Article: Four Steps to Hunger Control
By John Mericle M.D.

Axiom Number Two: Hunger Control

Trying to lose weight without understanding how to control your hunger -impossible. Probably the main reason so many diets fail is because they ignore hunger. Hunger is one of the human's strongest drives, right up there with procreation and survival. Diets that attempt to restrict calories by controlling portion sizes are almost universally failures. All the positive imagery in the world will not stop your hunger, even for a nanosecond. Hunger is just like a river. You can dam it up for a while, but it will eventually spill over and occasionally "burst" the dam itself.

Nutritional density

The first and most important step in controlling your hunger is to feed your body what it is hungry for, not a big gulp at the local convenience mart. All the food in most large commercial grocery stores, fast food restaurants and convenience marts is not what you need to turn off your appetite. The only way you can even begin to shut down your hunger is to feed the body complete foods. Here in America that means organic whole foods.

Evolutionary Biochemistry

As man evolved, he did not have convenience marts and fast food on every corner. Today, the biochemistry of man is still anachronistically Neanderthal, while on every corner are heavily processed foods that the biochemistry of the human is not prepared to process. Incomplete foods rob the body of precious minerals and micronutrients. Whole foods, on the other hand, are complete and add these precious nutrients back to the body. Processed sugar is a good example of how the biochemistry of the human has not evolved while the food industry has figured out ways to process almost every known food substance. It's no wonder that today we have so much cancer, heart disease and stroke.

Hunger control step number one

Eat at least one whole food and organic meal a day. Whether you prepare this from the MericleDiet, which makes it very easy to have good whole food vegan sugar-free meals on short notice, or you prepare these meals yourself, makes no difference. Your body needs some whole foods. Once you have established a routine of at least one whole food organic meal a day, you can start working on the rest of your hunger control.

Hunger control step number two

This is one of the most important and "difficult" steps to accomplish. You have to stop or at least really restrict simple sugars (as we have recently covered). Why is this so important? Simple sugars like sucrose, honey and high fructose corn syrup, deliver huge loads of fructose and glucose at the same time. Not only can the human biochemistry not handle this as you all know by now, but they are very "addicting" chemicals. If you can't stop your sugar habit, you will never be able to really control your hunger. This is extremely critical to ever regaining control of your hunger, your weight and the well being of your immune system.

Hunger control step number three

Understand that you will get hungry. This may happen both before your main meal of the day as well as after it. Be prepared. Stock your refrigerator with "healthy snacks." Organic carrot sticks in water work for me. I come back from a run hungry, reach in the refrigerator and out come the carrot sticks. Peppers work well this way, celery or any other organic veggies. Keep large amounts of prepared salads ready as they make a great snack that is very low on the glycemic index. Whatever works for you, keep a good supply on hand, including fresh fruits such as apples and bananas. For myself, being the potato chipaholic (I've been to Potato Chips Anonymous many times), it took some practice. Now, I don't even reach for the potato chip bag, I go straight for the carrots, even if there is a bag of chips on top of the refrigerator.

Hunger control step number four

Learn to think in percentages. Controlling your hunger is a huge project. I think it is actually more difficult for those of us who are adult onset diabetic or pre-diabetic. Understand that you will fail, more initially than later on. Most people just can't stop bad eating habits overnight. This is an ongoing work-in-progress and will be for the rest of your life. Don't ever get down because you failed, just strive to do better the next time. It is too easy to fail, and then just give up all together. Initially you may fail two or three times a day, but keep eating that one whole food organic meal a day. Soon you will be failing two or three times a week, and be a whole lot healthier. You will never be perfect, but as long as your weight and health are what you want them to be, you can go out and enjoy the ambience of pizza and beer or some great Mexican food -and not "worry" about it.

I would like to leave you with this quote from one of my daughters, Danielle. You may cast a jaundice eye my direction for using one of my own family as an endorsement. Let me quickly dispell any thoughts of that, as in our family, it is extremely difficult to even get noticed, much less some positive words.

Danielle Mericle

In a lot of ways it comes down to your old saying, "balancing getting through the day with getting through your life." There actually is a balance if you can find it. For example, last night we made a big Mexican feast for friends. I made a Mexican rice that required long grain white rice, which I know isn't good. I also made chili rellenos which, although thankfully had no eggs, had quite a bit of cheese. But because I had eaten mostly brown rice, beans, and steamed veggies all week, I could easily eat that meal last night without worrying about it. Knowing what to avoid and then when you can get away with it -is the key.

Danielle Mericle
Ithaca, New York

Thanks for your time.

Copyright © John Mericle M.D. 2005 All Rights Reserved

The MericleDiet is the clear and easy path to that one organic sugar-free whole food meal a day. To visit the MericleDiet follow the link below.

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DrMericle.com is devoted to achieving optimal health and peak performance through diet and lifestyle change. Dr. Mericle brings together a unique blend of formal training in organic chemistry and biochemistry, medical education, 29 marathons, 3 Hawaii Ironman competitions and a lot of practical real life experience.

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