Needing extra meals and looking for advice

[amckenzie4]

Hey folks. I ran across the No S page a couple weeks ago, and I've been reading up on it. I like the idea, but I have one major concern: Three meals has NEVER been enough for me, even when I was at an excellent weight (180lb and 6').

I've made some changes to my diet over the last few years, and things are getting better, but while I've pretty much managed to eliminate snacking between breakfast and lunch, the lunch to dinner and dinner to sleep gaps are harder. If breakfast is at 7:30 and lunch is at noon, dinner is usually around 7pm. The problem is that sometime between 4:30 and 5:30, I start suffering serious hunger problems, occasionally reaching the point of dizziness and headache. Similarly, if I eat dinner at 7 or 7:30 and go to bed at 10 or 11, I generally wake up at around 4 or 5, nauseated from hunger.

This isn't a blood sugar issue. I've been repeatedly tested for diabetes, and have a blood test kit that I used regularly for a month or so. Everything has always tested out fine. What is it? I've never found an answer, and none of the doctors I've talked to can answer either. Adding a lot of protein to my meals has helped, but not much, and short of eating a pound of steak and a protein shake at every meal there's not much more I can add.

So: my solution at the moment is that I eat a substantial snack (almost a small meal) at around 5 (or whenever I get home from work), and something small (yogurt with fruit, usually) just before bed.

Has anyone else had this problem? How did you make No S work for you? Alternatively, did you find a solution that let you eliminate the problem entirely, and what was it?

Should I just accept that those snacks are necessary and plan for them? That's certainly the easy solution, but I'd really, REALLY like to eliminate the need.

[lpearlmom]

Hi & welcome!

I was always a big snacker so the three meal thing for me was really hard for me too, but after a couple of weeks the hunger pangs disappeared. I drank a lot of coffee & diet coke at first to get me through to be honest.

I didn't get dizzy or anything serious though so it just may be that you have a faster metabolism & need to eat more often. Alternatively you could use slightly smaller plates for your 3 meals & then like a saucer sized plate for your snack (or small bowl).

The main thing is consistency. Once you decide on a plan, you stick to it or give yourself a red day. Don't leave any room for confusion in your mind about a success day vs a failed day.

Good luck!

Linda

[amckenzie4]

Thanks!

[wosnes]

You might look at always having your snacks be the same thing. The lack of variety might keep you from eating more than you need.

[amckenzie4]

You might look at always having your snacks be the same thing. The lack of variety might keep you from eating more than you need.

That's a good suggestion, and pretty easy -- the bedtime snack is almost always either yogurt or cottage cheese with fruit or berries, so codifying and requiring that would make it easier to make sure I didn't start eating extra.

I'm going to experiment this week with pushing lunch back half an hour or so and trying to make dinner a little earlier. That might prevent the need for the afternoon snack, though it might not. My metabolism is already weird enough (I confuse every doctor and dietician I talk to) that it's hard to tell how I'll react to things.

[Healthiermum]

On the website it says that it doesn't have to be 3 meals a day and if there is a medical reason for it you can have more frequent meals. The point of it though is that you are not constantly snacking or grazing and don't chop and change everyday you decide on a number of meals and stick to it. If you are going to have 5 meals I would put them on smaller plates then a normal dinner plate or divide a dinner sized plate portion in half and eat it over 2 meals

[automatedeating]

Hello,
I know you said you've been tested repeatedly for diabetes, and I am sure then you don't have it, but have you eliminated hypoglycemia? Unless you used your at home kit while you were suffering your classic hypoglycemia symptoms (dizzy, headache, nausea), you would have missed your lows. Just want to double check that you tested during the symptoms, otherwise it's easy to miss this diagnosis.
Sorry to mention this if you have already repeatedly tested your blood sugar during episodes. Even blood sugars of 70 or so can cause some people symptoms.

[~reneew]

I can relate. Honestly, you will get used to 3 meals. Give it a few honest days and your body will learn the new routine. Really! Also, If you can, bump up dinner... I eat at 5:30 just to avoid the long wait. Another thing. At lunch I fill a huge (4 cup) water bottle with ice water and a big splash of unsweetened cranberry juice (not cocktail) and drink it through the afternoon. The little bit of calories, coldness, and water stave off hunger like you wouldn't believe.

[JustForToday]

I second the suggestion to move up your dinner time. If I had to wait until after 7 to eat dinner every night then NoS would be a lot more difficult. An earlier dinner also gives you the benefit of having time to digest before going to sleep at night - I've found I sleep wonderfully when my stomach is closer to empty. I'd rather be hungry at midnight when I'm sound asleep than hungry at 5:30pm when I could be eating a nice NoS dinner.

[oolala53]

Or have a latte break mid-morning and eat lunch an hour later.

[amckenzie4]

Thanks for all the comments!

Yes, I've been tested for hypoglycemia: no luck.

As to bumping up dinner time, it's not really possible. For one thing, I don't usually get HOME until 5:30, which doesn't leave me much time to cook for dinner earlier than about 6:30. For another, my partner is diabetic, and finds that she has problems controlling her blood sugar if we eat before about 6:30.

Adding liquid to my diet is... well, let's say it's problematical for various reasons. My doctor is trying to run some tests to track down something else, and has me on a fairly low fluid intake, and my normal intake is fairly absurdly high anyway. So right now I'm medically restricted, and normally I'm restricted by the capacity of my body's ability to process it.

That said: I'm considering myself to have started Monday, with three meals plus a snack just before I sleep. I've set on that being yogurt with some berries, which seems to work well, and is fairly low-calorie and healthy. Dinner has been moved up to 6:30, which is about the earliest I can realistically manage, and I'm doing more or less OK without the afternoon snack. That is, major cravings, but I seem to be lacking the dizzy spells and nausea I used to get.

Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday are green days. Today is red, only because I had unexpected guests for dinner and the meal ended up being unexpectedly prolonged. Doing the math after dinner (it's not habit yet!) I figure I went over by about an apple and a piece of brie.

Tomorrow should be simpler, which means week one was close to successful. I'll keep trying, and hopefully I'll do better next week.

[oolala53]

You're actually doing great. Remember, this is not something you get down in a few weeks and it's all over.

Out of curiosity, when do you think you OVEReat? It seems to me if you are getting legitimately hungry after several hours, you are not overeating.

[amckenzie4]

You're actually doing great. Remember, this is not something you get down in a few weeks and it's all over.

Out of curiosity, when do you think you OVEReat? It seems to me if you are getting legitimately hungry after several hours, you are not overeating.

To be honest, I don't, much, these days. Three or four years ago I overate habitually; I'm six foot, and I weighed in at around 265, give or take. Granted I'm fairly heavily built to begin with, but I still needed to lose over 60 pounds. Right now I'm at about 230, but it's been a struggle. I suspect quite strongly that cutting out snacking is going to be the big difference, because I honestly don't know these days how much extra I'm eating. Meals have gotten a lot smaller than they were: at my worst, my best guess was around 2800 calories from meals, plus snacking. I haven't done the math recently, but I suspect I'm down in the 2200-2500 range, which is reasonable for someone my size and activity level.

But snacks? Who knows. A bag of chips here, some yogurt there, maybe a couple of cookies when I pass through that office that always seems to have them fresh out of the oven.... I KNOW that some of my cravings are habit based, rather than necessity. I also know that if I don't eat just before bed, I wake up nauseated, dizzy, and with a brutal headache (which makes it really hard to get something to eat...)

I'm hopeful so far, since I'm doing better than I expected. The real test will be to see how hungry I feel most of the time in a few months.

And thank you all for the encouragement! I appreciate it, and it's probably helping me keep this up.

[wosnes]

I posted this over 4 years ago and what you just wrote about how you feel in the morning if you don't have the yogurt at night reminded me of it:


The first thing I want to say is that I'm in no way affiliated with Dr. Fuhrman. I have followed his program in the past (about six years ago). While I was never hungry when following his program, I was also never satisfied with my meals. Eating satisfies more needs than just filling the belly and other needs were not met by his program -- at least for me.

While I think there's a lot of truth to what he says, I think most of it is too extreme for the majority of us to follow -- at least not without worrying about what you eat daily.

I've noticed a lot of people talking about hunger, almost overwhelming hunger. Dr. Fuhrman talks about "toxic hunger." Toxic hunger has nothing to do with how much or how often you eat, but with what you eat. Toxic hunger is like an addiction that needs to be satisfied. The addictive substances are the foods most of us routinely eat; and the "hunger" we feel is more like symptoms of withdrawal than true hunger.

Now if a person who has acclimated to or become tolerant to eating unhealthfully, stops eating, even for a few hours, they may feel ill, they may start feeling withdrawal from their toxic eating habits and excesses. The body cannot manifest symptoms or engage in right directed withdrawal symptoms from their disease causing diet while eating and digesting food. This begins when digestive activity diminishes.

If you were drinking 5 cups of coffee a day or of caffeinated soda, you will get a withdrawal headache when your caffeine levels dip too low. You can take more caffeine again (or other drugs) or you can eat and the food can make you feel a little better as it retards detoxification or withdrawal. The caffeine withdrawal symptoms can contribute to you eating more frequently as a means of managing the symptoms from caffeine withdrawal.

A few hours after eating most people begin to feel "hungry". They feel weak, headachy, tired, mentally dull, and have stomach spasms. Is this real hunger? I call it "toxic hunger" because these symptoms only occur in those who have been eating a toxic diet. They are withdrawal symptoms and they force people to eat more frequently and take in more calories than they would have if they were eating healthfully.

Symptoms of Toxic Hunger

headaches
fatigue
nausea
weakness
mental confusion
abdominal and esophageal spasm
fluttering and cramping

When we consume toxic or noxious substances or a toxic diet our body reacts to it rather violently attempting to remove or deal with the damage it may cause. This concept is called withdrawal. It represents an attempt by the body to detoxify from a harmful diet. It is this harmful diet that results in half of all Americans dying of heart attacks and a third dying of cancer. Nobody escapes from the biological laws of cause and effect from eating American food. If you eat the American diet you will develop and die of American diseases. Plus, you will feel ill before you die, you might feel ill every day eating this way. In fact, you might have been calling these sickly feelings of withdrawal, hunger and it may be the reason you have become overweight. Withdrawal occurs when not ingesting toxins. Withdrawal is inhibited by eating, exercising, and imbibing in stimulating substances. If you eat when you are withdrawing and not really hungry then you will be consuming more calories than your body needs to maintain its lean weight...

... True hunger would not have occurred so early after the meal. True hunger signals when our body needs calories to maintain our lean body mass. If we ate food demanded by true hunger and true hunger only, you could not have become overweight to begin with. We actually require less food than most people realize. Once we get rid of the perverted toxic hunger our central nervous system can accurately measure and give us the right signals for maintaining our ideal weight on the right amount of calories. Cravings are not the result of hunger they are the result of toxic habits.

In a portion controlled (calorie counting) diet it is likely that the body will not get adequate fiber or nutrition. The body will have a compounded sensation of hunger and craving which for most is simply overwhelming. It invariably results in people losing then gaining back their weight. Calorie counting simply doesn't work. Diets based on portion control and calorie counting generally permit highly toxic, low nutrient foods and then requires us to fight our addictive drives and attempt to eat less. This combination toxifies and undernourished the body. The resultant is uncontrollable and frequent food cravings. Without an adequate education in superior nutrition and solid principles to stick to; these individuals are forced to flounder and fail bouncing from one diet to another, always losing a little and regaining. Frequently regaining more than they lost.

True hunger is gleefully satisfied by almost any wholesome natural food. No special food is craved or needed. The food also tastes better when the body is physiologically ready to digest and assimilate, when hunger is present. Digestive juices are ready to be released and the enzyme secreting glands have had time to refill and are ready for action resulting in the most efficient and healthy digestion.

[amckenzie4]

wosnes, there's definitely something to that. Over the last year I've been trying to move my diet towards something a lot healthier than it's been. The No-S diet is just the most recent step.

An increase in protein has helped a lot during the day, as has a dramatic increase in fiber. Oddly, adding more meat to my diet has helped, too.

My hope is that at some point I'll manage to balance things out enough that I can stop eating just before bed, but I'm not convinced. I've had that problem since I was about 10, and my parents were pretty strict about making us eat well. At this point I'm used to it. It'd just be nice if it wasn't necessary.

[oolala53]

It's interesting that someone posted about Fuhrman's toxic hunger here. On the other board I participate on, there is an older woman who keeps trying to follow him, and just posted about it. It's been more than a year, maybe even two, of her trying. Amazingly, though she has failed most of the time, she has a huge following. She was wailing about how long toxic hunger would last.

Earlier on, I suggested No S to her. Instead, she has just wrestled with trying to be super restrictive. Hey, who knows? She might be one of the 3% it works for.

Over the years, my diet has moved even more towards freggies. I was already eating a fair amount of them, but I was bingeing, too. Now, the dense foods have decreased and even more freggies have replaced them. It would not have worked in the first two years for me. It's been a pleasant and sumptuous evolution, with my enjoying most of my food all along the way! I've had my issues with wanting to overeat, but I'm glad about the way it's worked out.

Experimenting within the meal structure is terrific!

[Sinnie]

Hey oolala, roughly how many fruits/veggies do you have per day or meal? Do you find using the one plate rule with this causes your hunger to appear much earlier? Curious on this!

[oolala53]

For lunch and dinner, I try to have something green and leafy, plus two other veggies of different colors, cooked or raw. And one piece of fruit. This is along with my dense food. If my entree is saucy, I tend to mix bites and use no salad dressing. I do make sure I have an extra fat if the entree is light. This summer, I've sometimes had an extra fruit (nectarines! mangoes! grapes!) instead of a starch. And I'll sometimes have yogurt with my fruit at night.

I get hungry about 4-5 hours after lunch. I don't mind being hungry for about an hour or two before dinner. (I aim for that with lunch, too.) I'm often not very hungry in the morning, but on workdays, I most always have a little something anyway. I never get hungry in the evenings, though the thought of munching still occurs.

This spring and summer, I was often still not hungry at meal time, so I would reduce or even eliminate the dense food. I'd rather have lots to chew! It's an ongoing experiment.

And SOMETIMES, when it's too complicated to pull this off, such as when I'm at a restaurant, I just eat!

[Sinnie]

Thanks for the explanation! That helps to see what other people do. Do you virtual plate all that, or just put it all together on one plate? I imagine you stick to the rules. So your plate must look full and be filling, but lower in calories.

[oolala53]

I put it all on one plate to start, but I sometimes split it up afterwards.

I'd actually been eating lunches like that for years before No S, but bingeing afternoon into evening. When I started eating dinner regularly, I almost felt lost. If felt as if, if I was allowed to eat what I wanted, I should be having a big plate of lasagne or other "forbidden" food every night. But, I found I didn't want them as often as I thought, though I had plenty of pizza and still have burritos (split into two and sometimes even three meals) from local fast food Mexican places just about every week. I had gotten over the fascination with forbidden foods except sweets and refined carbs before. But my love affair with sweets lasted quite awhile. I really believe No S and my meal makeup healed me. (It may be hokum, but I do believe freggies balance you out and "fight" food addiction.) It just took longer than most people want. (Am I repeating myself? Sorry.)

[Dhack]

I find the comments about toxic hunger fascinating. I've always been a "calories matter, food doesn't matter" type of girl but with s days I can definitely see something to contradict that. Right now, my weekends are a mess because I eat whatever I want. My inner toddler says let's eat all the "Nos" I couldn't eat all week. For two days it means a lot of sweets and my meals are off because I'm not hungry for "good stuff." Meanwhile, all this "bad stuff" is putting me into a "bad place" appetite wise. I'm too full for healthy food but hungry for junk and it's a vicious circle. Get it before it's gone is a problem for me, too. Now that I know it isn't just in my mind, it's what I'm doing to myself, I'm going to try to manage it better. At least be cognizant of it. I'm looking forward to Saturday to experiment. Btw, I'm on my 3rd month.

[amckenzie4]

I'm updating in large part in case other people with the same problem I had find this thread.

After two weeks, I'm doing pretty well. The afternoon cravings are still there, but receding. I do still need to eat before bed, but again, the penalty for not doing so is less than it was.

Overall, I'm fairly happy with the diet. I have two red days on my calendar: one was a dinner with unexpected guests (and unexpected dessert), and the other was a day when I forgot to take things out of the freezer, so dinner was two hours late, and I just wasn't willing to wait to eat.