Managing Portion Sizes for Meals and Snacks

Even though you have adopted a new menu plan with a steady mix of exercise to lose weight, it is important to understand the difference between your appetite and real hunger. Rather than the quantity of food you consume, a lack of nutrition can cause hunger pangs. However, your appetite may be emotionally out of control rather than your body bottoming out physically, and when your blood sugar drops below normal, you are likely to eat anything.

Experts suggest that you only need a 250-calorie deficit each day to shed about two pounds per week. That explains why it is important to avoid a quick snack before your normal mealtime, as you can ruin your daily deficit. When you are dedicated to shed unwanted weight, it is more important than ever to keep your body well nourished, so you can better manage real hunger and avoid triggering your more creative appetite mechanism.

During your weight loss journey, you learned that controlling your body weight involves much more than just managing what you eat. Intense feelings of hunger should be avoided at all costs. Weight maintenance will not be effortless, so try the tips discussed below to keep it off:

• Plan Your Meals – Although hunger is a natural response, letting yourself get too hungry can increase the risk of having strong food cravings. If you plan meals and snacks correctly, you will be feeding your body when it needs fuel.
• Manage Portion Size – When eating out beware of larger portion sizes. Studies show people will unintentionally consume more calories when eating high-calorie food from larger containers. Manage size to avoid portion-size pitfalls.
• Do Not Ban Foods – Fortunately, your favorite foods can be a part of your plan to lose weight even if they’re not the healthiest. However, it is important for you to account for your dietary choices and manage portion sizes accordingly.
• Add Resistance Exercises – Exercise is beneficial from a number of health perspectives. Resistance exercises are helpful in restoring loss muscle mass to keep your fat-burning engine working at optimal performance.
• Consume Protein & Fat – When you replace fast-burning carbs with healthy fats and protein, you should immediately notice a reduction in hunger. Protein works to satisfy your appetite and healthy fats digest slowly to keep you feeling full longer.

When you are already hungrier than normal, it is easy for you to mistake thirst for hunger. Most of us do not stay properly hydrated throughout the day, so see if drinking a glass of water will help you feel fuller to temper your appetite. There are a lot of opinions about eating breakfast or not. Nonetheless, starting your day by consuming nutrients rather than empty calories could make losing weight and managing your hunger and appetite a lot easier, especially for weight control.

Consuming high-fiber foods and lean proteins effect your sense of fullness and to help reduce the number of calories you consume each day, which is an important factor in weight loss and long-term weight maintenance and control. Whether it is a better understanding of true hunger or the emotional backing to get over the next hurdle, eventually everybody needs some support. Call MRC today to learn more about our personalized approach to losing weight.