**Jim Hill:** Welcome to Weight Loss And, where we delve into the world of weight loss. I'm Jim Hill.

**Holly Wyatt:** And I'm Holly Wyatt. We're both dedicated to helping you lose weight, keep it off, and live your best life while you're doing it.

**Jim Hill:** Indeed, we now realize successful weight loss combines the science and art of medicine, knowing what to do and why you will do it.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yes, the “And” allows us to talk about all the other stuff that makes your journey so much bigger, better, and exciting.

**Jim Hill:** Ready for the “And” factor?

**Holly Wyatt:** Let's dive in.

**Jim Hill:** Here we go. Today's episode is one that I think everyone who's been on a weight loss journey is going to love. Holly, we're talking about something huge, how to reset your appetite. And by reset, I don't just mean controlling it. I mean lowering it so that you feel satisfied with less food. This is a game changer for anyone looking to manage their weight long term, right?

**Holly Wyatt:** Exactly, Jim. Everybody wants to decrease their appetite to make a change to their appetite. Think about it. It's one of the questions we hear all the time. How can I decrease my hunger? How can I get rid of my cravings? How can I feel satisfied with less food? Nobody wants to feel like they're constantly fighting hunger while they're trying to lose weight. That's exhausting.

**Jim Hill:** And it's totally understandable. Nobody wants to be in a constant battle with their appetite, feeling like they want more food even when they're trying to cut back. So today, we're diving deep into exactly how you can feel full and satisfied on less food.

**Holly Wyatt:** And here's where it gets interesting. I think this is kind of where we got the idea for this. The new weight loss medications, they're working by really decreasing your appetite, making people feel full on a very small amount of food. And the big question I think we started asking ourselves is, can we do this without medication? Can we actually reset your appetite, and lower it using food as the tool instead of medications?

**Jim Hill:** Yeah, Holly. That's what's so exciting about today's episode. We're going to explore how to use food as medicine. That's a term we're hearing more and more. How you eat, when you eat, and what you eat can literally help reset your appetite. Imagine using food to feel full and satisfied without constantly having to rely on willpower or medication to keep your appetite in check.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah, it's a cool concept. And I think the weight loss medications have really brought it out for us to really think about more and more and more. Can we reprogram your body's hunger signals so that you stay satisfied with less food or less calories? And it’s not just a theory. We're going to give you five science-backed principles principles can help you do it. There's some science in here. So that's a good thing. So today's episode is all about practical strategies that anyone can start using right away.

**Jim Hill:** So we're going to walk you through each of these five strategies, breaking down how you can apply them in your daily life to get your appetite working for you, not against you. And the best part, these principles don't just help you lose weight, they help you maintain it.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yep. All right, guys. So if you've been wondering, how do I stop fighting my hunger? How do I start dealing with my cravings? How can I feel more in control of my appetite? Today's your day. Let's get started.

**Jim Hill:** All right, Holly. So maybe we ought to define some things getting started. So what is appetite?

**Holly Wyatt:** We use it in so many different ways, I think. And so I do think it's good to define it. I think of appetite as just the desire to eat. So I put everything. I use it as kind of a garbage pail. Everything. You know, it's about hunger can increase my appetite. Cravings can increase my appetite. Food noise can increase my appetite. So I use it as just the idea that my appetite is really my desire to eat. What do you think, Jim?

**Jim Hill:** I do think that. And I think when you look at people managing their weight, it's probably the number one problem that they feel they have is they want to eat more food than they need for their weight. And so, you know, it's this vicious cycle of you trying to restrict. Did you get hungry and your appetite increases and you eat more? So we're talking today, Holly, about an appetite set point. I'm not always a fan of set points, but with appetite, this kind of makes sense. So what is an appetite set point?

**Holly Wyatt:** Well, I mean, I know set-point makes it seem like it can't move. And so maybe better to think of it always like as a settling point, but some kind of level at which, you know, I think that there's the amount of food that I need to feel satisfied. And I call that my appetite set point, a certain number of calories, a certain amount of food, or even maybe a certain type of food that then I need. It's almost like a set that I need to hit before I feel satiated before I feel I'm not hungry anymore, or maybe I'm not thinking about food. So there's kind of a set point that I'm always trying to reach for. And when I don't hit that set point, I'm having to use willpower and kind of fight against it to not eat more. So that's what I think of a set point. It's kind of your body's internal setting for how much food you need to feel satisfied, almost like a thermostat a little bit for hunger and for satiety.

**Jim Hill:** But I think, Holly, the major point we're going to get to today, it's that's changeable. It's not that you have one set point, you have to live with it. If your set point is high, you know, you're just basically out of luck. I think what we're going to tell people today is, no, you do have some control over that. And if your set point is too high, it can be adjusted, not forever, but it can be adjusted to the point of where you can be satisfied on an amount of food that helps maintain your weight.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. So just kind of like a thermostat, you can dial it up and down and, you know, keep that, if you can maybe make some changes. And I think today we're going to be talking about what are changes you can make to change that set point to lower it so that you don't need as many calories or as much food to feel satisfied. And I think there's lots of different things that can go into that, lots of different things that can impact our set point. Maybe we should talk about some of them. What are the things that you think that could change that thermostat for people?

**Jim Hill:** Well, again, most people, I think that are listening to this would probably feel like their set point is too high. And there are so many things that influence your set point. You know, one of the things that we talk about all the time is our food environment. Food, it just tastes really good.

It's out there everywhere. You walk by the bakery and you just had a big meal, but man, those cinnamon rolls smell so good that you got to eat them. So there are internal signals that affect your appetite. Your body has many, many ways of telling you that you need more food or you have enough food.

But in the world we live in, you sometimes override those cues. So, you know, we eat when we're not really that hungry. And in fact, for most people, you don't go very long without eating something. There aren't periods of not eating. So there are so many things both internally and externally that can affect the set point.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. I think it's multifactorial like we talk about. So definitely there's hormones that are, you know, society hormones that we've talked about on this show that impact hunger and cravings, physical activity we've talked about. I think that could impact, right, your appetite level so it can change that stress level. You know, how much stress you have, we know, can change that appetite set point and even sleep.

Right? That's a big one. A lot of times there's data that show that you want to eat more, your appetite will increase when you're not getting enough sleep or good quality sleep. And then Jim, the one that I think is fascinating that I do think may have a bigger impact on our appetite set point than we even realize is this, you know, the gut microbiome, the idea that your gut health might even be impacting your appetite.

**Jim Hill:** Yeah, we did an episode not too long ago on the microbiome and we learned some fascinating things that the microbiome really can help you both feel more or less hungry and it can actually help with when you take in those calories, you de-store them or burning them. So the microbiome probably has an amazing impact on your appetite set point. But Holly, how did the new medications, the GLP-1-based medications, affect set point?

**Holly Wyatt:** Well, we know that through the appetite hormones, the hormones in that signals you to eat, they're playing a role. You know, most of them are through GLP-1 but we have new other medications that are doing it through multiple hormones.

So they're actually going in really at a physiological level and changing those hormones to decrease your set point. And so they're doing it really, really well, meaning they're really bringing that thermostat on down where you don't need very much food at all to feel satisfied, to not be hungry, to not seek out food, to not think about food. And that's really why there's been so successful, I think, with the weight loss. I think though what I want people to realize is there, that's one thing that's going on, but there's so many other things and we can play with some of those other things to help you with your appetite. And today we're going to be playing with Can you change the food you're eating? You know, medication's one way to go about it, but can we actually play with what we're eating, when we're eating it, the combinations of food that we're eating to do what that medication's doing, but instead do it with food?

**Jim Hill:** So I think we don't totally know how these medications are working, but we think that one of the big ways is through this resetting the appetite set point, because people on the medications report that they can eat way less food than they used to eat, and they're very satisfied. And so on the medications, your appetite seems to be reset, but it actually is reset pretty low.

And while you're on the medications, that's okay. And actually Holly, some people are worried that people eat too little on the medications that they might get some nutritional deficiencies. But clearly, the medications show us that appetite can be reset. And so one of the ways I think about it is if most people that are overweight, if your appetite is too high, and you go on the medications and they take it real low, is there a sweet spot in the middle that people should be aiming for?

**Holly Wyatt:** Right. You know, our bodies are wired with an appetite for a reason. And so when you take it completely away, you know, that might not be the sweet spot. The sweet spot may be somewhere in between, which is I think what you're talking about. So, Jim, how do people know if they're sitting out there, if they're wondering, how do you know if your appetite set point is high, low, just right?

**Jim Hill:** Yeah. So I guess it's trial and error. If you're constantly trying to manage your weight and you feel like you're not very successful, so you go on a diet and you just can't stick with it, or you lose weight, you're trying to maintain it, and you just can't eat sufficiently little to maintain it, then your appetite set point is probably too high. If you're out there managing your weight, you're eating an amount of food that you're satisfied with, it's probably in a good place. And again, we haven't worked with too many people whose appetite set point is too low, but with the new medications, we may be learning a little about the problems of having too low an appetite set point.

**Holly Wyatt:** Well, but there are people out there, they just don't come to us because we're obesity researchers, but I know I've met these people where they have to work really hard at forcing themselves to eat food to not lose too much weight. They're rare, but they're definitely out there.

So I think it's just in our current environment, we don't really have to eat that much food to eat enough. So I think they're out there, they just don't come to us, Jim. They're not on this podcast probably.

**Jim Hill:** I would say, given that three-quarters of Americans are overweight or obese, there aren't many people that are in that category. And I suspect our listeners don't have much sympathy for those people.

**Holly Wyatt:** Oh, I don't know they don't have sympathy, but I agree with you. They're in the minority now, but I know people who say I have to work really hard not to lose weight.

**Jim Hill:** But the main point here, Holly, is that appetite set point is not something you have to live with. It can be manipulated. And what we're going to try to do today is help people with some things they can do with their diet that sort of naturally help their set point to be lowered. Not as low on the medications.

We don't have that power with food, but somewhere between too high and where they are now and maybe too low is this point where your appetite helps you be satisfied with an amount of food that helps you keep your weight where you want to be. That's kind of what we're after here.

**Holly Wyatt:** Exactly. And can we do it with food? That's exciting to me because I do like this concept of food as medicine. And the idea is, can we be strategic about what we're eating and can we use food to actually impact that appetite set point? And this really comes back to this whole debate we've always talked about a calorie is a calorie. In many senses, yes, we talk about a calorie is a calorie, but in this case, can there be certain calories or certain foods you can eat that then have an impact on something like appetite, which then makes a calorie, not a calorie, right? The calorie then has an impact beyond just the energy in the food we're eating.

**Jim Hill:** Okay. Wow. So maybe it's time to get to the meat of the episode today where we're talking about five big principles to reset your appetite. I love it when we do a number of things. Here are five things you can do, which make it real concrete for people. So Holly, what's the first one that you want to talk about?

**Holly Wyatt:** So the first one I want to talk about, and I do think there's a lot of good science behind it. And it's part of what we use when we were putting together State of Slim is that you need to manage your insulin and blood sugar levels. For a lot of people, their appetite is impacted by insulin and blood sugar, and kind of that, I call it the roller coaster that you get. You eat something, your insulin goes up, it then causes your blood sugar to go down, then you want to eat something again. And certain people are more sensitive to that cycle really than others. So I think one way, one science-backed way that we can help decrease our appetite set point is to recognize this cycle and to manage the insulin and the blood sugar levels. What do you think, Jim?

**Jim Hill:** Yeah, it's something that you don't hear that much about, but you've convinced me based on the research that's out there, but even more based on your work with people in State of Slim helping people lose weight. This seemed to be a strategy that really, really does work for people.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah, it's been pivotal for me. I know that if I don't really control this relationship between insulin and blood glucose and carbohydrates play a big role there, if I'm not strategic about this, I am hungry all day long and I'm constantly fighting my appetite. I'm constantly fighting this desire to eat. But when I go in there and I kind of manage this insulin and blood sugar, when I try to keep them leveled out and not going up and down with these big cycles, I'm not as hungry and it's easier. I think it resets my appetite set point.

**Jim Hill:** So people get into problems oftentimes with these carbohydrate foods, particularly ones that might be high in sugar, for example, eating them alone where, boom, you don't have the protein sort of counter the effects of the carbohydrate on blood sugar.

**Holly Wyatt:** I tell people and what I do myself is I always combine a protein and a carbohydrate. I never just have a carbohydrate alone because when I eat a carbohydrate alone, I get that insulin spike and it feels good for a minute. But then when my glucose starts coming down, even before it doesn't have to get low, but I think just the fact of it coming down, the cycling of it, tends to then drive me to want to eat something else. And I find this really interesting, Jim because think about what foods we've typically told people to start their day with.

**Jim Hill:** Yeah, carbohydrate foods, cereals, and maybe a bagel and orange juice, things that probably have a lot of carbohydrate and not a lot of protein.

**Holly Wyatt:** Typically, we've started our day that way and I wonder if for certain individuals, that starts them off with not in the right way, really starts them off saying, okay, I'm going to start this cycle and therefore I'm going to be fighting this desire to eat more. And it's actually increasing the amount of food they need to be satisfied instead of decreasing it.

**Jim Hill:** And again, my guess, Holly, is there are some people that are going to be more sensitive than others to this. But if you're trying strategies to lower your appetite set point, this seems like a pretty good one to try.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah, pretty easy, right? Always combine a lean protein with a carbohydrate. Not telling you you can't eat carbohydrates. Just saying, what happens when you combine the two, it does change that insulin sugar dynamic that we see. So something to try out and see if it impacts your appetite.

**Jim Hill:** Okay, so that's a good one.

**Holly Wyatt:** Do number two. This is a hot one.

**Jim Hill:** This is a good one. And you've heard it before, but we're going to tell you why this is so important to eat more dietary fiber. Some of you are going, oh yeah, I hear that message, eat more fiber.

Let me tell you, there's no magic food, but fiber is pretty high in the category of things that are good for you. So it works in several ways. It slows your digestion, and that's a little bit what the GLP-1 medications do. So it's mimicking that in some ways, helps you feel fuller for longer.

So you eat fiber and you don't feel as hungry. So it has this short-term and maybe even longer-term effect on your appetite. And then you tell me, Holly, oftentimes that it's sort of like the anti-sugar.

It actually helps stabilize your blood sugar, whereas carbohydrate, especially sugars, increase your blood sugar. Fiber does the opposite. And one of the big ones on fiber is it helps you create a healthy microbiome.

And as we're understanding, a microbiome is probably playing a really, really big role in appetite. So, man, I mean, it's right up there with my favorite thing, which is physical activity, and all the positive things it does for you.

**Holly Wyatt:** If there was like a food of the year or MVP for a food of the year, I think it would be fiber. I think fiber is what everybody's concentrating on, and it makes sense because just what you said, it's hitting so many different areas. By eating more fiber, it's not just one pathway. It's not just one possibility to decrease or reset your appetite. You're hitting multiple pathways with one change, which I think is what makes it so exciting.

**Jim Hill:** And so where do you get fiber? Well, you get fiber from foods like vegetables, legumes, and whole grains. What these foods do is to manage your appetite. They make you feel fuller without calories.

So you're getting very few calories in these foods but man, you feel less hungry and you don't want to eat as much. Almost no one in this country gets enough fiber. Yeah, there are a few people, but for most people, we don't get anywhere near the amount of fiber that we need. And for people managing their weight, I got to tell you, I think fiber is absolutely critical to success. So we suggest you aim for 25 to 30 grams of fiber per day. And the good thing in our food supply is most foods have right on their label how many grams of fiber they have. And for things like if you buy vegetables and they're not marked, you can easily go online and find the fiber content of these. So I think this number two, eat more dietary fiber is almost essential if you're going to reset your appetite.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah, one of the things we've been doing in our State of Slim classes is trying to start our day. So we’re saying like we're trying to aim for 30 grams and just trying to get half of it, even 15 grams, which is a lot of fiber, Jim, in that first meal of the day to kind of set ourselves up for success. So I might challenge some people to see, can you get 15 grams of fiber?

You're going to have to really be strategic with that. You know, there are certain foods now that I'm adding in very purposefully that have a lot of fiber. There's some tortillas that have like 15 grams of fiber in a tortilla. There's some cereals that have a lot of fiber in them, but you want to do it with maybe not a lot of calories necessarily. Can you get a lot of fiber without a lot of calories, I think is the key to helping out with appetite and then also helping with your weight.

**Jim Hill:** Okay, we're going to come back later and maybe talk about some more strategies here, but talk about the next one.

**Holly Wyatt:** So the third science-backed strategy to reset your appetite is another one that I use all the time is to increase the volume of your food. Some of us, and I'm one of these people, is a volume eater, meaning I need a certain volume of food in my stomach before I am satisfied before the signals from my stomach to my brain go off.

And it says, okay, Holly, you don't need to eat any more food. I need a volume. Some people aren't volume eaters, but some people aren't. I think a lot of us are volume eaters. And now because our food supply, foods can have a lot of calories in a small volume. That's what's gotten us in trouble, especially the volume eaters, because we eat to a certain volume and now there's a lot more calories in that volume, or there's the potential to be a lot of calories in that volume. So we then eat more calories than maybe our body needs. So this is interesting because it's the appetite reset, and it's not really about the calories in this case. It's about the volume of food and the stomach needing to be stretched to a certain volume before it signals your brain that you've eaten enough. So I am definitely like this. You can give me a little portion of food and I don't care how many calories are in it. I will not be satisfied. It's something about that volume and stretch of the stomach that's really important for me to say, okay, I can stop eating and feel good.

**Jim Hill:** So we've talked about there are many, many signals your body gets to tell you if you're hungry or not. And this is a different one. The stretch sort of volume is stimulating a different way to tell your brain if you're full or not than some of the other hormones, etc. And what we want to do is hit as many of those signals as we can.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. And water and fiber are the way to increase the volume without increasing the calories. Because that's the key here, right? You don't want to just increase the volume and have a lot of calories in there. It defeats the purpose. You want to increase the volume with the least amount of calories. And so fiber, water, doing that, doing it that way is really the key to be successful with this, with this tip.

**Jim Hill:** Okay, you want to go to the next one? Sure. The next one is related, but a little different. It's lower the energy density of your diet. Energy density is a concept you really need to know about and to pay attention to. Energy density is the number of calories per gram of food. So foods with a low energy density, they weigh a lot, but they have fewer calories.

Foods with high energy density don't weigh that much, but they have a lot of calories. And I'll give you an example of Holly's favorite food and my favorite food. Holly's favorite food is chips. And chips have a high energy density. They don't weigh a lot, but they bring a lot of calories. My favorite food is carrots. And carrots bring-

**Holly Wyatt:** Your favorite food is not carrots.

**Jim Hill:** Carrots bring a lot of weight with very few calories. And so what science suggests is that if you choose a low energy-dense diet, you actually eat fewer calories. And Holly, there's a great book by a friend and colleague of ours, Barbara Rolls, called Volumetrics that tells you a lot about energy density. It's a great strategy to help reduce your calories. And okay, I might admit that maybe carrots aren't my favorite food, but I do like carrots.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah, no, I think this is a great strategy. It kind of fits with more fiber. It fits with increasing the volume. These kind of all hang together, but they're slightly different. And so when you get to choose between two foods, if you can choose the food with the lower energy density, that's going to be helpful. That's going to allow you to decrease this appetite set point to be satisfied with less calories, which is really what this is all about. So I'm constantly thinking about this. If it's between two foods, which food can I have more of this food with less calories, basically, because the energy density is less?

**Jim Hill:** All right. The last one, Holly, number five.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. And this is a new one for me. I mean, a lot of these strategies I've talked about for a long time, but this one, add more micronutrient-rich foods daily. So we talk about energy density, but you can also talk about nutrient density. And so the idea is you do want to get some of these micronutrients, some of the vitamins and minerals, some of the phytochemicals that we talk about can be important. And there is some data to show that if you're deficient in certain things, that could lead to cravings.

That could lead to an increase in appetite. So you want to make sure that you're getting all of these micronutrients and vitamins and so forth. And the way to do this, is fruits, vegetables, whole grains, that's where you really get these micronutrients, not empty calories, things that have a lot of sugar but don't have a lot of the micronutrients in it. So I think these may be more important than we realize, this kind of natural compounds that support your appetite regulation. And then the other big reason, the reason I'm even looking into this more is this whole idea of your gut and that you may need some of these micronutrients to have a healthy microbiome. And that may be why a variety of fruits and vegetables may be more important than just having one or two, having actually have a variety.

So you get a variety of these micronutrients. I don't know, Jim, what do you think about this? This is kind of a little bit new, I think, coming out in terms of this may be something to reset the appetite set point.

**Jim Hill:** Yeah, I think it's a good strategy. And there's a lot of science here to suggest it may play a role. And I really like what you said about the microbiome. I know we keep coming back to the microbiome, but we're big believers and you have to have a healthy metabolism to be able to manage your weight.

And the microbiome is becoming more and more a big part of a healthy metabolism. So I think each of these five strategies, there's science to suggest they're important. And I would suggest our listeners to try all of them. And what you might find is one of them works better for you than others. But I think there are really five good, big science-based strategies that can help you reset your appetite.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah, I agree. You don't have to do all of them, but figure out if there's one that's kind of really, really works for you. And if you don't know, try them all and then pay attention.

**Jim Hill:** Try them all and find out which ones work. And if all five work, wow, fabulous. All right, Holly, we've talked about the five big science-based strategies. We talk about pie on the plate. Let's bring some pie on the plate here and talk about some ways that people might actually implement these strategies.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. So the first one I already talked about, I can't, it's hard for me to talk about strategies without putting some pie on the plate. But the idea is to prioritize or put some protein in every meal. And this kind of goes with that insulin glucose roller coaster preventing that. So always combining a protein and a carbohydrate. So I'm always telling people, think about adding some lean protein to each one of your meals. Don't go out there and eat a carbohydrate by itself.

And that's even a piece of fruit. I learned this the hard way. If I eat a piece of fruit, I love it at the moment I'm eating it. And then an hour, maybe two hours later, I am starving. But if I combine that piece of fruit with some lean protein, the appetite, I stay satisfied for longer. So the idea that protein can help with satiety and can help decrease this kind of appetite set point. So prioritize protein in your meals. Think about the protein.

**Jim Hill:** All right. Number two, incorporate more vegetables. Again, you hear everywhere, eat more vegetables. And again, most Americans are way shy of the amount of vegetables that would really maintain their health. And so I think a good strategy is to add vegetables to every meal. Now, the good news is there are a lot of vegetables. Don't just stick with the two or three that you've done before.

Try some new ones. You've got leafy greens. You've got roasted veggies.

You've got side salads. Play around a little bit with different kinds of vegetables. And if you don't know how to cook something, I mean, you know, the internet's great for recipes. And then Holly, one thing that I like, and we've done some work in this area, herbs and spices can be used to help vegetables taste better. Herbs and spices have virtually no calories. But what they can do is add flavor to these things. And we've done research showing that you can use herbs and spices to really increase the liking of these vegetables. I mean, one way to do it is you put a whole bunch of butter and oil and everything, but that's not a good way to do it because you're adding the calories. The herbs and spices can really do the same thing that those fats can do. And so think about adding fruits and vegetables to every meal, try different fruits and veggies, and try using herbs and spices to taste them better. And by the way, if you have kids, lots of research has shown that kids can learn to like vegetables if you keep exposing it. They may not like it the first time or second time or third time, but research shows that it's important to keep offering them. If they don't eat it, they don't eat it but don't stop offering it because they actually will learn to eat them and learn to like them.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. And the key here, I think I like to prioritize vegetables over fruits. I know a lot of times we say fruits and vegetables and maybe for your kids, that's fine. But if you're doing this, I'm really focusing on the vegetable because the vegetable is going to be lower energy density and that's where we can get the volume, get the volume of the meal up without the calories going up. If you eat, I have to limit my fruit. I can't just eat unlimited fruit, but unlimited veggies. I know one of my pet peeves is dietitians sometimes will come out with a plate and they'll have like a half cup of vegetables and they'll be like, that's a serving.

And I'm like, no, no, no, that is not a serving for me. With vegetables, you can go with multiple cups as long as you're not putting the butter on there. As long as you're not, you know, adding a fat to them, that's where I get my volume. That's where I get my satiety. So when I am really hungry and I almost feel like my appetite's out of control I could do big damage, meaning I could eat a lot of food, three cups of vegetables go into my bowl and then I add my protein and then I add whatever, but I'm going to have at least three cups of veggies to lump up that volume and that's going to allow me to control my appetite to get satisfied with less calories. So using vegetables that way, I think is a really good tool to reset your appetite.

**Jim Hill:** I don't think anybody's ever become overweight due to overeating veggies.

**Holly Wyatt:** I know, but why do dietitians tend to do that? They will like, oh, a serving size of veggies. I'm like, ah, I know technically they're correct. I mean, they're right. There is a serving size of veggie, blah, blah, blah. But I'm like, no.

**Jim Hill:** You aren't going to overdo it with veggies. Don't worry.

**Holly Wyatt:** Put them on your plate. You know, the key is like, don't put sauce and cheese and butter all over them. But man, that's where you can really get the volume up. And if you're a volume eater, that's going to save you. That's why cauliflower rice became so popular, Jim, is cauliflower rice because you were able to use (cauliflower is a veggie) to really increase the volume of the food, like rice. But rice has more calories than cauliflower, regular rice. So cauliflower rice, that's why it's so popular for a lot of people.

**Jim Hill:** All right. So what about choosing low-energy-dense foods?

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. And we talked about that a little bit. I think that's always the case. If you can think about those low-energy-dense foods to get full on, things like soup have a big volume, which also means that they're low-energy-dense salads, foods that have a lot of water and fiber like we talked about, they can just help you get full on less calories. And that's what this is about. Resetting that appetite is about getting full on less calories. So when you incorporate low-energy-dense options into your meals, you manage hunger, and that supports your weight goal.

**Jim Hill:** All right. And the last one we'll talk about here is swap sugar for fiber. So if you're craving those sugary snacks or refined carbs, think about some fiber alternatives, at least some of the time.

You know, one thing, we're very realistic. There are times you're going to crave those sugary snacks, and you're going to go and do it. But if you could at least some of the time replace those sugary snacks with fiber-rich alternatives, fruits, whole grains, and nuts. I'm going to talk about nuts later on.

That's a good one. So fiber not only stabilizes your blood sugar levels but helps regulate your appetite by keeping you full for longer. So again, you know, nobody's perfect. There are times you want those sugary things and you just need to have them. But if some of the time you could go for those fiber-rich alternatives, it would make a big, big deal in resetting your appetite.

**Holly Wyatt:** I have a class with undergraduates here at UAB and we did an experiential assignment. We sent them out and we had them swap added sugar for fiber. So they were to take one of their meals, one of the things, and look for something that had added sugar and said, can we take out 10 grams of added sugar or five grams of added sugar and in its place swap fiber and be creative about it. And they really got creative at creating some of these meals. And then the idea was to eat this meal and see how you feel, see what happens to your energy level, see what happens, you know, how hungry you get. And so we really, we called it a sugar fiber swap.

And I'm going to challenge some of the listeners to do that. Look at your meals, look at which ones have added sugar, specifically added sugar in them. And can you take some of that added sugar out and swap something that would add the equivalent amount of fiber? And then see what happens.

**Jim Hill:** All right. So five big science-based principles to follow. And we've given you some ways to do that. But go out and explore, experiment, try each of these five, see what works for you. If one doesn't work, fine. But find the ones that do and within that explore, be creative, be like college students, and go out and figure out how to innovate around these strategies.

**Holly Wyatt:** All right. Do we have time for some listener questions?

**Jim Hill:** Let's do a couple of listener questions.

**Holly Wyatt:** Okay. You take the first one.

**Jim Hill:** All right. I've been trying to manage my hunger, but I always find myself craving sweets in the afternoon. What can I do to curb those cravings and avoid overeating later in the day? So again, this is a perfect one for a sugar-fiber swap some of the time. And I'll do my favor, which is nuts.

Nuts for me, it's not exactly perfect substitute when I want craving something high in sugar, but usually it does the job. It's sufficient enough. So again, don't be unrealistic. If you crave something in the afternoon, you're probably going to need to eat something. So keep something you can eat. No carbs without protein. So see something that has carb and protein or things like nuts. Fruits can be a good one, whole grains. So some of the time, try to not give in to those sugary snacks and do something that contains more fiber.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. The other thing I would say for this person is to look at what they ate before. You know, why are they suddenly now maybe craving something in the afternoon? Think about the meal they had before. They might change the meal they had before that would impact how they feel in the afternoon. So that's another thing to think about. Can I change what I'm eating before?

And the other thing for me, and this is one of the students. So they really craved sugar, they craved regular sugar sodas, and there's a new soda out and don't have any affiliation with it called olipop, I think. And it has, I think, nine grams of fiber.

It's only 35 calories, so it only has a few grams of sugar. And they've been substituting that for that sweet craving comes in a lot of different flavors. So it is being creative, right? Really going out there and thinking what could satisfy my sweet tooth, but not with all that sugar, with some fiber, that type of thing. So it's really going out there and be creative with what you can find.

**Jim Hill:** All right. Why don't you do one more? And then we'll do the vulnerability.

**Holly Wyatt:** All right. Let's do this one. I've heard so much about fiber being crucial for appetite control, but I struggle to add enough to my diet. What are some simple ways to incorporate more fiber into my meals without feeling overwhelmed?

So this is important. I mean, what are the easy ways to add fiber to your diet? And I've made a list because I've been so into this. I have two or three things that I've used, and so it's not overwhelming. You can use, obviously, fruits and vegetables to do it, but I've also used the low-carb tortillas. Mission brand has one that's carb balanced and has almost 15 grams of fiber in one tortilla.

They taste pretty good. I use one of those a day to kind of get up my fiber. I'm using a high-fiber cereal. I'm looking at the labels and kind of, there's also some new bread out there, keto bread. And even though I'm not using it for low-carb diet, it has a lot of fiber in it. So I've been using that.

So look for fruits and vegetables are always an easy way to get more fiber in, whole grains, but you also can look for some specific products, I think, that can help you get more fiber into your meals, especially if you're feeling overwhelmed in terms of I need to have some simple ways to do it.

**Jim Hill:** Okay. Time for vulnerability questions, Holly.

**Holly Wyatt:** All right. So I got one for you, Jim. When you're feeling really hungry or battling cravings and you're not craving little carrots, it's not, this isn't a carrot craving, like you said, especially you're craving something unhealthy. Let's just say that. How do you handle it? Do you have any personal strategies you use in those moments?

**Jim Hill:** Yeah, I'll give you an example. I like a little snack most afternoons. And sometimes those are cookies or something like that. But oftentimes I'll go with something like nuts, which for me, satisfies that. The other thing, it depends on how much physical activity I got that day. If I was really physically active during the morning, I might go for that sort of sweet snack and feel okay about it. And otherwise, I won't. And I think the key is I know I'm going to want to eat something. So it's having reasonable alternatives around and limiting the alternatives that I don't want to choose.

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. And this is a perfect example because, Jim, I don't think you're a volume eater. I've been around you enough. You can be satisfied with a small amount of nuts.

I can't. That would be, so it works for Jim. He's getting more fiber. He's getting more nutrients. But he doesn't need the volume to feel satisfied. For me, that could potentially be a disaster because eating a small amount of nuts wouldn't do it. I would need more. And with more nuts, I could get a lot of calories. So that just shows how different people need different strategies to really reset this appetite.

**Jim Hill:** All right, Holly. What's one piece of advice about resetting appetite or managing hunger that you wish you had known earlier in your journey? How could it have changed things for you?

**Holly Wyatt:** I wished so much when I was younger that I had just known some of these things. We didn't talk about this. I knew when I was younger that my appetite was strong. And I knew that I was constantly fighting it. And I guess that's one of the reasons I'm here, right?

That I asked those questions and that's ended up being here. But I wish I had understood things like volume, that I can help my appetite by eating a large volume and what to eat. I can remember fighting my appetite and just trying to eat a little bit like other people and not understanding why that didn't work for me. And actually felt like something was wrong with me because I was not satisfied with what seemed to be a portion that other people around me were satisfied with.

And I would go to bed thinking about food, wanting food, just having to fight it. So I guess I wish I could have talked about this with someone and understood the volume and understand there's multiple ways to do it, that there's nothing wrong with me, that it's just different variations.

**Jim Hill:** Okay. So let's get to the take-home messages. This is such an important topic. And I think the major message is your appetite set point can be changed. If you feel like, gosh, I just have a high appetite set point, you're not subtle with that forever.

There are things you can do to change that. I think for most people who are trying to manage their weight, their appetite set point is too high. I think on the GLP1 meds, it goes really low. I think the place to be for most people is somewhere in between. I do think there's a sweet spot there. And I think we'll talk later about some other things like physical activity that you can do to help manage. But diet is probably the most powerful way that you can reset your appetite. And what we've talked about today are some changes you can make in what you eat that really will help you get that appetite set point to a place where you're satisfied with a reasonable amount of food that helps maintain your weight. Is that okay?

**Holly Wyatt:** Yeah. Sounds great.

**Jim Hill:** Well, this was a good episode. And I hope people will go out and try some of these strategies and let us know if they worked. And we love to hear creative ways that you've been able to put these science-based principles into action. See you on the next episode of Weight Loss And. Thanks, everybody.

**Holly Wyatt:** Bye, everybody.

**Jim Hill:** And that's a wrap for today's episode of Weight Loss And. We hope you enjoy diving into the world of weight loss with us.

**Holly Wyatt:** If you want to stay connected and continue exploring the “Ands” of weight loss, be sure to follow our podcast on your favorite platform.

**Jim Hill:** We'd also love to hear from you. Share your thoughts, questions, or topic suggestions by reaching out at [weightlossand.com](http://weightlossand.com/). Your feedback helps us tailor future episodes to your needs.

**Holly Wyatt:** And remember, the journey doesn't end here. Keep applying the knowledge and strategies you've learned and embrace the power of the “And” in your own weight loss journey.