Battling Early Satiety

Can't finish more than 50% of your meals at a time? Does eating food cause frequent indigestion? Do you find it hard to eat after a long run? You may be experiencing early satiety or feeling full sooner than you'd like.

Many people deal with early satiety for different reasons. For some, their stomach hurts after a good exercise. For others, they battle having an upset stomach due to conditions like GERD or acid reflux that leads to a poor appetite at meals. There are even more reasons, like gastric motility disorders and acute illnesses and infections, but I don't think I need to explain anymore that some people get full sooner than others!

In order to get the required energy and nutrients we need in one day, dietitians recommend eating 3 moderate sized meals with variation in food items. When eating three meals is so traditional in eating patterns around the world, it can be difficult to arrange comfortable eating times when they are different from the usual breakfast, lunch, and dinner times. Instead of changing timing of meals, change the size of meals and spread them out.

Eating 5-6 small meals per day can be very beneficial to an appetite that struggles to get enough food. At the normal meals, make less food, or purchase less food, and plan to eat more in 2-3 hours. These smaller meals do not need to attempt to cover all food groups. For example, a lunch that consists of a grilled chicken breast, a side of half a cup of steamed green beans, and a glass of milk could be a perfect small meal. Another smaller meal in about 2-3 hours could be a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and an apple. The key here is to spread out the meals, or split them in half, in order to still obtain a balanced day of food intake.

Eating more spread out can take some practice. It helps to have non-perishable foods on hand often. Put a bunch of bananas in the car and have one as a snack. Putting trail mix or granola bars in your backpack or work bag can work perfectly, just take a handful out and only go for another handful if your appetite allows. Packing work lunches to be accessible throughout the day at any time is very beneficial. Try packing things like individual bags of chips, single serving yogurts, sandwiches cut in half, and baby carrots. Packing things like microwavable meals can be too much at once and cannot be saved for later.

There are some foods to avoid when early satiety is a problem. These include greasy, fried, or rich foods. These foods take longer to digest and can feel like a lump in your stomach. Fiber can become problematic too as this can slow down digestion as well. The plethora of fruits and vegetables contain not only beneficial vitamins and minerals, but are typically high in fiber. I don’t want you to miss out on these foods! Just be careful in having too many at one time. Don’t eat a salad, an apple, and lentil soup for lunch; the very high fiber content could result in bloating, long term satiety, and uncomfortable gas. Some of the worst offenders in the fiber category are broccoli, cauliflower and beans as these vegetables tend to create more gas than others in digestion.

So try it out! Spreading out meals and eating food throughout the day can be very beneficial to those fighting consistent poor appetite at meals and problems feeling full quickly. By using 5-6 small meals per day, carrying around snacks, and avoiding greasy and fibrous, gassy foods, you’ll be able to get your nutrition needs and avoid early satiety.

Update

Hello all,

I wanted to just quickly update my loyal fans on what's going on with my life.

I am still in my dietetic internship, and things have really started to pick-up! This week I start my staff relief rotation where I assume the role as a dietitian on a ward at the hospital. I'm nervous and excited at the same time! My training so far has prepared me well for this moment, so I'm hoping things go swimmingly.

I've really wanted to get back into writing posts for my blog, but I've truly gotten tied down with assignments, studying, and other projects. I will do my best to post when ideas come to mind, but unfortunately a lot of the information running through my brain concerns acutely ill patients. I don't think you all need to know about that!

My internship ends at the last weekend of May, and I can't wait! I'm so close to being the registered dietitian I dreamed of being. Wish me luck, and thanks for always tuning in!

Side note: shout out to USA sled hockey on winning gold with their win over Russia! Proud to know some members! USA!

Tom

Why Salt Isn't Bad For You

For whatever reason, salt has become a "naughty word" in the realm of nutrition. I'm not really sure why; we actually need to get it from our diets, and it is incredibly important in bodily function and homeostasis.

The reason why salt is so incredible important for you, especially as athletes, is because we lose it so easily through exercise. Ever taste your sweat? It's pretty salty isn't it? That's because salt escapes your body through sweat. You also lose sodium through visiting the bathroom too. 

The key to understand here is this: water follows salt. I've talked before about the importance of hydration in athletes. I don't need to tell you that people get thirsty after eating salty snacks. The reason is because water follows salt. Now, let's walk through it. You exercise a lot. You lose a lot of water through sweat, you also are losing salt too. What does all this lead to? Dehydration. How do you reverse it? Obviously hydrate, but now you understand that salt is essential as well to help hold on to that water.

Muscle cramps are associated with lack of salt and potassium in the body, which can be lost during intense exercise. If you are working out for over 1 hour, it is important to replenish salt after. This can be accomplished a number of ways. Drink a gatorade, there's salt in there. Eat a salty snack after exercise like pretzels or beef jerky. Add table salt or sea salt to your meal. For those of you doing long marathon style training, I've heard you can carry around soy sauce packets (like you get from chinese to-go restaurants) and just pop one of those when feeling exhausted.

Just remember, hydration is what we are trying to accomplish. Having salt in our diet helps accomplish that fluid status. I'm not endorsing a high sodium diet by any means, I just don't want athletes to be scared of salt when a lot of media sources portray it as an enemy. The only reason to avoid salt in general is if you have heart complications or hypertension. When it comes down to those two health concerns, exercise is your greatest medicine anyway.