Exercise and Hunger Pangs?!?

hannahwil2002

Full Member
Hi all,

Since deciding to speed walk the 30 minutes to my train station every morning (saw the butt starting to sag and had to do something about it!) I've noticed that I seem to feel a lot more hungrier than I used to!

I can see some kind of scientific reason behind it (I'm sure Pete will correct me if I'm wrong, wink wink :p!). Exercise = more calories burnt = more calories needed!

Has anyone else found they suffer with really bad hunger pangs when they started to exercise whilst still in foundation??

Hx
 
I'm afraid I was always pretty useless when it came to exercising - still am! But your theory makes sense.... Pete? Hehe.

A xx
 
Its fake hunger most of the time, take a sip of water and see if that helps, also judge how long its been since a meal, if its been 4 hours its probably real hunger.

Also drink some leaf tea like pepper mint tea with (pellet) sweetners not powder versions.

As for exercise dont over do it go easy and listen to your body
 
Hi
Just started today - how long do you recommend avoiding exercise at first
Usually do spin class weekly at gym but is very high intensity
Cheers

James

Ur officially a nutcase!

Spin is EVIL! I mean that and squash are like the Devil's workout. Makes me feel ill just thinking about it!

Definitely do not do it on the first week. But if you are used to a lot of excercise you should be fine getting back onto it after that!

My first week I though I was going to die!

B x
 
Hi
Just started today - how long do you recommend avoiding exercise at first
Usually do spin class weekly at gym but is very high intensity
Cheers

James

The official lighterlife recommendation is to avoid exercise for a couple of weeks, then when you are in full ketosis you can resume you regime, i push it quiet hard on the tredmills by doing burst training
 
Hi Guys
Thanks for info
I have a acl knee injury so running squash circuit training and all the things I liked to do are out
I cant cope with boredom of Swimming so cycling is only thing I can do
I lost a couple of stone last winter as I has a traget to do the London to Paris charity bike ride in July 2008 - 300 miles in 4 days I managed it but it was tough on the hills at 17st so this year I want to do LL and get down to 14stone
Will give exercise a miss for couple of weeks while I get into the programme and then pick it up again.
I will also not be boozing on LL so that will help - not alcaholic but got into habit of having wine every night - Those days are over
Cheers

James
 
good goals there Jim, all the best in reaching that target weight. Dont neglect RTM when you are done (route to management) its very important in teaching you healthy eating

all the best
 
Hannah said:
I can see some kind of scientific reason behind it (I'm sure Pete will correct me if I'm wrong, wink wink :p!). Exercise = more calories burnt = more calories needed!

*Walks in, clad in white lab coat, sticks on thick specs and prepares to get sciency* :p

Yes of course, you are right, more exercise = more calories burnt = more calories needed!

The hunger pangs could either be mental, as Huseyin says, purely that you think you are more hungry as you recognise you've been more active.

They could also be real, and that is going to stem from the fact that your body is basically asking you to provide it with some "quick" energy as it has none, and the slowly-released energy that it is getting from breaking down fats is now not enough as you've used it all from exercising.

Once it's broken down some more fats and gotten the energy back, and you are back to a "normal" pace of a day, the hunger will go away as your body will realise that it doesn't need the "quick" energy anymore. Lots of water can help dull the 'pain' of a pang though!

*removes specs, takes off lab coat, then runs out quickly as he realises he's forgotten to wear anything else under the coat*

:p
 
Sure thing LS, Ill do a post about it when I get in from work, not enough time left here now to do it properly! lol

I will put it up around 6.30pm :)
 
OK here goes!

I don't know the "real" names for what I called 'Quick Energy' and 'Slow Energy' (if there even is one!) but I can tell you about them.


Quick Energy is energy gained from eating foods which contain naturally occuring 'simple' carbohydrate (form of energy) which the body can digest and make use of quickly (hence, Quick Energy!) as well as vitamins and minerals which help to produce an all round, better, more energetic feeling. The most popular and well-known (if you watch Wimbledon) is Banana's; a good source of simple carbohydrates, vitamins B&C and potassium. A banana can be absorbed and used for energy very quickly, which is why tennis players use them to keep their energy up during a match. All fruits contain these kinds of carbs, as they are actually the fruit's natural sugars (yes, for those who didn't know, sugar is a crystallised form of carbohydrate).


Not all simple carbs are good though.

Most un-natural carbs are classified as simple, as they are carbs which have been taken in their natural state, broken down and then re-formed to make something un-natural like chocolate. These "freak" carbs are not good at providing energy in the same way as they would have if they were in their natural state (such as the Banana) but still retain some of their former properties; for example, it holds true for most people that a small amount of chocolate can provide a mental boost, yet for everyone a large amount of chocolate will lead to bloatedness and weigh gain as the body cannot digest and absorb the energy found in the chocolate quickly (hence the "bloated" feeling coming from the elongated form of digestion) and as the energy is released, most other forms of energy will be used in it's place (such as the sandwhich and crisps you ate before the choc bar) as that energy will be better than that found in the chocolate, with the slow crappy energies from the chocolate being laid down as fats for use at a time when there is no other, better energy to make use of.

Complex carbohydrates, such as those found in cereals, are "Slow Energy" forms, as they take much longer to be broken down, absorbed and made ready to use by the body, hence the reason they are good for breakfast as they provide you with large amounts of energy which will be released slowly over time, helping to get you through the morning as well as providing a mental boost which most often, the un-natural "freak" carbs do not give.



So, the effects of quick vs. slow energy in terms of a VLCD.


Well, body fat is extremely difficult for the body to break down, in fact it is pretty much the hardest cell structure to break down. It contains lots of things that can't be used for energy (much of which becomes the Ketones produced by the breakdown of the fats) which have to be expelled. Despite containing a lot of calories, it contains very little usable energy and actually requires energy to do the breakdown process in the first place.

The reason the body will lose muscle while in starvation mode is that muscle is packed with energy, and far easier to break down than fat; hence, the body will 'hang' onto the fat as it is easier, quicker and requires less energy in itself to convert muscle to energy.


So, as you have no glycogen stores (ready-made, ready-to-be-used energy) on a VLCD,3 or 4 times a day for short time you are relying on the little amount of semi-quick energy gained from the carbs after you've eaten a pack, but most of the time you are relying on the slow-to-break-down energy gained from the conversion of the bodyfats.

As such, the body is almost continually breaking down fats to power the body. This slow, steady stream of energy is enough to keep you feeling fine throughout a normal day, but when you do something energetic above 'normal' levels (i.e. go and run for half an hour) then you use up all of the fat-energy your body has broken down, and have to wait while it breaks down more, hence why you can end up feeling extremely tired and run down and generally crap as you literally end up running on empty - that includes mental processes too, don't forget it takes a lot of energy to keep a mentally active mind going!



Hopefully that kinda explains what I mean when I use the terms 'quick' and 'slow' energy, and the difference between how the body can use these various types of energy forms in both good and bad ways :)
 
*sides steps in*....pete do u work in a lab or something? fricking hell!! lol!! xxx
 
lol no, I don't work in a lab, I have just always like learning new things so I read a lot of (often useless but still interesting!) stuff, be it about medicine, technology, the universe, the body, atomic structures, mathematics, quantum mechanics........

I love learning! lol :p
 
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