"What's Wrong with Diet? What is the Role of Dietetics?"

Chapter 29. Dietetics Program: Feeling Your Desires

What we are exploring: What conscious desires maintain homeostasis?

What's new: How does the natural feeling of hunger affect human eating behavior?

What we will learn: What does the word "needs" mean and why is it important to satisfy them?

1. Many physiological processes within us act homeostatically like a thermostat. These processes activate various motives [conscious desires, author's ed.], which help maintain homeostasis (Atkinson R. L., et al., 2003) [1].

2. Homeostatic processes. Like a finely tuned thermostat *, many processes interact in our body that maintain the constancy of the internal environment. A human can exist only if his internal environment is balanced. Balance is maintained automatically, influencing the formation of those desires that maintain the constancy of the internal environment of the human body (III fr. 3. 8).

* A thermostat is a device for automatically maintaining a certain temperature in a closed system. In our case, it refers to the automatic maintenance of the constancy of the internal environment of the body - homeostasis.

3. Maintaining the constancy of the internal environment of the body. Desires arise through the nervous system, which transmits signals from the body. A human uses his senses to interact with the external environment - the vestibular apparatus, vision, hearing, touch, smell, and taste. Similarly, to interact with the internal environment, he uses the influence of internal organs on his psyche through the nervous system, and the brain coordinates this (I fr. 20. 5) [1, 2].

4. Desire: wakefulness. Sleep and dreaming have fulfilled their purpose: they have checked and prepared all their systems and organs for the safe and active wakefulness of a person during the current day (IV fr. 26. 14). The man has woken up, and the concentration of his consciousness and the vigor of his body indicates that the amount of sleep corresponded to his needs, as did drinking, eating and physical exercise. The man is in anticipation of active activity and feels the desire to carry it out (IV fr. 24. 4).

5. Desire: thirst. The human body has been in a state of sleep for a long time without replenishing water, the internal process of homeostasis has detected a lack of water [1]. The art of living will be manifested in whether a person can feel this. However, it is important to quench your thirst with water during the day as well. Perhaps, at first, it will not be easy to feel a natural desire to drink, since a human has been drinking water for a long time under the pressure of an externally imposed norm of its consumption. Therefore, it is better to listen to the inner voice and not suppress it with "norms" of water consumption, remembering that they are average, not individual (I fr. 17. 10).

6. Desire: hunger. A good night's sleep, as well as timely quenching of thirst after sleep, increases the likelihood of feeling a current need for food [3, 4]. It is impossible to indicate at what time the feeling of hunger will arise, it depends on the heredity, environment, and lifestyle of each person. For example, studies have shown that breakfast time can most often be a hereditary factor.

• "The research team demonstrated in a twin study that breakfast time has a high heritability (56%), lunchtime has a lower heritability (38%), and that dinner time is not determined by genetics (0%), but is determined by environmental factors" (italics added) (Lopez-Minguez H., Gomez-Abellan P., Garulete M. 2019) [5].

With a balanced lifestyle *, the first feeling of hunger does not occur immediately after sleep, but after some time has passed. Some people have breakfast at one time in the morning, and some later. There can be no rules here. It is necessary to learn to distinguish a natural feeling of hunger from an artificial feeling coming from an external source - the social environment (II fr. 11. 5, 6).

* A balanced lifestyle is an optimal mode of human life when basic physical and mental needs are satisfied to the extent that corresponds to one's individuality. Physical needs include sleep, exercise, drink, food, sex, clothing, and work that provides for these needs. Physical needs include the presence of a higher authority (without God, people tend to deify themselves or others), ethics, knowledge, aesthetics, creativity, one's social circle, to love and be loved (I fr. 26. 2, 19; Fig. 1).

7. Distinguish from an external source. At first, this will not be easy, but over time, by responding to the natural feeling of hunger, a person will determine how many times a day he will satisfy it. Due to events during the day, the environment, culture, and advertising of miracle diets, distinguishing feelings of hunger becomes very problematic (I fr. 4. 2, 3; 5. 4; 7. 4, 16; 8. 4; 21. 10-12). Medical studies on recognizing hunger have shown that, in general, people are not familiar with the natural feeling of hunger. One of the participants in an experimental study admitted that she was not familiar with the feeling of hunger.

• "I tried to listen to people, I tried to follow a routine, I tried everything that could be done in this regard, and I would sometimes lose (a few) pounds and then I would be right back where I started because I didn't know what it was like to feel my body. I didn't know what it was like to be hungry. I didn't know that I was full. So I was full all the time" (author's italics) (de Bruin WE, et al. 2019) [6].

These studies have proven the importance of a balanced lifestyle in the ability to feel a natural feeling of hunger. This experimentally acquired ability to feel hunger has a powerful influence on a person's eating behavior and therefore leads to "changes in food choices, portion sizes, and adjustments to the timing and frequency of eating" (ibid.). Why then are there so many recommendations for specific foods, exact portion sizes, specific times, and specific frequencies of eating? What are the reasons for the norms?

8. What are the reasons for norms? The main reason is the lack of understanding of the differences between human identity and individuality. No one would think of feeding their pets the same: a parrot, a hamster, a cat, or a dog. It is much more complicated with humans. A person's heredity, culture, environment (climate), body biochemistry, their lifestyle, including their level of physical activity, affect the choice of products, portion sizes, time, and frequency of meals. Therefore, there can be no norms and rules. Everything is individual, not identical. Think about what would happen if you forced a dog to eat like a parrot and vice versa.