Did drawing back on the comfort food make you depressed?
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beautifulsparkles
Posts: 314 Member
I feel like 2015 was quite rough for me, when I didn't respond to negativity with comfort foods, I had no one to turn to, no hot bath to get into and no comforting food to eat. I got really depressed some days, and felt a lot of hatred for myself.
Do you experience this? if you did in the past, what new ways did you find to cope?
Honestly, I didn't know I hated myself so much until I stopped rewarding myself with food, every time I got upset!
Do you experience this? if you did in the past, what new ways did you find to cope?
Honestly, I didn't know I hated myself so much until I stopped rewarding myself with food, every time I got upset!
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Replies
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I feel the same sentiment!!
I have gained 25 lbs over the last 4 months from the 60 i lost, and I was not eating the comfort foods, staying away from carbs & sugar.
Wow! I never realized I could be so hard on myself... it was torture. Like you, I hated myself, my confidence & self-esteem went way down, and I don't know how I managed to survive.
But because of the genetic "need to survive" in me I slowly pulled myself out of it and am taking things "step by step". This motivation for staying strict on a low carb eating plan has returned but it takes a while for the confidence & self esteem to return.
"THIS IS THE WAY IT IS AND IF I WANT TO CHANGE I MUST DO SOMETHING"........ that's pretty harsh, but if I look at it that way I can then think with a logical mind and go forward.
It's not easy, in fact it's hard, but I must change for me....
Look for other rewards, or limit the food rewards, for example if you've been drooling for a slice of pizza... wait. tell yourself, yes I will have a slice of pizza, next week, but this week my goal will be to loose (however much weight) 1 lb.... and if I succeed I will have the one slice next week. This seems to work for me.
It's also good to know that you are not alone, many many other people are in the same situation.
Love yourself, and get rid of the word "hate".....
New day, new start.....
happy new year
-Frustrated Jeff in NYC0 -
I have found that eating high sugary foods did depress me after eating them...not because I ate them, but my emotions/mind felt depressed.0
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beautifulsparkles wrote: »I feel like 2015 was quite rough for me, when I didn't respond to negativity with comfort foods, I had no one to turn to, no hot bath to get into and no comforting food to eat. I got really depressed some days, and felt a lot of hatred for myself.
Do you experience this? if you did in the past, what new ways did you find to cope?
Honestly, I didn't know I hated myself so much until I stopped rewarding myself with food, every time I got upset!
I highly suggest counselling. The problem being that if you don't like yourself now, you won't after you've lost weight either. You in fact say you "hate" yourself. Talking to a counselor or a psychologist would help you sort that out, so that you don't *need* comfort food. Perhaps you also need antidepressants for a time. I speak from experience. I ended up seeing a registered psychologist through a work employee assistance program, and am on a mild antidepressant. I can't even express how my life has changed because of those two things. My disordered thinking (I'm a loser, I can't do anything right) is gone. My "all or nothing" (you are either perfect or you're a loser) thinking is gone. I now acknowledge every day all the good things I've done. My attitude has become so much more positive that it's even helped me at work. And, my new attitude has helped me lose over 40 lbs since September. In my opinion, learning to love yourself no matter where you are in life, is the most important thing in becoming happier and healthier.
I really, really hope you can learn to love yourself. When you are your own best friend, you won't need comfort from food and you won't seek approval from others because it's really all within you. I wish you the best of luck.0 -
@RoseTheWarrior I can't go on anti-depressants, they would make me manic/high as a kite. I'm currently on mood stabilizers.
I don't think I need counseling- I don't really have any friends, and everyone needs someone to vent to. If I had some good friends, then I probably wouldn't get so low. My mood is picked up so much by talking to my dad or when I used to spend time with my personal trainer, having a laugh.0 -
Yep. Stuff like bread, take out, sweets, greasy stuff. And I was just so sad and tired. Now I'm just sad cause I keep eating these things, but sadder when I don't . It's terrible0
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Giving up comfort food can make you feel depressed because then you have to face up to the things that are really bothering you rather than hiding your feelings behind binge eating and hating yourself because of it.
For myself, I actually just found out I was really tired in the evening when I usually had a binge so started going to bed earlier and then I felt better.0 -
I understand how you feel @beautifulsparkles ... the blanket is gone... question... what other things makes you feel good that are not comfort food? Why not taking that hot bath when you need it?
We can be too harsh on ourselves, I try not to, and if I gave in into the sea of comfort foods, which I have all this 2015, so be it, i enjoyed them and tomorrow is another day.
My 2015... it was rough as hell as well ... my Mom passed away, had to have another knee surgery (on the other knee), moved, and my productivity at work went down the hill... I though 2015 was gonna be my year and went the other way... but what is left but moving foward? There is no way back, so tomorrow is the day... There is no reason to hate our little selves.... thinking about how f***** the rest of humanity is you deserve a solid pat on your back honey... I agree with @jgwriternyc as it will be a good idea to get rid of the word "hate" for the year 2016. No more saying or thinking "I hate myself" in 2016.
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Yep. Stuff like bread, take out, sweets, greasy stuff. And I was just so sad and tired. Now I'm just sad cause I keep eating these things, but sadder when I don't . It's terrible
You can still eat some of that stuff just fit it into your calories...
I was surprised to learn that bacon and icecream wasn't as bad for me as I thought. I can have a decent amount of icecream at 100mls, and I eat it slowly, so it feels like I get enough.
I'm not really a bread person, but I love grilled cheese, so I have 2 every day- I also use chutney and tomatoes, or I will have left-overs between the bread, or onions and red capsicums, or mince and cheese, or potato and cheese. The options are endless, I just switched the bread I was using.
What are your favourite takeouts and greasy stuffs? you might be able to recreate them at home.0 -
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AngelinaB_ wrote: »I understand how you feel @beautifulsparkles ... the blanket is gone... question... what other things makes you feel good that are not comfort food? Why not taking that hot bath when you need it?
We can be too harsh on ourselves, I try not to, and if I gave in into the sea of comfort foods, which I have all this 2015, so be it, i enjoyed them and tomorrow is another day.
My 2015... it was rough as hell as well ... my Mom passed away, had to have another knee surgery (on the other knee), moved, and my productivity at work went down the hill... I though 2015 was gonna be my year and went the other way... but what is left but moving foward? There is no way back, so tomorrow is the day... There is no reason to hate our little selves.... thinking about how f***** the rest of humanity is you deserve a solid pat on your back honey... I agree with @jgwriternyc as it will be a good idea to get rid of the word "hate" for the year 2016. No more saying or thinking "I hate myself" in 2016.
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I wasn't able to take a hot bath last year because we didn't have one at our house! having a hot shower wasn't the same, there is a limit as to how long you can stay in there...
I feel for you, your year sounds much worse than mine. I guess I'm just used to stuffing down the worst of my feelings with food- it seems to take the edge off. I hope 2016 IS your year!!!0 -
The tantrums i used to thrown when i "couldn't" have what i wanted because i was trying to lose weight was ridiculous. I got so angry and hateful, and yes depressed
I think the problem here is your feeling towards yourself and not so much what you are eating.
Learn to accept yourself - i wanted to be thin because i believed that equated to beauty. I wanted to be accepted by others, whoever they were, because i thought that validated me as a person. Its taken a long time but now i recognise accept my positives and negatives. Its ok not to be good at everything, the kindest or prettiest or cleverest person in every room you go into. Learn this and it wont matter because the greatest people you will ever meet will like you for you, the rest - well, who cares, they have no taste!0 -
Good question. I went thru this last year when I began to "attack" my emotional eating issues. It was a long slow process but I learned to eat only when I was truly physically hungry and only 3 times a day, no snacking and no more excuse to eat for emotional comfort. Food does not solve any emotional issue and in fact makes many worse. When you strip it away you do have to confront your demons. It's hard but it's possible. If I ever slip up -- and of course that happens on occasion -- I see whatever "thing" I'm avoiding is still there waiting for me to work thru.
So yes now I do "seem" to have more negative thoughts that I can't numb out and have to face. That's not fun but I ride the wave, journal, pray, talk it out, exercise, read, take a hot bath and maybe another the same day. Whatever it takes to avoid eating the emotion. The wave passes, maybe hours, maybe days, but it passes. And then there is no guilt, regret or self-loathing when it's over b/c I didn't binge. There is only freedom.0 -
Giving up comfort food can make you feel depressed because then you have to face up to the things that are really bothering you rather than hiding your feelings behind binge eating and hating yourself because of it.
For myself, I actually just found out I was really tired in the evening when I usually had a binge so started going to bed earlier and then I felt better.
Take a walk instead of reaching for the food.0 -
Giving up comfort food can make you feel depressed because then you have to face up to the things that are really bothering you rather than hiding your feelings behind binge eating and hating yourself because of it.
For myself, I actually just found out I was really tired in the evening when I usually had a binge so started going to bed earlier and then I felt better.
Take a walk instead of reaching for the food.
If I did that in the olden days, I probably would have cried the whole time. I think I did a few times.0 -
Good question. I went thru this last year when I began to "attack" my emotional eating issues. It was a long slow process but I learned to eat only when I was truly physically hungry and only 3 times a day, no snacking and no more excuse to eat for emotional comfort. Food does not solve any emotional issue and in fact makes many worse. When you strip it away you do have to confront your demons. It's hard but it's possible. If I ever slip up -- and of course that happens on occasion -- I see whatever "thing" I'm avoiding is still there waiting for me to work thru.
So yes now I do "seem" to have more negative thoughts that I can't numb out and have to face. That's not fun but I ride the wave, journal, pray, talk it out, exercise, read, take a hot bath and maybe another the same day. Whatever it takes to avoid eating the emotion. The wave passes, maybe hours, maybe days, but it passes. And then there is no guilt, regret or self-loathing when it's over b/c I didn't binge. There is only freedom.
:-( Too many feelings, too many issues for my tissues. I feel like theres too much to work through, like I'll never get through them all, and if I can't fix them all, why bother with one?
Its that kind of thinking that probably got me so fat in the first place.0 -
beautifulsparkles wrote: »@RoseTheWarrior I can't go on anti-depressants, they would make me manic/high as a kite. I'm currently on mood stabilizers.
I don't think I need counseling- I don't really have any friends, and everyone needs someone to vent to. If I had some good friends, then I probably wouldn't get so low. My mood is picked up so much by talking to my dad or when I used to spend time with my personal trainer, having a laugh.
I think if your looking for a place to vent then you have come to the right place. Your obviously under the care of a doctor ( you mentioned meds ) and said your not interested in counseling right now, but where interested in venting.
I would start by adding friends on here. It takes time to find a few that may click well with you, but keep adding people until you find ones that you really like. ( you can remove those that end up not being a right match. Also try to read through profiles to see If you can get a feel for who may click well with you )
Then I would search the groups. Maybe you will find a group on here of women who are in the same situation. Keep searching the groups often, because new groups pop up every day. ( again, you can delete the group If you don't like it. It doesn't hurt to try though, you may find people who you like )
Create a thread asking for friend requests , you may find some people who are in need of support also.
And lastly ,create a thread like this one venting about your feelings. Sometimes it helps to get it all out and hear suggestions from others.
So if your looking for support and a place to vent, you can definitely find that here. You just have to put yourself out there and send out requests .
And as far as your original post-
I've come along way in this process . I started out so depressed that I hated myself. Instead of focusing on the good, I seriously just fixated on all my bad qualities not the good. I hated the way I looked and used food as comfort. I would sneak food, and wait until my husband left for work to overeat ( I was embarrassed to eat an entire pizza in front of him so would only have a few slices but then eat the whole thing when he left )
The more food I ate, the more depressed I became and then the more depressed I became, the more food I ate.
I knew I had to make a change .like you said you didn't use food as a comfort but still felt badly ,I realized it was deeper then just food. I had to work on myself . it took a long time but I had to get to the root of the problem to solve it. Using food as a comfort, or not using it as comfort didn't matter. It was more then that .
I felt badly when I overate and then still felt badly when I didn't. So I made the effort and put in the necessary work to begin to love myself. If I didn't, I knew I wouldn't be happy with myself either way ( skinny or obese ) I was depressed and hopeless until I got to the bottom of my issues.
Now things are much different. I look at food much differently too. I'm now 135 lbs(5'8), and have a different attitude in general. I have lost all my weight and kept it off for 2+ yrs so far. It took a lot of work, but it was worth it.0 -
@thorsmom01 How are you able to respond if your profile is in a cage? *confused*0
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thorsmom01 wrote: »I think if your looking for a place to vent then you have come to the right place. Your obviously under the care of a doctor ( you mentioned meds ) and said your not interested in counseling right now, but where interested in venting.
I would start by adding friends on here. It takes time to find a few that may click well with you, but keep adding people until you find ones that you really like. ( you can remove those that end up not being a right match. Also try to read through profiles to see If you can get a feel for who may click well with you )
Then I would search the groups. Maybe you will find a group on here of women who are in the same situation. Keep searching the groups often, because new groups pop up every day. ( again, you can delete the group If you don't like it. It doesn't hurt to try though, you may find people who you like )
Create a thread asking for friend requests , you may find some people who are in need of support also.
And lastly ,create a thread like this one venting about your feelings. Sometimes it helps to get it all out and hear suggestions from others.
So if your looking for support and a place to vent, you can definitely find that here. You just have to put yourself out there and send out requests .
And as far as your original post-
I've come along way in this process . I started out so depressed that I hated myself. Instead of focusing on the good, I seriously just fixated on all my bad qualities not the good. I hated the way I looked and used food as comfort. I would sneak food, and wait until my husband left for work to overeat ( I was embarrassed to eat an entire pizza in front of him so would only have a few slices but then eat the whole thing when he left )
The more food I ate, the more depressed I became and then the more depressed I became, the more food I ate.
I knew I had to make a change .like you said you didn't use food as a comfort but still felt badly ,I realized it was deeper then just food. I had to work on myself . it took a long time but I had to get to the root of the problem to solve it. Using food as a comfort, or not using it as comfort didn't matter. It was more then that .
I felt badly when I overate and then still felt badly when I didn't. So I made the effort and put in the necessary work to begin to love myself. If I didn't, I knew I wouldn't be happy with myself either way ( skinny or obese ) I was depressed and hopeless until I got to the bottom of my issues.
Now things are much different. I look at food much differently too. I'm now 135 lbs(5'8), and have a different attitude in general. I have lost all my weight and kept it off for 2+ yrs so far. It took a lot of work, but it was worth it.
I am between doctors at the moment, as I have moved recently. I am monitored closely by my family though. I have seen some people similar to life coaches that I liked, that just gave me resources and advice about stuff. I have had bad experiences with counselors (or maybe psychiatrists), I found that they talked in creepy voices, and passed whatever information I gave to my parents. I know they wouldn't do that now because of my age but I don't know if I could trust them. Sometimes I think a good self help book is more useful than paying $100+ to see someone for an hour, but the trouble can be getting the right book as well as accountability, feedback etc.
I have some really good friends on here- about 8. We used to talk, but I don't see most of them around anymore, although they could just be busy because of the time of year. I find MFP feeds really frustrating because you have to manually scroll through them and they aren't particularly intuitive, so I often go days/weeks without checking on them. I think things got a bit one sided for my friends.
What I was expecting from this feed was basically coping strategies, when the obvious stuff isn't available because of where you are, or the time of day etc. I can't exactly call my sister in the middle of a melt down if its 10pm! There have been some good suggestions in here though- exercise, keeping a diary, praying etc... sometimes if I really want a food, but its a big no-no for one reason or another, I will wait until the next day and make it fit into my calories. Nothing is really off limits unless you binge on that with a combination of other foods.
Thank you for sharing your experience. I used to sneak food as well, 9/10 I don't do that anymore, if I'm ashamed to eat something, I shouldn't, and if there are other people there, I should be willing to share. There will be other opportunities to eat that food, its not gone forever!0 -
beautifulsparkles wrote: »@RoseTheWarrior I can't go on anti-depressants, they would make me manic/high as a kite. I'm currently on mood stabilizers.
I don't think I need counseling- I don't really have any friends, and everyone needs someone to vent to. If I had some good friends, then I probably wouldn't get so low. My mood is picked up so much by talking to my dad or when I used to spend time with my personal trainer, having a laugh.
This is going to be blunt because I was in your shoes, but you seem to be coming up with a lot of excuses as to why something can't be done. Can't go for a walk because you'll cry? That warrants a need for help whether you like it or not. I am technically bipolar, have been on mood stabilizers and anti-depressants, so I know your struggle there. And you are exactly like me in that if I am down, I need to be surrounded by people or I think myself to death.
The issue with that train of thought? It's unsustainable. Even with friends, you will not be able to surround yourself with them whenever your down. Think of how draining and selfish that would be on them. You need to learn how to manage your emotions, and getting psychological help will aid in that. Cognitive behavioral therapy can work wonders.
You have been given coping strategies, and seem to find a reason as to why they won't work for you. We aren't therapists and can only offer from our experiences. In the end, you can continue to be depressed, or you can give yourself a kick in the butt and do what needs to be done. It isn't fun, nor desirable, but it's all you can do. Because does living your entire life like this seem like a good life?
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Exercise is a better coping strategy for me than eating. Listening to music, taking photos (while I'm out getting light exercise by walking), knitting, drawing, taking a class, dancing, and generally staying busy, are more strategies. Yes, I have emotions to face, but I have some control over when, how, and for how long at a stretch, I face them.0
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