honor your fullness
Respecting your fullness is intuitive eating principle 5 of 10. It’s all about tuning in with your body while eating and listening to those signals that are saying “I’ve had enough to eat.” Honoring your hunger and respecting your fullness are different sides of the same coin. They both involve mindful eating and trusting your body.
Regardless of your past or current eating habits, you can respect your fullness. It takes some practice but you can get there. A professional can help, especially if you find yourself compulsively overeating or suspect you may have binge eating disorder. So if you need a helping hand please reach out for our coaching services.
For this principle there should be 1 big takeaway: Practice conscious eating to find your fullness. How can you do this?
Tune In While You Eat- Practice Mindful Eating:
So many of us eat meals while watching television, playing on our phones, scrolling through social media or checking emails. Think about it — when’s the last time you sat down at a table and did nothing other than eat? No phones, no distractions, just ate? So slow down and enjoy the meal.
What does it look like to be a mindful eater? Ideally you’d tune in with your hunger before you start eating. You could think about where you are on the hunger scale: Are you famished, just starting to feel hungry, or simply put just could eat? It is time to eat so as you eat you chew each bite thoroughly, savor the flavor, scent and texture of the food. You will set down your utensils occasionally, perhaps take a sip of water. You’ll look at your food. Truly being present as you eat. And part way through eating, you stop take a moment and tune in with your body and think about where you are on the hunger/fullness scale. Are you still hungry? Are you starting to get full? Ideally we push away our plates at around a 7 out of 10 on the scale. That means we are comfortably full but not overstuffed. You’re not uncomfortable and you’re no longer hungry or thinking about or interested in food. You’re satisfied. This is being truly present or mindful while you eat.
Tune in with fullness:
What does fullness feel like to you? Many of us know what it feels like to be hungry and on the flip side of that to feel overly full. But how do we find that comfortable satiated feeling?
Here are some cues to check in with:
Absence of hunger
An expanded belly
No longer interested in food
These are all signs that you’re getting full. The key is to stop when you’re feeling pleasantly full and before you feel uncomfortably full. That I need to un-button my pants feeling, we have all been there.
STOP WHEN YOU ARE FULL:
You are aware and know you’re full but you want to keep eating. Now what? Ask yourself why do you feel this way? Is the food simply delicious and you want to keep enjoying it? Were you trained to clean your plate no matter what? Or is it a food you don’t normally allow yourself to have because diet culture told you it was a “bad food? The major cause of overeating is restriction. Think about it: if you know you can have any food any time you want, what would drive you to overeat it? This can also apply to wanting to eat past fullness because the food is yummy. When you’re full but still have delicious food on your plate, save that food for later and remind yourself you can have it whenever you want. You are respecting your fullness. You’re preventing that feeling of discomfort. You’re doing what is best for your body right now. And you can eat whenever you want!
IMPORTANT NOTICE: If there is a particular food you shy away from because you can’t trust yourself to not gorge yourself on it, it’s time to lift that restriction and allow yourself unlimited access to it. It might seem counterintuitive but it’s just like telling a kid they can’t have or do something — then that’s all they want! Intuitive eating has NO food rules so let’s not allow them in. Without those rules YOU WILL LEARN to trust yourself around foods you once could not. For example many of my clients who would binge on ice cream can now have it in the freezer and just enjoy a scoop or 2 now and then.
What if you’re afraid to eat to the point of fullness?
This is common in people who have disordered eating. (Disordered eating is looking at certain foods as “good” and other as “bad”) But going through life always hungry is no way to live. Irritability, brain fog, low energy and constant food thoughts are no fun. It’s important to eat until you’re full. You need to trust your body to tell you when, what and how much to eat. Your body will trust you to feed it when, what and how much it needs. This may take some time but it will free you from endless dieting.
Remember that hunger is your body telling you it needs nourishment. If you find yourself constantly hungry, I recommend getting familiar with the hunger/fullness scale. Some of my clients realize they are only eating to a 5/6 because they are scared of overeating and in turn gaining weight. Are you always undereating? Are you restricting foods? Are you compulsively exercising? Is your body below its healthy weight? These are all things that can cause your body to throw you lots of hunger signals. And it is so important to honor them and allow yourself to eat.
ACCEPT THAT OVEREATING WILL HAPPEN:
Vacations. Emotional times. Food insecurity. Crazy schedules. Medications. There are many reasons we overeat and it is totally normal. Remember that intuitive eating is not a hunger/fullness diet. Sometimes we under eat and sometimes we overeat. It’s a fact of life. It’s also normal to overeat a food if you’ve just given yourself unconditional permission to eat it, because you have been craving it for along time maybe even years. It’s an expected part of the food freedom process. Know that things will balance out in time.
If you find yourself feeling out of control with food and consistently eating very large amounts of food and/or to a very uncomfortable state, it’s time to see a professional.
You can be as prepared and mindful as physically possible and still find yourself in situations where you’re eating too little or too much. Cut yourself some slack. The important thing to remember is there is never a need to restrict after overeating. This just puts us right back into that harmful diet/binge cycle. Remember to trust your body to tell you what it needs. You might find yourself naturally less hungry after a day of overeating. Or not. There is no right or wrong.
Make sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to get more information on intuitive eating, follow along workouts, yoga, meditations and more to help you become and intuitive person/ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-H34J0lQEd7YpdVwy9DoQw
Next week we will discuss the next principle - Principle #5 Discover the Satisfaction Factor
