shelves if you are seeking help to curb your appetite. Apart
from the high costs of appetite suppressant drugs, their
addictive nature and noted side effects make them a potentially
dangerous choice. Given that in most cases their effects are
short-lived and your weight rapidly rebounds when you stop
taking them, they are not only expensive and dangerous, but
really quite useless too.
There are many natural methods for controlling your appetite.
The following eight have been chosen for being effective, cheap
and easy for everyone to implement.
#1 : Exercise. Contrary to popular opinion, you do not "work up
an appetite" through exercise. Exercise is a proven appetite
suppressant. It stimulates brain chemicals known as endorphins.
These are your body's natural pain killers that give you a mood
boost and reduce your appetite. (The corollary is that people
who lack these endorphins due to insufficient exercise tend to
boost their mood via "comfort food" instead.)
#2 : Drink more water, regularly. The human body craves
hydration long before it craves food. Modern society and product
marketing has 'educated' people into confusing thirst with
hunger. Drinking water at regular intervals throughout the day
will help to keep your appetite in check.
#3 : Avoid artificial sweeteners. Despite the well publicised
fact of artificial sweeteners having no calories, they are the
enemy of the dieter. Many studies in both human and animals have
proven conclusively that these chemical sweeteners stimulate the
appetite. Avoid them like the plague. Particularly do not drink
diet sodas. Stick with water.
#4 : Spice & season your food. A recent study demonstrated that
sprinkling common spices and seasonings such as herbs like
oregano and others reduces the human appetite. The reasoning
appears to be that the blander the food, the more a person tends
to eat to feel satisfied. Herbal seasonings have next to no
calories and enhance the flavour of your food, leading to
earlier satiety.
Appetite for Life: The Biography of Julia Child
#5 : Don't miss breakfast. Skipping this most important meal of
the day not only slows your metabolism, it results in snacking
and binge eating later in the day.
#6 : Avoid sugars and starches. Eat proteins and non-starchy
fibers. Other than the obvious calorie implications of sugars,
sugars and starches are short-chain carbohydrates that are very
rapidly converted into blood glucose, then very rapidly stored
in muscle and fat tissue. This leads to rapid spikes and
troughs, highs and lows, in your daily blood sugar levels and
thus the urge to eat to treat those low points. Protein foods
and high fiber non-starchy vegetables are more nutritious and
take longer to fully digest - preventing those blood sugar
spikes and troughs.
#7 : Eat slowly. After your first bite of food at a meal, it
takes around twenty (20) minutes for the signal of satiety from
your stomach to reach your brain. Make a habit of taking a bite,
then putting down your cutlery while you thoroughly chew your
food. Do not pick up your utensils again until you have
completely chewed and swallowed what is in your mouth.
Developing this habit gives your brain time to recognise what
you have already consumed before you shover too much into your
mouth. Eating slowly means that you will feel fuller on a lower
food intake.
#8 : Develop healthy sleep patterns. Lack of sleep or disrupted
sleeping patterns disturb several hormonal functions within your
body, at least two of which lead to loss of appetite control.
Additionally, most people tend to compensate for their feeling
of a lack of energy caused by lack of sleep by overeating or
drinking calories. A steady eight-plus hours of sleep per night
will assist in controlling those hormonal appetite cravings
during the day.