Celebrate Snacks You Love
Finding the right snack is empowering. Even though diet culture tells us to push through our hunger, snacking raises low blood sugar levels, boosts concentration, increases energy, and improves our mood. Yay for snacks!
Additionally, a snack might carry us into lunch or dinner without feeling famished. If we let our bodies reach an uncomfortable state of hunger, our biological need to survive kicks in, and we are prone to eat fast, not tasting or enjoying our food as much. As a result, we may become uncomfortably full. Ignoring our hunger can evolve into a dangerous cycle of restriction and bingeing – no fun.
Finding the right snack and the right amount of food takes some trial and error. I usually recommend a combination of two things for increased satisfaction, including these examples -
Fresh fruit and toasted nuts
Seeded crackers and Swiss cheese
Yogurt and granola
Apple slices and peanut butter
Cheese toast
Pita chips and hummus
Cherry tomatoes and olives
Enjoying snacks that sound good to you matters a lot. Even if you eat a bowl full of fibrous and filling carrot and celery sticks because you’re trying to be “healthy”, you will likely feel unsatisfied. Alternatively, a handful of salted cashews and some carrot and celery sticks might sound delicious and get your energy and headspace where you want them to be.
Here’s a way to take care of yourself this week:
This week try 3 different snacks that sound good to you. Notice how hungry you feel before you eat and how you feel afterward. Notice how you feel at your next meal.
One of my teachers urged me to share this story with parents of teens: Let your kids have a snack without watching TV, doing homework, or playing video games. Some teens report that their families won’t allow them just to sit and eat after school, that they must be doing something.
We live in such a productive-oriented world that this doesn’t surprise me, but I feel sad for these teens, and sad for those of us in offices where we eat our snacks and lunch in front of the same computer screen where we sit and work all day. Revolt if you can! Take a walk and sit outside. Sit at the cafeteria table that’s always empty.
“Snack Hungry” versus “Meal Hungry”
One of my clients with middle school-aged twins asked for help around what to have available when they returned home from school. The lunches they purchase at school are not large, so these kids are “meal hungry” in the afternoon, not just “snack hungry”. Having last night’s leftovers or anything else with protein, carbs and fat, is a great choice. Here are some easy ideas that won’t keep you or your kids in the kitchen cooking all day:
Store-bought chicken salad and whole wheat pita bread
Frozen bean and cheese burrito
Leftover pizza (buy 1 pie extra next time you order)
Peanut butter, honey, and banana sandwich
Turkey and cheese sandwich with corn chips
Store-bought pasta salad with protein
…Add fresh fruit to any of these!
And what about you?
If you’re the person who’s primarily in charge of meals in your house, but you feel “meal hungry” at 4:30pm, I recommend eating what you need to feel satisfied. Free up the headspace that’s distracted by thoughts of food. At dinner, you may find you eat less. Also, think about what you ate earlier in the day. Did you never reach “comfortably full and satisfied” on your hunger/fullness meter?
The Gift of Right-Size Portions: If you are concerned that you or your children are always hungry, consider increasing your portion sizes at meals. Most of us don’t want to spend hours each day thinking about our hunger. One of my clients ate a piece of toast, one hard-boiled egg and some fresh fruit each morning for breakfast, and found herself hungry an hour or so later. She was so conditioned by diet culture’s message to keep portions small, that she hadn’t tried eating a bigger breakfast until she began learning about intuitive eating and honoring her body’s hunger and fullness signals. She experimented with having two pieces of toast and adding some walnuts to her meal, and now she feels satisfied for several hours!
