to think “food noise” is becoming one of those phrases people hide behind rather than actually dealing with their eating habits?

[foodywoody]

I keep hearing people say they have “food noise” and that’s why they’re constantly thinking about food or snacking, but isn’t that just hunger, boredom, habit, or emotional eating dressed up in a nicer label? I’m not saying it’s not real for some people, especially where there are medical issues involved, but the way it’s thrown around now makes it sound like no one has any control over it at all.

It just feels like another way to remove any personal responsibility. Not everything needs a label. Sometimes it’s just about eating properly and getting enough protein and actually addressing emotional eating.

They do have a phrase for emotional eating though - kuchisabishii - literally “lonely mouth” - translated as “eating because the mouth is lonely” or “longing to put something in one’s mouth”.

Interesting!

Good to see the nasty posts being deleted!

Thank you.

They still have a much lower obesity rate.

It is real it's just a new name for it and it's been banded about a lot of late so now everyone is claiming to have it. Usually related to the constant promoting of weight loss injections etc "stop the 'food noise', take this!" which basically means if you take this it will reduce your appetite and you're obviously thinking about food less.
Another new health-related buzz word will come along soon enough....

It's not always quite so simple, but I have only just worked it out recently. DH is on a course of treatment for a sight issue (that will leave him blind, if untreated) for which the treatment is mahoosive amounts of steroids. So everything tastes fabulous, because that's one of the side effects of steroids, and he wants to eat nine meals a day. I/we are aiming to regulate the side effects by only eating raw food, but biscuits and snacks (which we don't generally eat often) are creeping in. I would be grateful for any ideas. I don't really want either a fat husband, or a long argument about his weight. from him.

Of course they do. But it's nonetheless climbing, amongst both adults and children.

I suspect Japan will curb this before it ever gets very high though, because they're a rich enough society to afford WLIs for anyone who needs them.

Yes, I’ve been overweight most of my life because I’m a lazy, undisciplined idiot. The fact that GLPs allow me to easily and healthily lose weight because my body doesn’t think it’s starving is, of course, pure coincidence. I only ever failed at diets because I was bored, my life was empty, and I was morally lax and incapable of delayed gratification. Absolutely not because I was dizzy and nauseated from hunger. After all, it’s not like it was an evolutionary advantage for early humans to maintain a higher weight once achieved, or anything like that. And of course we exist in the same food environment in which we evolved, so there’s no possible biological or societal reason why I was fat. It’s just laziness and a lack of personal responsibility. Thanks for opening my eyes!

Speaking from my experience I would say it is insulin resistance. You get in a cycle of peak and crash and the recovery from the crash means you need to eat. You reach for something either downright sugary to get through the slump, or a 'healthy' snack that doesn't fill you up. When what you need to do is wait it out and have a proper lunch/dinner, with even a bit of dessert.

Japan has reversed its obesity trend through, basically, fat shaming. https://medium.com/women-write/japan-doesnt-arrest-you-for-being-obese-but-what-it-does-instead-will-surprise-you-c1e3616611a8

They have a different food culture. It is not solely fat shaming.

Oh, I assumed it was people eating crisps in cinema, or eating with their mouth open, or slurping soup! 😕

I will endeavour to refrain from further colouring-in and concertrate on my reading.

This was always going to be an emotive topic, and I can understand why, but there are some overly aggressive replies here. The OP does acknowledge that food noise is real for some people.

I completely agree with you OP. It used to be called being greedy…
The processed food industry has certainly made us addicted to their products, but it should generally be possible for most people to cut out the processed stuff and eat properly, which if you do it for a couple of weeks will usually cut the food noise. There may be a few people who are genuinely unable to do this of course.

My husband was saying there were two fat women at his office last week who sat at the desks and did not stop eating or drinking from lunchtime until going home time - a constant rustling of packets and cracking of cans. This ongoing consumption never used to be even remotely socially acceptable.

I bet you those ladies will tell you they barely eat a thing and can’t understand why they’re overweight.

The thing is, we’d all like to stuff our faces with crisps and chocolate all day. It takes a great deal of self restraint not to.

I saw a newspaper headline today that having suffered from one condition is common to over 50 percent of sufferers of 13 types of cancer. When you put it like that it is frightening.

For someone who has been on Munjaro and now isn’t, I can tell you that food noise definitely is a thing. If that means I should have more self control then I’ll take that, in the same way that people require support for any other addiction. Surely not too challenging to understand?

The food noise doesn't stay quashed with either WLI or surgery. It comes back. Majority of people don't use WLI for life, and won't qualify for them on NHS for life either.

Targeting the symptom instead of the root cause is rarely effective.

And? What does that have to do with you, if you don’t have it and don’t think it’s a thing,
why even have an opinion?

My sister and I, same parents, are having this conversation. She has always tended to gain weight easily and I am pretty much the same size and shape as I was at 30. She's using WLI to get back to her preferred weight. I do not judge her choice of foods or anything else. I don't think being overweight is anything other than a health issue. It's more difficult for her than me. Metabolism. Mine runs a lot faster than hers.

I think the only time I truly had food noise when I was on a medication that was known to cause it. I was getting up in the night and eating butter with a fork.
I am not on that medication any more. If I am really craving food now, I try and think about if I am really hungry at all... am I thirsty, or am I bored?

But I don't think anyone is hiding behind that term. Food noise for me was all consuming. It was awful.

But WLI do target the cause of obesity and the food noise. They fix the hormonal issue that causes them.

I'll be on levothyroxine for life, because it fixes the hormonal issue I have. Why can't someone be on a GLP1 for life if it fixes the issue?

Bollocks.

I am not emotional. I am hungry. Fucking starving.
Because for whatever reason, my body is oblivious to satiety signals even after a huge meal. Thats biochemistry not emotion.

The only emotion involved is fucking rage when people with no idea spouts patronising nonsense.

And no I am not fat. But I am hungry. Constantly and permanently and its miserable

It is both real and it's become a get out of jail free card in some ways

The fact is lots of things are like this, some more serious and awful, some less serious. From feeling compelled to gamble, gossip, to wanting to shag people other than your wife.

But in the end we have to take responsibility for these kinds of feeling and impulses. And sometimes we fail even when we try.

But there do seem to be people who like to be able to get out of trying by making out like they are not responsible, and not just with food

Its not psychological. Its biochemical. Its faulty feedback meechanisms in food metabolism

Thats why its biochemistry and not psychiatry which has found a solution in the form of GLP peptides.

Yes.
Happy to help.

No it's not & repeating nonsense doesn't make it any more correct.