Head Hunger

Hi everyone! I'm a little over one week post-op! I know I made the right choice to change my life and my lifestyle but I'm STRUGGLING with head hunger. It's terrible! Have you found anything that helped? I'm driving myself crazy!!

9 months post op here.  The first 2 months or so are the WORST for head hunger!  Hang in there because it will get better (for me if did at least). 

My head hunger was usually focused on something specific,  and I would try to find an alternative to satisfy me.  If I was craving ice cream,  I'd have a sugar free popsicle,  or a Greek yogurt bar.  If I was craving pizza,  I'd get an Atkins frozen pizza.  They're gross,  but things like that were my crutch to staying on the wagon and not being miserable.  After a while of the alternatives,  my head decided it didn't want those new things so much and my head hunger hardly ever comes around anymore.  

Good luck! 

Dealing with my unhealthy relationship with food and my food addiction is what helped me.  I worked with an eating disorder counselor, read a lot (Good Calories, Bad Calories by Gary Taub -- Food: The Good Girl's Drug by Sunny Sea Gold are a couple) -- and really worked on changing how I saw nutrition.  

It's been a long road to recovery.  

It's great that you recogise it for what it is.  Try to distract yourself - and stay out of the kitchen.  Maybe you need to time your meals so that you are eating separately from family and then drink while they eat.  this worked for me early out.  Go for a walk, avoid the kitchen, read, get on OH, did I say avoid the kitchen?

This will pass especially as you work on your eating sdisorder and as you lose weight and achieve your goals it will become something that you just deal with and move on.  I make tea or drink coffee when I want to eat but it isn't planned.  Or I just suck it up.  Stay on plan, move and be positive.  It's all worth it!

My head hunger goes away when I'm following a pretty strict plan. I set my meals and snacks, plan what I'm having the night before (takes the choice out of the equation that could be easily impacted by my current emotional state). For some reason, when I know exactly what and when I'm going to eat, and when I avoid too many carbs and sugar/flour all together, my head hunger is virtually eliminated. It took me 4.5 yrs after surgery to find my "sweet spot" so to speak. 

Don't give in! Eventually, you will learn to accept it and your body will adjust. The beginning is the hardest, but it is worth it. Train yourself to eat on a schedule, and it will become a habit.

I had VSG on March 31, so I'm not even 2 weeks out, but last weekend my head hunger was almost unbearable. Every time it happened, I made myself a protein shake and tried to choke it down. At least if I think I'm hungry, I'm gonna consume something that is good for me. It knocked the HH, by the way.