09/19/22
#143 Emotional Eating
Many of my clients are emotional eaters. They use food to avoid doing things that they don't want to do or more often to avoid feeling things they don't want to feel or as a reward after a hard day or a good week.
This is a learnt behaviour pattern that often goes back to childhood. My Mum used to give me Maltesers when I fell over or when she had to get a splinter out of my finger. And there it was have Maltesers instead of crying!!
The dopamine hit that we get from hi glycemic foods was supposed to encourage us to eat more of them for survival. For instance to stock up on lots of sweet fruit before winter came. This obviously no longer serves us well.
Our brains will always seek short-term pleasure which is exactly what these foods give us, they light up the pleasure centre of our brain like cocaine! Making this behaviour addictive and hard to kick.
Our primal habit brain is a 2 million-year-old device designed to ensure survival it doesn't know that for most of us food security isn't an issue, although with rising food costs this may change!
To kick this we have to use our pre-frontal cortex or logical, thinking brain to overcome our inner labrador.
We have to learn to feel uncomfortable and learn to feel our emotions rather than trying to avoid them. We have to learn to process pain rather than eat our way through it.
At 63 I am finally in a state of emotional adulthood where I no longer need to use food as a crutch.
The odds are often stacked against us the food manufacturing industry has all the tricks to trigger you and to keep you hooked. They keep coming up with more and more hyper-processed hyper-palatable foods that human beings were never meant to eat or process.
It is hard but the first step is awareness. If you catch yourself eating when you aren't hungry- ask yourself why. Stop, have a drink of water and ask what it is you are trying to avoid. Know that the uncomfortable feeling of craving passes and will not kill you. You are stronger than that. You just have to relearn how to cope without using food.
If you need some help I have 5 spaces left on my Weight Loss - Mindset and Motivation program starting on Monday 3rd October.
If you struggle to control your thoughts, emotions and behaviour around food or you do really well and then fall off the wagon. This is the program for you.
With weekly videos and online coaching, this could change your life. Grab a spot now as it is filling up fast and is limited to 5 more students as the coaching is live.
Have a fabulous week,
Ginny
PS If you have any questions please don't hesitate to ask!
PPS Please pass this link on to anyone who you feel might benefit from some help.