3 Reasons The Stomach Feels Hungry When Stressed

Illustration of hungry stomach during stress (Pexels/Alena Darmel)

JAKARTA - Many people feel hungry and want to continue eating when they feel stressed. This phenomenon is often referred to as comfort eating or eating for convenience.

Someone who is stressed and eager to continue eating is caused by several things. Here's the explanation, quoted from Good Food.

When you feel stressed, the body produces the hormone cortisol, which is responsible for tension and anxiety. Stressed people will try to find something that can make them feel calm, including food.

Sweet foods and high fats like chocolate can help lower levels of cortisol while. According to nutritionists, this food can have a hedonis effect, which means a person can feel calm and happy when eating it.

Maybe you've eaten a piece of chocolate and suddenly feel better. The brain notes that this food helps reduce stress, so that when stressed the brain will automatically ask to eat it continuously.

Stress can make a person experience a bad sleep pattern. When you are sleep deprived, the body's hormones will become unbalanced, including the ghrelin hormones in charge of making hunger increase.

While the leptin hormone that tells the body is full will actually decrease. This causes the body to feel hungry constantly, even after you eat a lot of food.

When you feel stressed, a person often loses control of many things, including the portion of food consumed. This happens because the brain continues to associate that the food consumed gives you a sense of comfort.

However, please note that the comfortable effect is only temporary. After finishing, stress often returns and makes you want to eat more, and will continue if your stress is not overcome.