Triggers I notice on MFP

So over the course of 4 years of not only losing weight, but gaining knowledge about the human body, metabolism, and the psychology of food, I've picked up a few things, learned a few things, and experienced a lot of emotions.

I always try to put things together and make sense out of it. Like a jigsaw puzzle if you will.

One thing I notice on MFP forums quite a bit are triggers that people have. Things I would never have thought twice about 5 years ago scream at me now like they are in flashing neon. In 90% of the cases when I see them, the people posting them don't even realize they are triggers.

Some are "pet peeves" or annoyances, some are negative (and even positive) emotions based around food and body image. Some are habits that people post about. Usually if I see an obvious one, I'll take a quick look at the poster's profile and see if there are any hints that further develop my suppositions. Many times there are. I'm not going to point anything out here, that would be rude of me. But I'll put out a call to everyone, a challenge if you will, something I've done with myself in the past, to examine your own thought processes and see what triggers you have, and maybe, just maybe you'll be able to trace these triggers back to mental issues that are part of the underlying reasons for your weight gain. Remember, in many many cases, weight gain is a symptom of psychological trauma or disassociation, and solving the underlying cause, can really help with the weight issue.

Here's a completely fictitious example I just made up. If this hits close to home for anyone, remember, I didn't draw this from any real person's life, I may have heard many many stories and drawn upon those facts to create the situation, but never was I told this story.

Jane Doe is obese, she's in her mid 30's and works at an office. She's tried to lose weight most of her adult life. When she was 18 and in college, she was trying to keep the college beer and bad food weight off (even though she was considered at a very healthy weight, she felt she was a little fat and wanted to lose). Back then getting the weight off was relatively easy, a couple of weeks eating nothing but salads and going to the school gym to work on the bike or elliptical and she dropped that little 5 or 10 lbs. But it always came back eventually.
When she left school and started to work full time, money was an issue (as it always is), free time became less, and priorities changed, she still on and off dieted, with limited success, but gained about 15 lbs over the next 3 years anyway. She thought about it once in a while with some small amount of shame and guilt, but never really took control of the situation. Eventually she was married, and had a child, gained about 25 lbs more weight, and was now on the verge of the obese category. She never even noticed until one day, at about 30, she overheard some rather caustic stuff said about her weight by a co-worker in hushed tones. Embarrassed and angry, she decided to lose weight, took on a rather extreme diet, lost 30 lbs, and strutted her stuff. Within 6 months the weight came back with a vengeance, not only did she gain the 30 back, but packed on another 15 as well. Now she's solidly obese, doesn't go to the gym regularly, has a sit down job, a 9 year old kid demanding attention, and a husband who is losing interest in her physically. She decided to change, this time really change. No more diets to lose, no more yoyoing up and down, she sits down to start researching, and finds MFP, starts working on her food, her exercise, eating with a decent deficit, and slowly starts dropping weight. She hits a bit of a wall, and has been stuck for a couple of months with minimal weight loss. She's at a loss for what the problem is, she follows her routine (mostly), tries to stick to her calories (usually), works out 3 times a week moderately hard, and tries to eat relatively healthy.

Reasonable story, so what's the issue?
I don't know, but I can tell you there are gaps here, mental gaps. Triggers if you will. Mentally we know the highlights, but not the things that really bother her deep down where there's no place to hide. Food is so intimately tied in with psyche today that most of us tie food to comfort and safety. I'd say that she has triggers, maybe she doesn't realize when she's eating, maybe she's lying to us, or herself without even realizing it. I'll be she gets offended at certain topics easier than is reasonable (trigger), maybe she finds herself in certain situations where she just can't seem to take control of her eating, like with certain friends or at certain locations (trigger), could be that when she has certain emotions she stresses much more (trigger), or that she's subconsciously backing off her "best effort" when working out (trigger). Triggers are like pieces of the puzzle. The don't tell you your issues, but they give you clues.

Essentially it boils down to confronting your own problems, you don't have to solve them, you just have to recognize them. Once you do that, you eliminate a major roadblock for many people to becoming truly healthy. Seeing your mental person "naked" with all it's faults is eye opening. Really confronting your shortcomings (and I don't mean the fat rolls, I mean the truly nasty stuff like bias's and hatreds and fears) and identifying them can be nothing short of an epiphany, don't sell yourself short, be strong, strive to be better, it really will help physically as well as mentally.