myself into it when I was at a four or a five. I was looking at the clock and deciding I should be hungry so I'd eat. Let me tell you that if you eat when you are not hungry it is really hard to stop when you are full because there is not really a contrasting feeling - do you know what I mean? I was eating at a 4 or even a 5 and then having a hard time knowing when to stop. Here is part of the problem for me: I'll be coming home from work and think - what am I going to have for dinner? Then I'd have to figure out some place to pick up some food on the way home cause I knew I didn't have much at home. Well I wasn't hungry but I didn't want to go home and then have to go out again. It finally occured to me that I should go to the grocery store and buy food to prepare for when I was hungry. It is so key to have good food on hand so you will have something you want to eat WHEN you are hungry. So I know now I should WAIT until I am at a 3 to eat.

You only learn these things by experience - I can't stress that enough. Keep at it - who's in for the meeting? We're going to read the chapter on respecting your body (chapter 12)