Does Losing Weight Mean Having to go Hungry

Lawndale News Chicago's Bilingual Newspaper - Local News

Lawndale News Chicago's Bilingual Newspaper - Local News

For many people losing weight is synonymous with restriction and sacrifice. In an effort to acquire the body of their dreams, patients obsess over every calorie and cut too many corners, leaving their body starved and tired. Dr. Niket Sonpal, an NYC Internist and Gastroenterologist, tells us malnourishment is not the key to a healthy lifestyle and could be the “gateway into difficult health problems.” Dr. Sonpal, who is an Assistant Professor at Touro College of Osteopathic Medicine and Associate Director of Brookdale Hospital’s Residency Program, says, “Starving yourself is a technique that quickly backfires on patients. It can cause mass to be stored, water to accumulate, and hormone imbalances, among other things. If we aren’t careful about our nutrition and our weight loss, we can end up worse than when we started.” Dr. Sonpal shares a few reasons to refrain from starving yourself.

Hydration is key to your health
In their incessant battle for an “Instagram-worthy” body, people concentrate overwhelmingly on the solid foods they eat and very little on the liquids they drink. Needless to say, our bodies are dependent on water to help keep them regulated, hydrated and refreshed. In other instances, people forget to drink water leading to dehydration and water retention. Drinking ample amounts of water is also an effective way to send signals to the brain, informing it that you are not on an empty stomach. Drinking water before a meal has been shown to effectively decrease the amount of a person consumes once they sit down to eat.

Fiber is your friend
Fiber is a useful tool for staying regulated and healthy. Fiber is interesting because, though it is a carbohydrate, the body is unable to dismantle the nutrient to convert it to a simple sugar molecule. This results in Fiber passing through our gastrointestinal tract accomplishing many beneficial tasks to help us with our diet and health goals. Fiber is a healthy way to increase fullness hormones in the body.. Fiber also helps to keep you full and it shows up in a variety of foods from fruits to vegetables to grains. The versatility of fiber means it is easy to work it into your diet without a lot of stress. Fiber helps fill you up as well without the risk of it staying and accumulating in your body to be processed into fat.

Fat Storage
The term “starvation mode” is incredibly common and if you confess your fasting weight loss methods to a caring friend or family member, odds are they will mention starvation mode as a reason against going hungry.  You may be tempted to roll your eyes and ignore the advice, but your loved one may be right. When we are constantly hungry, skipping meals and only feeding our bodies with one or two big meals a day, even if the meals are mostly healthy the body will do everything it can to store as much fat and nutrients as it can. This is especially true if you eat at inconsistent times of the day. Why? Because the body’s biological clock does not know when its next meal will come and how big that meal will be. So while you go hungry, your body grows anxious and looks for ways to compensate for the insufficient and inconsistent way with which it is fed.

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