Appetite Control – The First Pillar Of Fat Loss

One of my friends from the gym has been yo-yo dieting on basically the same plan for years. His diet of choice is low in both carbohydrates and fats. He basically eats large portions of extremely lean meats and lots of vegetables. When he’s able to stick to his plan, he generally loses quite a bit of weight – five pounds a week or so. The problem is that more often than not, he falls off the wagon and when he does, he PACKS on weight in a huge hurry.

His diet is a classic no-way-in-the-world-you-can-stick-to-it plan. He’s starving his body of many essential nutrients and that’s why he’s only able to do it for extremely short periods of time. After a week or two, his body starts to fight back and oh how it fights back. His cravings become out of control and he starts to eat everything in sight. Once he eats a single bite of a cookie he turns into a vampire who’s smelled blood. That’s only a slight exaggeration.

The saddest part about this story is that my friend has less muscle and a LOT more fat than he did when he started this plan, years ago.

When I see him at the gym he often asks me about my diet. I have of course tried to teach him about more effective, long term plans for losing fat but so far, he’s resistant. He’s going for fat loss that’s much ‘quicker’ than my plan. I have personally lost 40 pounds of fat but he chalks my success up to my ‘discipline’ and his failure to his lack thereof. I can tell you that this isn’t the case. I have learned how to feel less hungry than my friend because I have learned how to control my appetite. It doesn’t control me so honestly, it’s easy to not overeat.

Fighting feelings of hunger is perhaps that most difficult aspect of taking fat off of your body. Our bodies are extremely powerful and they are quite efficient at making us eat – often when we don’t want to. Constantly fighting our cravings for food is an extremely inefficient way to go about losing fat – one that is destined for failure.

Losing fat isn’t a game that can only be won by people who have obscene amounts of self-discipline. You shouldn’t be hungry all the time and if you are, you need to alter your approach instead of allowing yourself to be depressed because you aren’t ‘disciplined’. In order to win the battle against body fat, you have to learn where cravings come from and how to control them. This lesson will help you to do just that.

Principle #1 – Lack of Dietary Balance

In order to thrive, your body has many needs. Without the proper nutrition, your body can’t produce the enzymes and hormones it needs to survive. When your body has a need that isn’t filled, it will try to get you to eat more food.

Not eating certain types of foods that your body needs will most certainly end in disaster. Many people eat very little fat, others don’t eat enough carbs. Some don’t eat enough protein while other don’t eat enough vitamin rich foods. Follow any of these patterns and you will end up with CRAVINGS, cravings that you won’t be able to control.

Principle #2 – Dehydration

Water is the most important nutrient (next to oxygen) that your body needs to survive – this is why you generally can’t live for more than a few days without water.

The drinking of water is your body’s first choice for getting the water it needs, but drinking isn’t its only source for hydration. Eating food is its second source. If your body can’t get you to drink for its hydration, it will try to make you eat. Feelings of thirst and hunger are often confused for this reason. Drinking a lot of water will prevent this problem.

Principle #3 – Blood Sugar

Eating refined sugar or refined grains will spike your blood sugar sky high and high blood sugar is TOXIC to your body. Since having high blood sugar damages your organs (and some other systems), your body will deal with it immediately by using the hormone insulin. Insulin clears the sugar out of your blood to protect your body. Not only is the sugar turned to fat after this happens, your body then often ends up LOW on blood sugar. You then crave bad foods like sugars and refined grains – this is your body trying to raise your blood sugar up to normal levels.

I’ll cover this effect more completely in another lesson, but know this: This effect can be an extremely powerful addiction that creates INSANE cravings for food. But, blood sugar can be mastered and once you have mastered it, it’s a LOT easier to pass on bad foods.

Principle #4 – Eating Regular Meals

The longer you go without eating, the more you risk letting your cravings get the best of you. You should be eating within 30 minutes of getting up in the morning and at least every three hours throughout the day. For me, this means eating a healthy snack like an apple or some strawberries in between meals.

Skipping breakfast is especially disastrous for both appetite control and metabolism.

Principle #5 – Not Undereating

Many people get caught in the unhealthy trap of undereating. This is a hard one to break because these individuals often have more body fat than they would want, even though they eat little. They are constantly hungry and stay overly fat.

The key to overcoming this problem is eating more healthy food and less unhealthy food. If you’re in this trap, stop thinking about calories and start focusing on the quality of food you eat. Load up on fruits and veggies while you’re making the switch.

Additional Thoughts

If you would like to learn more about the principle of appetite control, you can learn more here:

Why Am I Always Hungry?

Also, you could check out my ways to decrease appetite. You will of course find a lot of the same information that you found here, but sometimes reading the same information from a different angle helps you to understand more fully.

1. Why Am I Always Hungry? The 7 Crucial Principles Of Successful Appetite Control
2. My Story Of Getting Fat, Yo-Yoing, Exhaustion, Mistakes, And Eventual Victory Over Fat
3. How To Decrease Appetite – 7 Ways
4. What’s the Best Breakfast for Weight Loss?
5. How To Control Weight The Healthy Way

Tags: appetite control, blood sugar, fat loss