Why am I famished

I’m exercising more but WHY am I so hungry?”

Many of my clients have stepped up their fitness program with extra training sessions and increased intensity, or they are new to fitness (maybe due to the reality that summer is coming and a swimsuit is eminent) and are asking the same question: ”Why am I so hungry?... I’m eating healthy, but feeling famished in the afternoon or evening.”

Sparing you the boring scientific answer, your body’s metabolism is kicking in high gear. Which means that when you exercise you are burning a lot of calories (hopefully 300+), and if your workout is a mix of strength and cardio circuits, you will create an after burn of calories hours later.

Gotta love that!

What this ultimately means is that you are burning more, and your body needs more quality calories and nutrients to replenish, restore and recover from your workouts.

Don’t be fooled into thinking that you can eat anything you want because you are a metabolic machine. This hunger feeling can drive you to making lousy food choices.

You still need to manage a higher amount of calories burned versus caloric intake to drop those fat pounds.

Here are a couple of tips to help you not feel so hungry and keep you moving positively toward your fitness and weight loss goals:

Eat within one hour of your workout. Get in a balanced meal or high quality protein shake that includes carbohydrates, protein and fat. Even if you are on a carb-restricted diet, this is the time to give your body the carbs! It wants them to replenish energy stores and repair muscles, so make a good choice of brown rice, pasta or whole grain bread with your balanced after workout meal.

Eat five meals every day – you’ve probably heard this by now, but here it is again. Your metabolism will stay on fire if you feed it every 2 to 3 hours. And to help curb your appetite, this is necessary. If you wait 4 to 5 hours between meals, you will feel famished and this can lead to poor choices or calorie holding by your body.

Eat quality foods – when you are feeling hungry be sure to have quality foods on hand for a meal or to snack on. Lean meats and bright green, yellow or orange veggies are your best choices. Fill up on the veggies!

Drink 80 ounces of water daily – sometimes your body will mistake hunger for thirst. Before you give in to additional calories because you think you are hungry, drink 8 to 10 ounces of water and wait a five minutes. If it’s been a couple hours since your last meal, then eat. If you were really thirsty, your perceived hunger will go away.

Keep your meal size small – your 5 meals a day should be smaller in portion size to allow your body to efficiently utilize the calories that you are eating. Eating large meals will result in storing the extra calories and that can equal fat. Yuk!

Implement these tips in your daily routine and you will excel with your fitness plan.

Please email me your progress and questions…I love to hear from you.

Be Well and Rock it,