eli5: why does eating sugar make you feel so full yet so hungry at the same time?

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Every time I have a sweet before I’ve eaten a real meal my stomach feels so full of food but the rest of my body tells me i’m hungry. Is there something about sugar filled foods specifically that doesn’t leave room in your stomach for other foods?

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2 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

Hunger is a relative thing. If your body needs something important, it might make you feel hungry even if your stomach is somewhat full just to get you to eat that thing. (For example, if you’re thirsty you usually get hungry too because your brain hopes if you eat a snack you’ll drink water.) The opposite happens too: if your body thinks it has too much of something it won’t make eating more stuff pleasant.

Your body has a maximum amount of sugar it wants in the bloodstream. Most food has at least a little bit of sugar in it, if we oversimplify what “sugar” means. When you eat something with a LOT of sugar, the body releases a LOT of insulin, the chemical that helps it process sugar. Insulin tends to make you feel full to try and prevent you from eating more stuff and having even more sugar in your blood.

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