Eat less or more when feeling negative emotions?

Betanee

This week has been a pretty difficult week, and since Tuesday, I have consumed 2790 calories, and 63 grams of fat in total. I'm just curious to see how other people's eating habits change during times of hardship/stress..

Twasney

I am guilty of being an emotional eater! So if I am pissed off, stressed, sad I want treats. I have to work really had against it and it doesn't always work!

Key here is when you have an over day....pick yourself up, dust yourself off and start anew! This is a hard lesson for me to learn, but I can see the "bad/Cheat" days are getting further and further apart!

skylinekt

Stress eater!

KatieJane83

In the past, I was always an emotional eater, except when it's been extreme stress, in which case I totally lose my appetite. Fortunately, since I started MFP and have totally changed my eating/workout habits/lifestyle, I find that even when it's just regular stress I'm not really tempted to be an emotional eater anymore!

crb1988

I know exactly how you feel. I tend to eat less, a lot less, than I normally would.

peddlepusher

I eat less when feeling negative emotions

Purecity

I am a total stress eater!

soifua

I am guilty of being an emotional eater! So if I am pissed off, stressed, sad I want treats. I have to work really had against it and it doesn't always work!

this is ME - and when I'm in the kitchen I just shovel stuff into my mouth, it's really bad, luckily it doesn't happen too often

ilookthetype

I don't eat and I run a lot. It's a bad combination...

SarahofTwins

I usually eat less when I'm mad or feeling down...then when I start feeling better I raid my kitchen lol. Guess I'm not too big on emotional eating but it gets the best of me later on.

aippolito1

I definitely let my emotions determine food choices too often. Don't worry about it. Just try to get control over it... the only way to do that is find a constructive way to deal with your emotions.

infamousmk

since Tuesday, I have consumed 2790 calories, and 63 grams of fat in total.

Are you saying you undereat when you're stressed?




I'm a stress eater, personally. High cal, lots of beer, as much food as I can get. *looking at avatar* .. I've had some stressful times...

bry_all01

I am definitely an eat way less stresser, same with depression and being sick. I have had to force myself to eat this week (head cold).

jaramae

I'm very much an emotional eater. When the situation is occurring (for example the duration of a fight), I tend to have a loss of appetite. Then because I've been in starvation mode for a while, once the conflict is over my body suddenly wakes up and craves lots and lots of food and that's when I tend to binge. It's not healthy at all, for your physical and emotional self. Exercise does wonders for the mood and gives you something to focus on when you're stressed. Even if you're pressed for time a 5-10 activity boost would probably have some sort of positive feedback.

CJK1959

I am totally an emotional eater......mad, sad, happy, bored, tired etc, etc, etc. If there is an emotion, I will eat for it.

wiglet23

When you are feeling the negative, try finding something positive (and active) that will keep your hands busy (and unable to shovel the food in)... I have found my house can get pretty clean when I'm in one of those moods... or, more recently, if I make myself get outside for some exercise (pounding away the negativity on the street), I begin to have the positive feelings of doing something good for myself help relieve the negativity...

tinaved624

I was definitely (and still am sometimes) a stress eater. It took me a while to build up the self control so I wouldn't give in to the cravings, but while I was building it up there were a couple of things that I did to help me out:

1. Snack packs - Even if we got the big bag of chips for the house, I would have them divided into 1 serving packs in Ziplocks or something. That way, even if I had the urge to eat something, I could only grab one bag at a time, and it registers more how much I'm eating (before it comes time to enter all of the calories into MFP). I did the same thing for any sweet treats or whatever too.
2. Low cal fudge bars - when I'm stressed, the first thing I want is chocolate - and if its in Ice Cream form that's even better. So I got those 100 calorie fudge bars (you have some that are lower too, but I find they're too small to make a real impact on the craving) and pretty much always have them in the freezer. That way, if you're ever in stress out mode, you can take one of those and not feel too bad about it.
3, Water - now this one was the hardest for me to do, and it took some time for me to remember to do it. If I ever have this urge to eat something sweet or salty, but I'm not hungry or I know I'm freaking out about something. I make myself drink a glass of water (you can even put a little sugar or lemon in it depending on what you're craving). Most of the time its enough to calm my brain down and push back the cravings for a little while. If not, one of those snack packs is right there.

I'm so sorry you've been having a bad week! Just remember, its totally okay to just pick up again and get back to routine after a bad day. Slowly you'll be able to work through it and the stress eating sessions will be fewer and far between!

Hope that helps!

orleansmith

I could go either way ... I got some bad news yesterday morning and I ate my lunch but just picked at my dinner (which is a shame because my grandma made pot roast and it was really good).

elliecolorado

I never eat when I have negative emotions! I am however an emotional drinker, I drink when I am upset, but I don't eat.

Betanee

Are you saying you undereat when you're stressed?

Yeah, the figures I said were all i've eaten this week. Including calories i've burnt off through exercise, as well as what I just haven't eaten, i've consumed 5105 calories, and 95 grams of fat less than I should have since then, according to MFP.

Lowfatbrownie

im having one of those weeks right now and i eat alot less i only drank two shakeology's (meal replacement) a day all week and that's just survival mode and i work out hard to

StarGeezer

Depends on the emotion for me. Melancholy, sad, depressed... more. Stressed, worried, angry... less.

I've been consciously working on not "self-medicating" with food, and finding other more constructive ways of coping with unpleasant emotions. And I concentrate on the less desirable moods as triggers for me; for some reason, happiness and other much more positive emotions don't elicit a need to abuse food. YMMV.