You know you have the “hangries” when you feel simultaneously as angry as, and as hungry as, a young bird with an open mouth and a screech in its throat.

The term combines the words hungry and angry for a reason.

The only problem I have with the term is it’s too late for me. I used to have that problem a lot, and hangry is a great word for how I felt. In fact, you could almost say it was genetic for me, since my mom and my sisters all got hangry. When we were hungry we wanted food immediately and would indiscriminately chow down any food in sight.

I no longer get the hangries. I do get hungry, but not that intense, crazy-making hunger. I attribute this to two possibilities.

First, I rarely eat bad carbs or empty calories. Most of my food is in the most whole form possible; therefore, it digests more slowly. It’s what I was told to do and strived for on the diabetic diet but never achieved. It’s hard to eat a lot more plant-based foods when you still want to eat meat and dairy.

The other possibility is fascinating. As noted in The Alternative Daily, “A study out of the University of California demonstrated that the more trans fatty acids we consume, the angrier we become.”

The reason is trans fats interfere with the metabolism of omega-3s, which generally serve to keep us upbeat and balanced. Lack of omega-3s has been linked to depression and to antisocial behavior.

If you don’t eat junk food, like I didn’t, you probably think you’re immune to this condition. However, consider this. According to the USDA nutrient database, cheese, milk, yogurt, burgers, chicken fat, turkey meat, bologna and hot dogs all contain up to about 1 percent to 5 percent  trans fats. Maybe I was getting the hangries because of all the chicken and dairy I consumed.

Whether my hangries were due to one or both of those issues, I’ll never really know. What I do know is that I don’t miss the feeling.

What about you? Do you ever get hangry? What happens when you do?