Recognizing and Controlling Emotional Eating to Lose Weight

Every one of my clients at one time or another discovers that over-eating is inexplicably tied to stressful periods in their day, month or year.

Awareness of "triggers" that inspire binges of consumption of food and drink is key to weight loss and weight control over a lifetime. So let's examine what defines emotional eating and we'll follow that with some lifestyle strategies that will help you to stay on track and avoid the pitfalls.
Most emotional eating begins with strong underlying emotions that drive the eating behavior.

1. Vengeful eating begins with some form of anger that the person cannot express overtly. Vengeful eaters often grab for crunchy/spicy foods like chips, salsa, hard cookies and will eat them for a period of time until either the anger passes, the food is gone or their conscience starts nattering at them to stop.

2. Sad eating begins with self-talk that occurs between the sadness and the first mouthful of food and often leads to "comfort foods" (often softer foods) such as ice cream, mom's old home cooking such as pies, sweets, extra helpings of potatoes, etc.

3. Celebratory eating occurs people find themselves in social situations and use food and alcohol to feed a happy mood or to "loosen up." After a drink or two, it is easy to graze on the appetizers and lose track....even so, a celebratory eater relies on food for comfort and finds it difficult to celebrate without food.

Do you recognize those times in your life that might cause you to overeat and if so, what can you do to minimize the damage? Here are some actions that have worked for others:

1) be sure to write down everything you eat in log or pad of paper, that way you can examine your habits and target change;
2) verbalize your feelings in a constructive way instead of holding your feelings inside;
3) unwind after work by doing easy stretches for 5 to 10 minutes while listening to music; 4) enlist support from friends or find a good counselor.

What other ideas work for you?
Denise C. Williams, CLC
denisew@lifestylesols.com