Emotional Eating
Emotional eating occurs when we eat instead of addressing our feelings, and while it can happen even when we’re happy, it typically encourages negative emotions. For example we tend to choose unhealthy foods, causing guilt or shame. This only gets worse if we choose to eat as a way to numb the pain of sadness, anxiety or emotional confusion.
Feelings are natural, and if you’re feeling sad then take time to be sad and think about what’s causing that emotion, instead ignoring the feeling with food. Emotional eating may relieve the pain, but it’s only temporary.
Do you eat emotionally?
The first step in moving past emotional eating is to first accept what you’re doing and take responsibility. The following checklist will help you determine if you’re eating emotionally:
- Do you eat more when you’re stressed?
- Do you eat when you’re not hungry or if you are full?
- Do you eat to feel better?
- Do you reward yourself with food?
- Do you regularly eat until you're stuffed?
- Does food make you feel safe, or do you feel like food is a friend?
- Do you feel powerless or out of control around food?
Understanding the difference between physical hunger and emotional hunger.
Many emotional eaters often suppress their emotions for so long, it can be hard to distinguish between actual hunger and emotional hunger.
Emotional hunger: Did the hunger come on fast? It this an overwhelming urge to eat?
Physical Hunger: Hunger should come on gradually. Hunger is not an emergency. Your body can go for weeks without food. You will not die if you don’t eat right now.
Emotional Hunger: Are you craving junk food such as sugary, fatty, or salty foods?
Physical Hunger: If you are actually hungry, you should be willing to eat healthy foods. If are physically hungry, you would choose to eat broccoli (or a vegetable you enjoy).
Emotional Hunger: When you are eating to feel numb, you will never feel satisfied from foods.
Physical hunger: If you are eating for hunger, you will feel full and satisfied after a meal.
Emotional Hunger: Is the hunger in your head? Is it a constant nagging to eat the food you’re craving.
Physical Hunger: If you are actually hungry, your stomach will be growling and you will be willing to eat whatever meal is available to you.
Emotional Hunger: Do you feel guilty after eating?
Physical Hunger: Eating should be to give your body nutrition. You should feel good and refreshed after every meal.
When do you eat emotionally?
The next step is to identify when emotional eating is occurring and learn what emotion is being suppressed. Often, emotional eaters never deal with their feelings, leading to a cycle of feeling bad, eating, then feeling worse. It may feel good to eat at the time, but afterwards, many feel guilt. Journaling can be helpful. Each day jot down how you felt, and if food was used as comfort or reward. Becoming more aware, provides control. If you used food for comfort, figure out what the emotion was you were suppressing.
Stress, Anger, Fear: When we are stressed, our body produces high levels of a hormone called cortisol. Cortisol causes us to crave salty, sweet, or fried foods. These foods give us a burst of pleasure from a release of opioids. Opioids are the active ingredient in drugs such as cocaine, heroin, and other narcotics.
Exhaustion, Boredom, Loneliness: Often when we feel bored or tired we crave crunchy foods. Crunching on foods gives our mouth’s something to do. It distracts us from the feeling of dissatisfaction.
Sadness, Shame, Resentment: We commonly crave sweets such as ice cream and cookies when we feel sad. Again, the body releases those opioids from high sugar content, giving us a very brief relief from our feelings.
Happy: Yes, emotional eating is often seen as rewarding ourselves with food. We usually crave things we associate with happy or nostalgic times. This may be cookies like grandma used to make, or pizza, which is reminiscent of parties.
Our cravings can also be influenced by gender. Men often crave homemade foods like steak or casseroles. Women are more likely to choose sweets such as chocolate and ice cream.
Are any of these craving starting to make sense?
Identify Your Feelings
Celebrate your happiness. Feel sad, angry, or depressed. At some point in life, everyone feels lonely or bored. But instead of turning to food for comfort, give yourself permission to feel emotion. Again, tracking emotional eating by journaling is a good idea. Simply jot down your feelings and identify why you feel that way. You can then take time to reflect on this instead of masking the emotion with food.
If journaling isn’t your thing, before turning to food, set a timer for five-minutes. During this time, think about your current emotional state and why you are craving that food. Even if you end up eating after five-minutes, at least you addressed the emotion and can better understand why you felt that way. Remember, mistakes will happen. There’s no reason to beat yourself up about it. Forgive yourself and start making healthy decisions at the very next meal.
Redirect
Before giving in to emotional eating, make a list of alternative activities you could do instead. Replacing unhealthy foods with healthy foods is still emotional eating and doesn’t address the real problem. Here’s a list of suggested activities based on the type of emotion:
Sadness or anxiousness: Try to do something active instead of eating. Being active releases endorphins, which can help boost happiness. Go outside. Being in nature, listening to the wind, feeling the sunlight on our skin, these are things our bodies are meant to do.
Happiness: Express good emotions by dancing, singing, or any other activity you enjoy. Turn up the radio and belt a song you like. Or pop in head phones and dance around the house.
Anger: A high impact activity such as kickboxing or Tae-Bo can reduce anger. Think about punching whatever made you mad.
Depression and Loneliness: If you have a friend you can call for emotional support, do it. Hopefully, they can help talk you out of eating or talk you through your feelings. Playing with a pet can also reduce depression and loneliness as well.
Stress: Try drinking a cup of hot tea, take a bath, meditate, or simply sit in a quite room with no electronics. Unplug and unwind. Yoga is a great activity to help reduces stress.
Let us know your comments and your successes in preventing emotional eating.
Sources- 'cause I don't just make this stuff up
Recipe Corner
Raw Brownie Bites- No cooking skills required! Plus they are vegan, so everyone can enjoy.
Ingredients:
1.5 cup walnuts
pinch of salt
1 cup of seeded dates
1/3 cup special dark cocoa powder
1 tsp vanilla
Directions:
1. Put walnuts and salt in the food processor. Process until fine.
2. Add dates, cocoa, and vanilla to food processor. Process again. Slowly add a little water and continue processing until they are smooth.
3. Roll into small balls on wax paper, they are ready to eat.
Recipe credit is to my mom Nancy Hackett. Thanks Mom! Shout out to the lady who always gave me vegetables for lunch and dinner.
She probably got the recipe off Pintrest because there are a ton of varieties of this recipe online including this one: http://detoxinista.com/2014/06/raw-brownie-bites-vegan-paleo/
Don't let the pretty picture fool you, they will look like little poo's. That just makes them more fun for kids to eat!
Skinny Bell Pepper Nacho Boats
Serves: 4
Time: 30 minutes
Ingredients:
1 pound lean ground turkey
1 teaspoon chili powder
1 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon kosher or sea salt
3/4 cup salsa, no sugar added
1 cup grated cheddar cheese, reduced at
3 bell peppers (Look for pretty ones and pick your favorite color)
Directions:
1. Remove seeds, core, and membrane from bell peppers and slice each into 6 vertical pieces. Set aside.
2. Cook ground turkey over medium-high heat, breaking up as it cooks. Cook until the turkey loses it's pink color and is cooked through. Drain off any fat.
3. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
4. Combine cooked turkey with spices and salsa. Evenly distribute mixture into the bell pepper boats, top with cheese. Bake on a parchment lined baking sheet for 10 minutes or until cheese is melted and peppers are hot.
5. Add jalapeños, unflavored greek yogurt, avocado, or diced green onions for extra flavor.
Recipe Credit: http://skinnyms.com/skinny-bell-pepper-nachos-recipe/
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