Tips on How to Control Hunger Pains When Dieting

When it comes to food, absence really does make the heart grow fonder - there's nothing like a bit of denial to set of a craving, or some serious hunger pangs. It seems that nothing makes you think about food more than going on a diet ~ and when dieting thoughts about food are only exacerbated by the gnawing of hunger.

There are some very simple methods you can try to stop hunger pains, a few of which are detailed here. It's important to remember that what works for one person might not work for another so you may have to try a few different methods before finding the right one for you.

However they are all reliant on one thing - that you are eating a sensible diet in the first place. If you're trying to survive on a lettuce leaf and a couple of apples a day you can try all the methods of hunger control on the planet and they won't work, so the first thing you have to make sure is that you are eating sensibly.

Dieting doesn't mean you have to stop eating, it's more about eating the right things. So if you've started a diet and are constantly starving it could easily be that you are either restricting your calorie intake too much, or not making it go far enough by making the wrong choices.

An average woman needs around 2000 calories a day and an average man around 2500.

To put that into perspective 2000 calories is about 400g of chocolate - or around 33 oranges.

Which means if you've set 200 calories a day aside for snacks you've got the option of about 40g of chocolate (around 3 - 4 squares) or 3 oranges.

So if you want to avoid getting hungry It's important to plan your meals to make sure that you're making the best use of the calories you have available to you.

 Hunger and thirst can be difficult to distinguish between, so it may be that while you think you are feeling hungry you are actually feeling thirsty.

Make sure you drink enough fluids during the day - aim for around 8 glasses of water - and when you do feel hungry have a glass of water and see if you are still experiencing the symptoms around 20 mins later. If after that time you're no longer hungry the chances are you were actually thirsty.