Hunger And How To Fight It

After a few recent topics about how long you could go without food, I came up with this question... How to face hunger? Let's say you don't find any food for some long period of time, and you start to get really really hungry. How do you deal with hunger? I think hunger can be pretty limiting in what a body can do in the wilderness, so I think you would be forced to choose between not doing too much to not waste energy, or use all the strenght you have to find something... in both cases, there are lot of risks if you can't find anything.
So... how do you face extreme hunger?

 

Food is vital when you're going outside, don't ever go out without food or if aren't sure how to find it, that's why this forum was made, if you're new in this, just buy some can food and go exploring little spaces, then when you're more experienced with the subject, look online for tips on how to hunt, or harvest food.

 

Conserving energy when you're short on calories is important. Trap lines are a good idea. Fish traps work surprisingly well if there is a water source.

I'm not a fan of being hungry but in a survival scenario, I think there are times when enough calories and hunger are likely to exist side-by-side. If I have to go on foot to my bug out location, it will be a few days of vitamins, peanut butter, and millennium bars. There are options to cook food there but I decided for the sake of weight and efficiency not to carry them for the hike. I like regular meals and fun food and I'm used to being able to snack pretty much whenever I want. Restricting to just what's in that bag while walking most of the day will mean that I'm pretty hungry but I'll be okay.

If there's enough water, know that hunger will not kill you quickly. It helps me to remember that I can get past it. Hunger also kinda comes in waves so sometimes you might feel really bad but other times, you might feel pretty normal. The key I have found to functioning while hungry is to do things at a low level. I go slowly and rest often. No reason not to nap while I wait for the traps to do their job, for instance. Staying warm becomes a challenge but maintaining body temperature is also a waste of what calories you have so a fire or whatever you need to stay warm might be important. The first time I fasted, I was freaked out by the side effects. The first few days were all headaches and basically withdraw symptoms from caffeine and sugar. I wasn't a happy camper. The next time though, I was better prepared and could function pretty normally other than not being able to sleep well.

 

If you don't have food in the first place you're doing survival wrong! But for the sake of the question, say yes you ran out of food, I'm pretty sure you could at least survive off of water, you can actually survive a considerable amount of time off of water (just purify it first) But then, if you really don't have anything on you even some water, your brain can actually handle these pretty well. Let me explain as simple as I could.

Say, you are hungry, when you are hungry, your stomach sends signals to your brain saying "hey, we need some food over here". This is the hunger that you feel. That faint slow pain in your stomach is hunger. Your stomach sends these signals until you find something to eat, but, when a lot of time has already passed and you still haven't had anything to eat, your brain will start to ignore these signals as your body enters something I like to call "low power mode" your brain will try to minimize activities not essential, and one of those non essential things are the signals from your stomach telling your brain that you are hungry.

Somewhat counter-intuitive, I know. But that's just how the body works, so to answer your question what would you feel when faced with hunger? You wouldn't feel anything at all.