How to get hunger cues back

By Heather Bray, RD

Maybe you don’t feel hungry before noon.

Maybe you don’t feel hungry all day until the night time when you feel like you can’t stop eating.

Everyone experiences both hunger and fullness differently but here are some of the more common signs of hunger:

• Tummy growling

• Thinking about food (this one can be quite nuanced) 

• Losing focus with work or school

• Energy dips

Here are some signs of hunger that may indicate you’ve waited too long to eat:

• Headache

• Nausea

• Dizziness or feeling faint

Hunger is a signal that our body sends us to let us know we need more energy. It’s a signal similar to when we feel like we need to go to the bathroom or when we need to go to sleep. Unfortunately for many people, there are many things that get in the way of us being able to feel hunger cues. These are called hunger disrupters. 

Hunger Disrupters:

• Neurodivergence and ADHD medication

• Stress

• Being very busy (i.e. constantly on the go) 

• Other mental health conditions such as anxiety and depression 

• Disordered eating and eating disorders

• Chronic dieting 

• Poor sleep 

• Substance use such as vaping or cannabis 

• Caffeine 

• Over or under exercise 

The chronic dieting one is important because when we engage in diet/wellness culture, we learn to self silence. Often the messages portrayed are that we aren’t to be trusted and our body’s messages cannot be trusted. We’re told “drink some water, maybe you’re just thirsty” (more on this below) in order to silence hunger cues. The issue is, when we have self-silenced for a long time and have stopped responding to the more mild signs of hunger, we start to lose touch with our bodies and therefore our hunger cues.

So if you’re looking to learn how to get hunger cues back, read below. 

If you’re concerned that you’ve lost your hunger cues or you feel like you only feel hunger and fullness on the extreme ends of the spectrum here are some tips.

1. Mechanical Eating

This is about setting up some guidelines to start getting your body used to eating at certain times and at a regular cadence. 

Most people need 3 meals and 2-3 snacks per day. 

Thanks to the rise in diets like Intermittent Fasting, many folks think they should go longer without eating - what this can often lead to is compensatory eating or binge eating. 

Most people need to eat a meal or snack every 3-4 hours. If you’ve waited longer than 4 hours, you’ve likely waited too long. 

Start by setting a rough schedule for when you will eat. 

If you’re not hungry in the morning, start with something small like a banana or a smoothie, the goal is to get your body back into a “regular” rhythm. 

The body works very well with rhythms, it likes to know what to expect. Therefore, if you eat meals and snacks at similar times each day, soon enough, you’ll likely start to feel some hunger cues come back. 

2. Start Connecting with your body using Mindfulness and a Hunger and Fullness Scale

While you’re eating in this new schedule, start to check in with yourself before, during and after you eat. How hungry were you before? Try to get curious with your body, without judgement and see what comes up. There is no right or wrong way to do this. 

3. Let go of food rules and expectations

Instead of trying to fast for an extended period of time or “not eating lunch before noon” or “not eating after 7pm” - try to approach mechanical eating above as an experiment. Once you start to feel hunger cues more often, start to respond to them instead of silencing them

The hardest part is starting. Eating in the absence of hunger cues is not fun, but it is a way to start to get your hunger cues back.

If you’re looking for more support, feel free to reach out here.