Emotional eating
theyoginurse
Posts: 82 Member
My struggle. Emotional eating. I eat when I’m sad and worried or even just to detach myself from the stress of life (work, sick family member, lack of friends and family). Am I making excuses? I am being honest. How do I get out of this hole so I can move forward? How do I stop emotional eating? Thank you!
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I struggle with similar responses. Everything I've read and everyone I've talked to about it all seem to focus on the same thing -- it's a habitual response that you've trained into yourself.
The first step is recognizing it, which it seems like you've done.
The second step is recognizing it when it's happening, which can be harder to do (IME).
Once you can recognize it happening, you can start to retrain yourself. When you sense your triggers, force yourself to do something else. What that is is up to you. I've seen suggestions ranging from go for a walk to journal about your feelings to doing chores around the house. But most suggestions are that the new action be easy and repeatable so you can do more easily replace the bad habit/response (eating) with a new one.
Like so many things, it seems fairly easy on paper. But I continue to struggle with my issues.9 -
I just added to another one of your threads about over-eating for the day if you want to check it out. I've been doing this for 2 months now (second time around I'm afraid) and adjusting to a regular routine that works for me. Give it some time. As for emotional eating, I think we all do that, but need to learn to control it. Over-snacking is my biggest issue, and although I still snack I am very careful with the calories and foods I choose. Often, I think I eat because I'm feeling somewhat depressed, or stressed, or just mentally bored. My strategies have been to eat fair size, wholesome, balance meals 3x a day then several low calorie snacks in between as I need them. I don't eat sugar at all, but use stevia and some Sucralose to meet my sweet-tooth needs. I love and look forward to my nightly sugar-free ice cream bar or pudding. I also try to replace goodies with fruit at least once or twice a day. For salt cravings I eat a small weighed amount of salted nuts or popcorn w/ a drizzle of butter. I stay away from things like chips that seem to evaporate when I open a bag. My other trick is to sip on drinks all day long. I like herbal teas, some sugar-free flavored sparkling water drinks with added regular sparkling water to cut the sweetness, and iced coffee with a little cashew milk and stevia....I also add cocoa sometimes for chocolate craving. They are becoming my new comfort foods, and calorie wise cost next to nothing.3
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I am an emotional eater as well. When I'm stressed, worried, sad, etc., all I want to do is curl up with my comfort foods. Even after being at this for over two years, I still get those responses from time to time. What has worked for me to help lessen those responses is to recognize the pattern before it starts. Recognize when I'm wanting to eat because of an emotion rather than actual hunger. Once I recognize what is happening, then I can redirect my energy elsewhere. Sometimes that means leaving the house, so I can't be by myself in a house full of food. Sometimes all I have to do is find another activity to take it's place - cleaning the house, playing with my dogs, etc.
Consistent redirection and not wallowing in mistakes has been the key to me building better coping mechanisms.3 -
Keep lower calorie foods on hand to eat. Carrots instead of cookies, sparkling water instead of beer or pop, light popcorn Instead of chips, etc.
Require yourself to weigh and log everything.
Hope you feel better soon.3 -
All my worst binges occurred when depressed.3
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Can i join your group?0
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theyoginurse wrote: »My struggle. Emotional eating. I eat when I’m sad and worried or even just to detach myself from the stress of life (work, sick family member, lack of friends and family). Am I making excuses? I am being honest. How do I get out of this hole so I can move forward? How do I stop emotional eating? Thank you!
The easiest way to stop it is to reduce the stress. That may mean a job change, move, or other lifestyle change. Another way is to practice yoga or meditation to reduce the stress so you aren't getting a temporary high from food. I had a serious problem with emotional eating and was related to a toxic work environment. When I got out of that job the emotional eating was reduced and much easier to eliminate.3 -
lucerorojo wrote: »theyoginurse wrote: »My struggle. Emotional eating. I eat when I’m sad and worried or even just to detach myself from the stress of life (work, sick family member, lack of friends and family). Am I making excuses? I am being honest. How do I get out of this hole so I can move forward? How do I stop emotional eating? Thank you!
The easiest way to stop it is to reduce the stress. That may mean a job change, move, or other lifestyle change. Another way is to practice yoga or meditation to reduce the stress so you aren't getting a temporary high from food. I had a serious problem with emotional eating and was related to a toxic work environment. When I got out of that job the emotional eating was reduced and much easier to eliminate.
It isn't always that easy. I have type II bipolar disorder. When I am depressed, it's because the chemistry set in my brain decided that's what we're doing today. I take medication that does a pretty good job of lessening the highs and lows, but they still happen from time to time.6 -
I didn't mean to imply that changing one's job is 'easy, ' either. Just that in the context of dealing with emotional eating that treating the cause rather than the symptom will ultimately make it easier to deal with or reduce the emotional eating. In the case of bi-polar it is a different situation and one may be able to manage the root cause with medication/ therapy but still have to deal with the eating issues.1
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I agree that a big help is to lessen the stress, but if I remember your situation correctly from another thread, you can't change the facts; you can only change your reaction. Yoga, meditation. Something I did a long time ago that really helped me was to write letters. Mostly to God. Some to real people, some to the universe. I started out with saying what was wrong with my life, my day. They went on to tell about the positive things. Some were long, some short. Some were mostly negative, some more positive. Some well written, some ramblings of a mad woman. Almost all were cathartic. A few were insightful. After writing them, I threw them away. Sometimes you just need to talk. You can talk in a letter. It may sound crazy, but it really helped me at the time. Give it a fair chance. It may help you through a tough time.
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I find that taking a 30 minute walk helps stress melt away into the background. It gets me out of the house where the snacks lurk, the fresh air is good at oxygenating my worried brain, and a little exercise never hurts.11
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You are not alone, me too! Logging here and knowing what I can and cannot do and stay within my OWN CHOSEN limits for calories during the day, helps me to ask in those grim moments whether MORE FOOD is really going to solve anything.
More importantly, knowing that my "calories-in" is one of the VERY FEW things that I can, at least in the approximate sense, determine, gives me that much needed boost of personal choice and agency in a world where most of the things I get emotional about, I can't control.2 -
lucerorojo wrote: »...in the context of dealing with emotional eating that treating the cause rather than the symptom will ultimately make it easier to deal with or reduce the emotional eating.
Usually it's a great idea to treat the cause not the symptom. But the cause here, stress and emotion, is actually pretty baked in to what we call "life", right? And if my symptom is actually a maladaptive behavior that in the long run causes negative stress (sense of failure and being out of control with food, lack of success at goals, being stuck at a weight I don't prefer, feeling out of shape ...), I think that's worth paying a LOT of attention to.
Many of the alternatives above, exercise or meditation or dealing with emotion by writing or defusing anger on unpleasant chores, actually decrease stress by adding endorphins or awareness or process or decision to the mix.2 -
So many good ideas here. I think emotional eating can be an attempt at self-soothing and distraction. It is so easy to eat as well when you are feeling overwhelmed. No real thought is required - just switch off brain and eat whatever is around. So surrounding yourself with better food options (that you enjoy!) is a wise start.
Maybe have a think about other non-food things that you find soothing and relaxing and be ready to implement them when you're feeling overwhelmed. I think one of the keys is to have options planned in advance so that there are alternatives to eating already in the back of your mind. It might be listening to music, having a bubble bath, going for a walk...whatever you find helps quieten the mind.
One woman I know used colouring books to cope when her son was diagnosed with a brain tumour. She told me it was easy to pick up and do, yet she found it distracting and soothing while she sat for long hours at the hospital.
When I went through a particularly stressful time, I read through my husband's old collection of Tintin comics! Novels felt overwhelming, so Tintin and Snowy were perfect company for me then. I've also used writing out my worries or upsets helpful, as suggested above. Just some ideas, but of course you will need to explore what works for you.
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Emotions are powerful. They take energy away from other cognitive functions. Emotions can lay you up in the bed, not even want to go out or see anyone. You loose the ability to say no to the drug of choice. It isn't so much emotional eating as the inability to deal with the situation that caused the emotion to begin with. Controlling Emotional eating starts with mental health.9
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Emotions are powerful. They take energy away from other cognitive functions. Emotions can lay you up in the bed, not even want to go out or see anyone. You loose the ability to say no to the drug of choice. It isn't so much emotional eating as the inability to deal with the situation that caused the emotion to begin with. Controlling Emotional eating starts with mental health.
We have way too much stigma. People dance around problems because they don't want to say they have a mental health issue. I am careful about revealing that I have a mental illness IRL because of how other people react, particularly because of misconceptions about what bipolar disorder is. You tell someone you are depressed and they console you; tell them you are depressed because of bipolar disorder and they hide the knives.6 -
lucerorojo wrote: »theyoginurse wrote: »My struggle. Emotional eating. I eat when I’m sad and worried or even just to detach myself from the stress of life (work, sick family member, lack of friends and family). Am I making excuses? I am being honest. How do I get out of this hole so I can move forward? How do I stop emotional eating? Thank you!
The easiest way to stop it is to reduce the stress. That may mean a job change, move, or other lifestyle change. Another way is to practice yoga or meditation to reduce the stress so you aren't getting a temporary high from food. I had a serious problem with emotional eating and was related to a toxic work environment. When I got out of that job the emotional eating was reduced and much easier to eliminate.corinasue1143 wrote: »I agree that a big help is to lessen the stress, but if I remember your situation correctly from another thread, you can't change the facts; you can only change your reaction. Yoga, meditation. Something I did a long time ago that really helped me was to write letters. Mostly to God. Some to real people, some to the universe. I started out with saying what was wrong with my life, my day. They went on to tell about the positive things. Some were long, some short. Some were mostly negative, some more positive. Some well written, some ramblings of a mad woman. Almost all were cathartic. A few were insightful. After writing them, I threw them away. Sometimes you just need to talk. You can talk in a letter. It may sound crazy, but it really helped me at the time. Give it a fair chance. It may help you through a tough time.brightresolve wrote: »You are not alone, me too! Logging here and knowing what I can and cannot do and stay within my OWN CHOSEN limits for calories during the day, helps me to ask in those grim moments whether MORE FOOD is really going to solve anything.
More importantly, knowing that my "calories-in" is one of the VERY FEW things that I can, at least in the approximate sense, determine, gives me that much needed boost of personal choice and agency in a world where most of the things I get emotional about, I can't control.brightresolve wrote: »lucerorojo wrote: »...in the context of dealing with emotional eating that treating the cause rather than the symptom will ultimately make it easier to deal with or reduce the emotional eating.
Usually it's a great idea to treat the cause not the symptom. But the cause here, stress and emotion, is actually pretty baked in to what we call "life", right? And if my symptom is actually a maladaptive behavior that in the long run causes negative stress (sense of failure and being out of control with food, lack of success at goals, being stuck at a weight I don't prefer, feeling out of shape ...), I think that's worth paying a LOT of attention to.
Many of the alternatives above, exercise or meditation or dealing with emotion by writing or defusing anger on unpleasant chores, actually decrease stress by adding endorphins or awareness or process or decision to the mix.
Your insights and support are so very helpful to me. @carvedtones I don’t judge you on your issue. I am a psychiatric nurse actually, and totally empathize with what you’re saying.
I know that the way I am feeling is a combination of biologically who I am and also has to do with the toxic work environment, where I live too. In 2018, I am planning to move and just start a new. So as I approach this new year, I am trying to get rid of the negative baggage that has been holding me back from my health and life. I am going to start adapting healthier habits and practicing mindfulness. I started reading about compulsive eating and do fit the definition significantly. Going to start to heal from that. Thank you all for your help and prayers!4 -
I have always been an emotional eater. And there has been a LOT of drama in my life. But this time around, my determination to lose weight has actually kept me from emotionally eating. There is this thought that goes through my mind, “It’s not worth it for the short-term emotional balm!”
Now I use fitness instead. I tell myself to go out and do something POSITIVE for my body. To use my emotions to fuel my goals FORWARD. So I go out for a walk or run or lift weights. And in the end I feel so much better for having done that than I ever have through binge eating.3 -
I struggle with the same. Add me. Journaling is helping me0
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Me too. Its so hard when theres so much to deal with sometimes. Ive lost so much the past few years. But my weight is the one thing i can control! after doing this for almost a year now, i eat it, log it, reflect, move on. I try not to feel so guilty anymore and have learned its ok to slip up or eat a little extra, as long as im 100% honest in my logging. Compared to this time last year im still eating less on my "bad" days and thats an achievement in itself for me. I have *kitten* weeks and some weeks the scales wont budge but i keep at it. I read these forums and learn, get inspired, look at my old photos and i get back into it. You got this
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