Yesterday I spent hours "working-from-home" by the window, expecting a snow-white scene to unfold and a blizzard to envelope my brownish yellow grass. But, as the day unwound, I watched the warning on weather.com turn from red to orange to nothing and was left with 8 mm of snow instead of the predicted 8 inches! Like someone said.."they just messed up the metrics"!
The point of the post wasn't the snow or the lack of it really... but the hunger pangs that seemed to gnaw harder while I was at home! Almost four years back, when I had gained a lousy fifteen pounds in three months (blame it on the overdose of dating one does strictly pre-marriage times, sadly with the same guy..) anyways.. I am still trying to lose the left overs from that era and striving hard to fit into my skinny jeans again!
My first intitiative to lose the pounds was to barely run 1.25 miles, pant like a dog, drink an iota of milk in the name of breakfast, let the stomach rumble until it hurt, eat a meagre lunch, feel proud of it and then 3 pm would strike; the hunger devil (as coined by my cousin villus) would cause me to burn and crash. I would give in to a heavy dinner and feel guilty. The cycle would continue. No surprises - I gained more in the bargain.
Over time, I have finally come into consensus with my body and learnt to manage the food-health-fitness cycle. Although, I am still hit with between-meals hunger accompanied by a pity-emanating-stomach-rumbling noise that can be heard two cubes away! I have tamed the beast to fat free fruit yogurt or a bowl of fresh veggies or a fruit or handful of nuts for the past sixteen months or so.
But yesterday, being home and having a shelf of haldirams displayed for the benefit of the weak-hearted, I was tempted to take more between-meal breaks and pop a spoon of snacks down my throat. When one spoon gave way to one too many, I had decided that WFH wasn't good for the heart (figuratively and literally). I finally tied the growling beast and many crunchy carrots were eaten instead and ran the risk of being called a "cow" by N (technically it should have been rabbit.. but whatever!) .
So here is what I figured about hunger in general yesterday -
1. Hungry every two hours - eat meager meals every two hours.
2. Ravenous during meal times - eat like no tomorrow each of these times
3. Balance hunger - crazy-I-will-die during breakfast, I-will-eat--to-survive at lunch, I-will-eat-because-its-dinner-time during dinner.
4. Snacker - eat whenever i please even if I am not hungry. My heart wants it.
5. Un-foodie - never know when it is meal-time. Who needs food, I say?
6. Skipper - I am too busy to be wasting time eating.. I will skip now and hog later when famished
6. Skipper - I am too busy to be wasting time eating.. I will skip now and hog later when famished
7. the in-between - Big hungry during meal times. Small hungry between meal times.
8. superman err... super-human hungry (for fear of sounding politically incorrect!) - interleaved, cyclic, biological clock keeping, scrupulous, always fit hunger! phew!
8. superman err... super-human hungry (for fear of sounding politically incorrect!) - interleaved, cyclic, biological clock keeping, scrupulous, always fit hunger! phew!
So what kind of hungry are you?? How do you deal with hunger pangs? How do you deal with cravings that have nothing to do with hunger pangs?
Share your thoughts and let it be a help and inspiration for better or worse! =)
Mail/chat/facebook me the miles for the week tomorrow!
4 comments:
Divu: I think your hunger pangs can be correlated to the fact that you were primarily sitting idle and not heavily involved with work. An added disadvantage is to have haldirams and all the junkie right in front of your eyes.
I believe I am the Balance hunger sort of person since I eat like a King at breakfast and lunch and like a pauper for dinner (exceptions not included) for the following reasons:
a. Breakfast typically means breaking the fast that one has been keeping by default for 8-9hrs so trying to skip that or eat less is a bad idea and is going to ruin your eating schedule so don't try that.
b. A healthy and heavy lunch will do the trick to sustain you until dinner time (although I fall short as after 4hrs of typical digestion time I feel hungry)and the chances of you eating junk in between lunch and dinner gets bleak.
c. It is a good idea to eat at-least 2-3 hrs before bedtime to allow partial digestion so that your tummy feels at peace before you rest your entire body's weight on it while snoring. Also eating less of starchy or cheesy food and in short eating light is the way to go for dinner as that makes digestion and in-turn sleeping more comfortable.
d. Having said all that I must say that I definitely feel hungry between lunch and dinner typically around 4-5pm and for that I keep activia yoghurt and/or crackers that keep me going for sometime before hitting the gym and dinner. I have found one other way to combat the hunger at the evening time - drink loads of water either in the form of hot herbal tea or just warm water.
Enjoy eating and Don't starve yourself! Just run an extra mile for the devilish endeavors that your body "forces" you into!!
Lately at work I have been a skipper :( thanks to crazy workloads extending well over 7 pm (hence the run-o-meter creeps so slowly). But I find that a big (or I should say healthy) breakfasts cleans up my entire day. If i mess it up, then I end up as an in-between.
I ended up keeping a big box of special K on my desk to force me into eating healthy and it all works great until the Indian in me ruins it by not wanting a sweet breakfast! In this case i've been trying to stick with a whole wheat muffin with a teaspoon of cream cheese!
I am more like a three-meals-a-day kinda girl.. I don't usually have hunger pangs in between if I have proper meals.. and one thing I learn is to eat only when you are hungry.. I have tamed my hunger from snacking when I have nothing much to do and also replaced all the "junk" food by fruit. I have also found that dates are really good for instant energy.. just before gym and for snacking in the evenings.
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