Learning to Eat Without Fear — Starch, Satiety & Trust
For a long time, I didn’t just avoid carbohydrates.
I feared them.
Rice felt risky.
Bread felt indulgent.
Pasta felt like failure.
Fruit — unless it was berries — felt dangerous.
This fear didn’t come from nowhere. It was shaped by years of messaging that carbohydrates spike insulin, derail fat loss, and lead to loss of control. And for a season, removing them did feel stabilising.
But over time, the fear itself became a kind of cage.
Why starch isn’t “just sugar”
One of the most important distinctions I’ve had to relearn is this:
Whole-food starch is not the same as sugar.
Potatoes, oats, rice, and legumes come packaged with:
- fibre
- water
- micronutrients
- and structure
They digest slowly, feed the gut, and provide steady energy — especially when eaten without large amounts of added fat.
This is very different from:
- refined flour products
- sugary foods
- ultra-processed carbohydrates
Dr John McDougall has been teaching this distinction for decades. His work centres on the idea that starches are humanity’s traditional fuel, not a modern mistake — and that when eaten in their whole form, they support satiety rather than overeating.
Potatoes, oats and rice vs refined carbs
What surprised me most wasn’t just that I could eat starch.
It was how different my body felt eating it this way.
A bowl of rolled oats with a little soy milk didn’t leave me chasing snacks.
Potatoes with steamed vegetables didn’t trigger cravings.
Rice didn’t send me spiralling — mentally or physically.
Instead, there was a quiet sense of enough.
That was new.
Satiety vs suppression
Looking back, I realise how often I’d confused appetite suppression with true satiety.
Low-carb eating and fasting can suppress hunger — sometimes very effectively. But suppression requires ongoing effort. You have to keep the brakes on.
Satiety, on the other hand, feels different:
- calm
- grounded
- unforced
Dr McDougall and educators like Chef AJ often talk about calorie density — choosing foods that allow you to eat a generous volume without excess energy intake.
That framework helped me understand something important:
I wasn’t failing at keto because I was hungry.
I was hungry because my body wanted fuel it could relax around.
What surprised me most
There were a few things I didn’t expect at all.
I didn’t expect:
- my hunger to settle
- my digestion to normalise so quickly
- my mind to quiet around food
- my body to feel warmer and more grounded
And I certainly didn’t expect this feeling:
I didn’t expect how calming it felt to eat without bargaining with my body.
No negotiating.
No promising to “be good later”.
No compensating with longer fasts.
Just eating — and stopping when I felt done.
Relearning trust
Fear around food isn’t really about food.
It’s about safety.
When we’ve relied on restriction to feel in control, letting go can feel like stepping into the unknown. But trust isn’t rebuilt all at once.
It’s rebuilt meal by meal.
Signal by signal.
Response by response.
For me, starch became a bridge — not just nutritionally, but emotionally — back to that trust.
A gentle reminder
This isn’t about declaring starch “safe” and keto “bad”.
It’s about recognising when fear has replaced wisdom.
And asking a kinder question:
What helps my body feel safe enough to function well right now?
In the next post, I’ll explore something many women are quietly afraid of:
How often should we eat — two meals, three meals, or letting go of rigid rules altogether?
Because nourishment isn’t just about what we eat.
It’s about how safe our nervous system feels while we’re eating it.
