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Friday, May 20, 2011

Hunger and Fullness

I had a conversation today with a client, who said that since she's changed her diet to one that is lower in fat and higher in fiber, she experiences a "different kind of fullness". I asked her to explain.

She said that when she ate a "meat heavy" diet, she felt full a lot of the time, and really liked that feeling. With much less meat, and other fatty foods, she gets full, but it has a different quality.

How interesting! Wouldn't you think that full is full?

I think that when we aren't eating what we REALLY want, we can be physically full, but not SATISFIED. There's a difference between full, and SATISFIED. For me, satisfied has several dimensions, physical, mental and spiritual or psychological. If you "fill up" just one of these, say the physical, the others just might not be satisfied. This might explain my client's observation that the fullness she feels on a lower fat diet isn't the same. This might be OK with her, or it might not.

4 comments:

Bryan Lian said...

This is a great post. I wonder how sustainable feeling full is, as opposed to feeling satisfied.

Ellen Glovsky said...

Thanks, Bryan. This is something I'm especially interested in. My work with clients involves lots of discussion about hunger, fullness and SATISFACTION. How do you know when you are full/satisfied? Are they the same? Every time, or only sometimes when you eat?

Spencer Kline said...

To me fullness is when I look down at a meal and I don't feel a tinge of regret. Regret and remorse really temper my feeling of satistcation.

Ellen Glovsky said...

Yes, what an excellent point Spencer. This is so interesting, how emotion can "color" the experience of satiety with food. It certainly does spoil the satisfaction when you feel regret about what you ate.