Hi / Hungry vs Full?

[Guest guest]

Hi- I am very new to IE and I just wanted to introduce myself and ask a question

about hunger/fullness. Sorry this is a bit long, feel free to skip to the

question. I've had a terrible relationship with food/ weight for years

resulting in dieting leading eventually to an eating disorder. Most recently I

lost a lot of weight and much of my hair and looked ill all the time (although

people were constantly commenting on how healthy I was for losing weight, how

they wished they had that " willpower " , and how I should be so proud- if they

only knew). After regaining some weight rapidly and trying to counter that with

extreme restriction (again) I finally sought medical help. I've been working

with a nutritionist and a psychologist for a few months and although I'm working

through some of the psychological backing for my difficulties, I've had limited

luck actually normalizing my relationship with food. Basically any " plan " we

try to make (they've been avoiding the term " diet " but it's really all the same,

i.e. predetermining everything I will eat in a day before it happens, diabetic

exchanges, trying to just eat healthy foods) eventually spirals into restriction

( " if I'm supposed to eat this amount, surely a little less will be healthier...

surely half will be healthier... surely none will be healthier... " ). Their most

recent suggestion is IE and honestly I'm excited (the thought that someday I

will never diet again but will still feel in control is amazing).

Now I'm not going to say I'm not worried about my natural weight being higher

than I'd like or respecting my body as it is, but right now I'm just trying to

focus on one thing: eating what I want when I'm hungry and stopping when I'm

full. The problem is that I previously used a warped version of this when I was

restricting but I clearly wasn't doing it in a way that honored my health. Some

ways I knew I was hungry was if I was shaking, if I couldn't focus on work at

all, if I was nauseous or felt sharp pains in my stomach, or if I thought I

might pass out. Similarly I was full as soon as I had eaten enough to make

those symptoms go away. Clearly those are ways to know you've waited too long

to eat but how do you differentiate actual being hungry from, for example:

seeing a cookie and knowing you like cookies or wanting more soup because the

first bowl you had was good.

Any advice based on your experiences would be totally great. How do you know

when you're hungry/ how hungry do you need to be before you will seek out food?

How do you know when you're full?

Thanks so much!

~