Not everyone will experience ‘food noise’ in the same way. Thinking about food is a normal part of everyday life – we’ve all got to eat! Food noise is more than this; it can feel constant and intrusive, occurring in the absence of real hunger, and doesn’t always pass after eating. It goes way beyond “I want something sweet after dinner,” it is the constant appeal of the food cupboard and the questions of “what should I have”, “what shouldn’t I have?” “What am I going to eat next?” “When can I eat next…?” An interference to everyday life.

Recently, the term ‘food noise’ has been thrown around a lot, mainly because of the growing popularity of GLP-1s. Generally, the information is an oversimplification of an early warning marker for disordered eating, and often there’s some sort of ‘overselling a quick fix’ involved.

What is food noise?

The first thing to understand is that food noise isn’t a clinically defined medical condition. There isn’t currently an official diagnostic definition, and the term appears to have emerged largely from people’s own descriptions of their experiences.

Broadly, researchers have used it to describe persistent and intrusive thoughts or preoccupation with food that are experienced as unwanted or distressing, particularly when they occur independently of physiological hunger.

What if your food noise is really loud?

Before you try to silence the constant questioning…

what you’re going to eat, what you’ve already eaten, what you’re allowed to eat, whether you’ve eaten too much, or when you can eat again

… it’s worth asking, where is it coming from?

Food noise usually comes from multiple places:

Is it hunger?

If you’re consistently under-eating, dieting, skipping meals only choosing the smallest portion, you’re going to be hungry. You brain feels hunger and so pays more attention to food.

This is a normal response; to survive, we need enough energy. In the absence of this energy, your brain will try to find it.

If your food noise to quieter after a meal and becomes louder between meals when you are also experiencing physical signs of hunger, its likely you do need to eat slightly more. That could be bigger meals, or more frequent eating occasions (snacking between meals).

Is it restriction?

This is commonly linked to dieting, or an obsessive control over the types of food you choose to eat. You might have decided that certain foods are off limits, and so your brain becomes preoccupied with them.

“Don’t press the red button” – what are you thinking about?

Same goes with food – “I can’t eat chocolate” – what do you now want to eat? “I’ll be good today’ – what are you stopping yourself from choosing?

Food rules can cause food noise. If you’re constantly trying not to think about food, monitoring everything you eat and feeling guilty when you eat something you hadn’t planned to, there’s a chance that the rules themselves are contributing to the noise.

It sounds counterintuitive, but sometimes the less control you force, the more in-control you feel.

Is it habit and environmental cues?

We don’t just eat because we’re hungry. We also eat because we’ve learned to associate certain situations with food. After dinner, we fancy something sweet. We go to the cinema, we buy popcorn. We walk into the kitchen knowing the biscuits are open, we want a biscuit.

These associations can become automatic, subconscious. Your brain is very good at learning relationships between cues and the happy feeling you get when you eat (the rewards).

If a particular environment repeatedly triggers thoughts about eating, changing the environment or switching the routine can sometimes make those thoughts less frequent. You can try changing location after dinner, taking your own pre-portion snack to the cinema, buying individually wrapped biscuits.

It’s not about avoiding situations or restricting foods, it’s about allowing yourself to pause so you have space to make a conscious decision about food choice.

Is it stress, boredom or emotion?

Food is amazing! It can provide stimulation, comfort, distraction and reward. If you’re bored, stressed or emotionally uncomfortable, thinking about food can be a distraction, and eating can be a coping mechanism.

It’s less about being hungry, and more about needing something to do, something that’s nice, something that brings short-term joy, something that helps you switch off.

This is emotional eating. It doesn’t make it “bad”.

You have unconditional permission to eat food. It can be enjoyed.

The key here is not to stop the thought patterns but to understand when and why they feel persistent. Noticing when they happen allows you to spot trends in why – then you can start to pre-empt so you can learn to manage.

What can help?

We might not be able to switch off food noise, but we can potentially turn it down by:

1. Building satisfying meals

Including a source of protein and fibre at meals is sensible for overall nutrition and can help with satiety.

Protein and certain types of fibre can stimulate the release of gut hormones including GLP-1, which plays a role in appetite regulation. Some studies suggest that higher-protein meals can produce greater GLP-1 responses than meals containing less protein.

It’s important to understand that the effect is modest. Whilst I would 100% recommend that you eat a portion (20-30g ish) of protein at breakfast, it won’t suddenly make you .food-thought-free’ for the rest of the day.

But every little helps! So consciously building meals (with enough food) that include a source of protein, and a decent number of fibre-rich foods such as vegetables, fruit, wholegrains, beans and pulses, will allow you to finish the meal feeling more satiated.

2. Getting enough sleep

Sleep is one of the most significant factors that affects our eating behaviours. A poor night’s sleep can lead to an increase in the release of ghrelin (the hunger hormone), and a reduction in leptin (the satiety hormone). However, again, the hormone imbalance isn’t always significant enough to make huge changes to our appetite.

However, when you’re exhausted, regulating behaviour is harder. You tend to have less patience, less capacity to pause before acting on an impulse and a greater desire/need for something quick, rewarding and enjoyable.

So, yes, you do need more sleep to help regulate your appetite hormones but also focus on resting to improve your ability to manage your food thoughts.

3. Paying attention to the thoughts rather fighting them.

If a thought about food pops into your head, your instinct response is probably “stop thinking about it.”

This is really ineffective - instead, try creating some distance between having a thought and acting on it.

Rather than “I need chocolate,” try to reframe that into “I’m having the thought that I want chocolate.”

The second statement doesn’t tell you what to do. It simply acknowledges what’s happening.

This is a mindfulness-based approach which has been studied in relation to cravings, suggesting a modest reduction in craving intensity. It basically helps you to learn to observe thoughts without automatically treating them as instructions.

It’s not a fix – but it does give the food thoughts less power to dictate your behaviour.

… if your food noise still feels unmanageable…

… stop trying to fix it with another #influenced wellness hack.

If you’re eating enough, sleeping well, no constantly restricting foods, but you’re still experiencing intrusive and distressing food thoughts, it may be worth looking at the function of those thoughts.

Ask yourself:

• Am I actually hungry?

• Are my meals satisfying enough?

• Am I restricting foods I enjoy?

• Do I spend a lot of time thinking about what I should and shouldn’t eat?

• Are particular situations triggering the thoughts?

• Am I using food to manage boredom, stress or emotion?

• Do I feel anxious or guilty around eating?

• Do I feel frightened about losing control around food?

Now do this daily. The answers, overtime, can help you see patterns.

If the food thoughts are accompanied by significant distress, bingeing, difficult compensatory behaviours, severe restriction or increasingly rigid food rules, I’d highly recommend seeking professional support – you can email me sayhello@emilynutritioncoach.co.uk

To be continued… Your questions answered:

· The role of GLP-1s in the management of food noise.

· Does food noise collate with hormones (menstrual).

· The role of professional help – managing food noise, not ignoring it.