When I first drew up a list of topics for this blog, I never imagined how crazy the grocery store situation would get—and remain. Even so, diet was always going to be a post at some point. Why? Because there are bizarre things that can happen to the appetite when ordinary structures are taken away regardless of what’s going on outside.
Most importantly, stress affects the appetite in some fairly vital ways. Depending on the situation, stress can either make your appetite vanish or cause rounds of unhealthy binge eating. To my enduring irritation, people talk about stress eating a good deal, but not the vanishing appetite. I don’t want to minimize the very real struggle of stress eating, but its fixes are actually simpler than the vanishing appetite. Either A) don’t keep bad stuff in the house to begin with or B) exercise more. In regards to A, binge-eating carrots will not hurt you as much as binge-eating potato chips. Eventually, you will lose the will to keep gnawing. If you know certain foods tempt you, just don’t keep them around. I know I cannot be trusted with a jar of Nutella, so I don’t buy it. As for B, the exercise not only burns off excess calories, but actually suppresses appetite up to a certain point. (Obviously, if you overdo it, you’re going to end up wanting to eat the world. Everything in moderation here.) People who lose their appetite under stress are in a much bigger bind, because not eating leads to more stress, which makes it even harder to eat. Eventually, they hit the proverbial wall and get locked into a vicious cycle of needing to eat, but not having the energy to do so because energy comes from food. Weirdly enough, the hunger can be there even as the body lacks the energy to deal with it, and it is truly terrifying. There are two helps to this dilemma, one preventative and the other to get unstuck. To prevent getting into this situation in the first place, be proactive about eating. Think ahead and constantly have healthy snacks like fresh fruit or nuts at hand so that your body doesn’t have a chance to freak out in the first place. Set an alarm reminding yourself to eat at proper intervals whether you feel like it or not. With the social cues of regular workplaces with regular work hours gone, this could be vital for maintaining a sense of structure that isn’t just good for the appetite, but for well-being in general. If, Heaven forbid, you find yourself in that situation of being desperately hungry and no will to eat, take advantage of the bizarre phenomenon of mirror neurons. As advertisers know, our brains are hard-wired to mimic what they see, especially when the action portrayed is eating. This is why you feel hungry when you see people eating on TV, and why people tend to eat more with others than alone. The thing I hate most about this is that it makes me crave stuff I don’t normally go out of my way for, like Doritos. I don't even like Doritos very much, but watching characters on a TV show eat them makes my body want them. If you cannot get your body to eat, use this brain hack for good instead of the usual evil and sit yourself down next to either someone else in your household who is eating or, if you’re alone, footage of someone else eating. It may not give you the will to eat an entire meal, but it can help you get down enough calories to keep going. Most of the time, mirror neurons get us to eat more than we should, but when the appetite is gone, they can be a real help.
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AuthorJillian Lutes is the youth pastor at West Covina Hills Seventh-day Adventist Church. Archives
May 2020
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