Breaking the Cycle: Emotional Eating
Emotional eating is a common phenomenon that affects people of all ages and genders. When your emotions run high, it's easy to turn to food for comfort, but over time (and without other coping skills) this behavior can become a cycle that's hard to break. Let’s break down what emotional eating is, what causes it, and how to work with it. Spoiler: notice I didn’t say “how to overcome it.”
What is Emotional Eating?
Emotional eating is defined as eating in response to emotions rather than hunger. This can be triggered by a range of emotions, such as stress, boredom, sadness, anxiety, or even happiness. It’s common when emotionally eating to consume high-calorie, high-sugar, or high-fat foods, and to eat until you feel full, regardless of whether you’re hungry or not. Notice what feelings come up when reading that. Are they negative? Neutral? Positive? Emotional eating has long been described as an “unhealthy” or “bad” behavior. The problem with that is as long as it’s seen as a bad thing to be an “emotional eater,” you’ll likely never experience having a healthy emotional relationship with food.
What Causes Emotional Eating?
Emotional eating can be caused by a variety of factors, including stress, trauma, depression, anxiety, and low self-esteem. It can also be a learned behavior that's reinforced over time. For example, if you were rewarded with food as a child or turned to food for comfort during times of stress, you may have learned to associate food with comfort and pleasure. Here’s a kicker: regardless of trauma, self-esteem, or previous reinforced behavior, every human being has some sort of emotional relationship with food. Everyone has their favorite foods. Everyone derives pleasure from food in some way (if you let yourself). So why do some people “struggle” with emotional eating, while other’s don’t?
Breaking the Cycle: Emotional Eating
If you're struggling with emotional eating, there are several steps you can take to break the cycle:
Eliminate restriction: If you restrict your food intake in any way (amount, type, timing, etc.) emotional eating will become a moment you “let your guard down.” When that happens, you’re significantly more likely to feel out of control around food and disconnected from your body. That makes it difficult to enjoy the food you are eating, which completely destroys the concept of eating for comfort.
Expand your coping toolkit: Turning to food for momentary comfort is a normal human experience. However, if you’re consistently turning to food for comfort, the root of your issue will not be solved. Again, there’s nothing wrong with needing some temporary relief, but at some point you will need to diversify your coping skills.
Reduce self-judgment: Judging yourself for emotionally eating will ruin the experience. Emotional eating is meant to provide temporary comfort and joy. Placing judgment on that experience will surely eliminate any comfort and joy that is meant to be present and you’ll just be left with guilt and shame.
Notice what might be missing: Think about why you tend to turn to food when experiencing discomfort. What’s missing? Love? Acceptance? Excitement? Entertainment? Joy? Companionship? How can you work towards adding what’s missing into your life?
Emotional eating can be a challenging experience to navigate, but with the right strategies and compassion, it's possible to work with it. By eliminating restriction, expanding your coping toolkit, reducing self-judgment, and noticing what might be missing, you can break the cycle of emotional eating and improve your well-being. Remember, it’s entirely normal and beautiful to have an emotional relationship with food. Embrace it!