WHAT YOUR FOOD CRAVINGS ARE REALLY TRYING TO TELL YOU

Whether it’s chocolate, chips, peanut butter, a steak or even a piece of fruit there’s something your body is trying to communicate with you when you have cravings.

I recently went away with some friends and it was so interesting to observe the cravings they were gravitating towards. After sharing with me what a stressful time they’ve been having (work + family stress) it was obvious to me their cortisol levels would be in a chronically elevated state and they were living in fight or flight.

What they didn’t realise is how incredibly intelligent their body was at ensuring they were getting the extra top up of nutrients they needed.

You see, when we are in a state of fight or flight (aka sympathetic nervous system dominance); we are more stressed – the more stressed we are, the more of certain nutrients we need.

Not only that, but high cortisol levels will suppress the immune system, cause the body to run primarily on glucose and use up a lot of your nutrient stores much faster. Hence why the carb cravings can go through the roof during this time.

So what was my friend craving, and what does it mean?

CRAVING CHOCOLATE?
Chances are if you’re craving chocolate, there’s a magnesium deficiency. The more stressed we are the more magnesium your body uses. Chocolate (particularly dark chocolate) contains high levels of magnesium.

50g of a high quality dark chocolate often contains more magnesium than most good quality magnesium supplements. I recommend getting at least 70%+ dark chocolate with no/low sugar, but I do also recommend that a high quality magnesium supplement is taken daily.

Solution: Magnesium bisglycinate is my go to (to avoid funky bowel movement changes and to calm the nervous system) – dosage starting around 300 mg.

CRAVING SALTY FOODS?
Chips, pretzels, salted nuts… all feedback your adrenals are constantly being stimulated. What do the adrenal glands do? Produce cortisol and adrenaline – hello nervous system again (starting to get the picture?).

Salt isn’t ‘bad’ like we’ve been led to believe. Sodium is one of the most required nutrients in the body, it’s an electrolyte and we need it to keep us hydrated. We’re 70% water after all and detoxification, mood, energy… everything is negatively impacted if we aren’t in a hydrated state.

So, having the salt isn’t the issue, it is normally what the salt is covering – e.g. the fried potato or the gluten filled pretzel. Salted nuts are fine, but often it is the overconsumption of these that affects our goals.

Solution: add kelp or natural salt to your meals, or to your water (yes I know that sounds weird), which is why my go-to is to drink electrolytes. Particularly around my workout or first thing in the morning.

CRAVING FRUIT?
This can be a combination of factors; one it could be the carbs you’re craving to calm down the nervous system (yes they do this). Or it could be the nutrients inside that particular fruit.

In my friend’s case, I think it was both. They were eating mandarins like there was no tomorrow! What are mandarins high in? Vitamin C. So not only was the body getting a hit of carbs to help calm down the nervous system from the sugars in the mandarins, but also the extra immune system support from the vitamin C.

Vitamin C can halve our cortisol levels which is great, because chronically elevated cortisol (as aforementioned) suppresses the immune system.

Solution: in periods of higher stress, or just as an added layer of support add in a high vitamin C piece of fruit to your day (e.g. mandarins, oranges, kiwifruit etc), or supplement with 1000 mg of vitamin C.

FINAL THOUGHTS
You can see that for my friend (as for many of my clients), the cravings were all supporting one core imbalance – nervous system dysfunction.

The body is always trying to get back to homeostasis – a place of balance – where the body feels safe and regulated. There are many other cravings that can mean different things too and I am happy to dive into those in another blog (let me know in the comments if you’d like that). But I hope this helps give you a starting point to understand that cravings aren’t there to sabotage you, they’re feedback from the body.

So next time you get a craving, ask yourself… What is my body trying to communicate with me?

With love,
Sheree xo