Picture quarter to four on a wet Thursday. Lunch was a jacket potato with tuna, a decent one. So why does the half finished packet of Hobnobs in the kitchen cupboard keep turning up in your head every few minutes? Mid email, too, the one you’ve already rewritten twice.
That’s what people have started calling food noise. Doctors don’t class it as a diagnosis, but most of us know it the second we hear the name, and a lot of people spent years putting it down to greed. Probably wasn’t.
How it differs from hunger
Ordinary hunger keeps to a schedule, more or less. A few hours after breakfast the stomach rumbles, you snap at whoever’s nearest, and a sandwich deals with it. Food noise isn’t interested in the clock. It can arrive straight after Sunday dinner with the plate still warm, or at ten at night in front of a series you aren’t even enjoying. Some people liken it to a radio on in the next room. Others say it’s more like next door’s drill, and the whole afternoon goes.
Why it might happen
There isn’t a tidy answer yet. The pharmacists at Day Lewis have written a page on what causes food noise for readers who want the longer version, and what follows is only the gist of what seems to play a part.
Hormones come into it. Ghrelin nudges you towards food, leptin is meant to tell you you’ve had plenty, and after a few nights of broken sleep those signals can get muddled, which might explain why a rough week at work leaves you hovering by the fridge.
Stress does its own thing. A bad day, a packet of crisps. It helps for about ten minutes and the brain makes a note for next time. Habit does the rest: the biscuit with the three o’clock brew, chips on the way home from the pub because that’s what Friday involves. After a while your head expects the routine whether you’re hungry or not. How much each of these matters probably varies a good deal.
Why it’s suddenly everywhere
Prescription injections like Ozempic and Wegovy are a large part of why the subject has surfaced so much lately. Some people taking them say the chatter simply went quiet. They’re medicines for particular health conditions though, so whether one would suit you is a decision for a doctor, and social media can’t make it.
Size doesn’t seem to come into it, oddly. Somebody who has never dieted in her life can be plagued by it more than the friend from work who has been through every slimming club in Warrington.
Things that may take the edge off
Sleep is the dull answer and possibly the best one. After a bad night the cravings seem to turn up louder, which is worth remembering if there’s a baby in the house, or a neighbour slamming doors at midnight, or a head that simply won’t switch off. Go easy on yourself.
Regular meals might stop the four o’clock raid on the biscuit tin, especially with a bit of protein and fibre alongside. Eggs on toast. Beans on a jacket potato. Rigid rules tend to backfire. Tell yourself chocolate is banned for good and, funnily enough, it’s all you’ll think about by Saturday lunchtime.
Notes on your phone for a fortnight can be surprisingly revealing. Each time the noise gets loud, write down the time and where you were, and anything that happened just before it, a rotten phone call, say. Patterns tend to show up faster than you’d think, and then you at least know when to brace.
Have a word with your GP if the noise is taking over your days. Skipping meals is worth mentioning, and so is bingeing, and so is simply being worn out by it. Your local pharmacist is often easier to catch than a GP, and a chat over the counter (or in the little consultation room at the back) may be a sensible first step. Don’t sit on it until things are really bad.