What's Really Going on With Emotional Eating?

Generally, most of us are emotional eaters. It just depends on how much of a negative impact it's having on us and how much control we feel like food has in our lives or over us. Hey there and welcome to let's Talk about it with Laurie Streeter. A space to talk honestly and get real about mental health, therapy and all things wellness. I'm Laurie, licensed therapist, speaker and your host, here to bring you insights, tools and information you can actually use, whether you're navigating anxiety, healing your relationship with food, or trying to figure out which techniques will work for your life. I'm so glad you're here. Let's dive in and let's talk about it. Welcome back to another episode of let's Talk about it with Laurie Streeter. I'm Laurie, and today we are diving into the topic of emotional eating. We celebrate with food. We comfort other people with food. We comfort ourselves with food. We eat when we're bored. We eat at the end of the day. We wake up and think about food, like food is such an integral part of our lives. And when people feel like they're an emotional eater, they tend to not have a healthy relationship with food and they feel like it has too much control over their lives but is also too closely tied to their emotions. So we want to define it, take a look at it. We're going to take a deep dive today and also look at how do we shift our relationship with food so that if emotions, nutritional eating is something you struggle with, that you can leave here today with some tools and feeling a little more in control of your own emotions rather than constantly turning to your eating habits and food to feel like you need those to regulate. So I want you to just sit for a minute. If you're driving, just listen, please don't close your eyes while you're driving. But if you can close your eyes and just picture this scenario for a minute, I'm going to paint a picture because this is something I hear a lot. So picture this. You are at the end of your day, you're finally on the couch. It's been a long day. You're relaxing. You have been on all day. Maybe you worked or you had meetings at the schools or in your community. You had a balanced dinner. You felt pretty good. You made quote, unquote, good, good decisions all day because you ate good all day and now you're exhausted and your brain won't stop. You want to relax, but all you can think about is the bags of chips in your pantry or suddenly you're laser focused on the ice cream in the freezer and it's 8:30. The day has gone well, but now there's less structure. It's quiet time. You're trying to relax and all you can think about is a snack and you're trying to white knuckle your way through the moment, but it feels like a snack is the only thing that might take the edge off the food noise just won't stop. So you grab the snack, plow through some carbs, and at some point the guilt hits and now you're pissed at yourself. Why? Why did I do this? Why do I always do this? Why do I do good all day and then at the end of the day, I quote unquot, ruin it all? If you hear yourself in that scenario at all, this episode is definitely for you. It is a very common scenario that I hear from a lot of my clients. And the worst part is that they then feel like a failure. They feel like they're weak. They feel like they did quote unquote again so good all day and then ruined it, or they were so proud of themselves because they ate good or they ate on their plan or they stuck to their goals and then everything unraveled at the end of the day, or they just ran out of willpower. Emotional eating is a coping mechanism when there is high emotion, when we're stressed, when we're bored, when there's lack of structure. Emotional eating is a coping mechanism for people. The frustrating part about emotional eating being a coping mechanism is it's often paired with an unhealthy relationship with food. So now you're like beholdened to the way you eat and it causes so much stress. Again, if you heard yourself in any part of that scenario, you are not alone. And it is something that I hear so often. Often. So let's take a moment to define emotional eating and, and what it really means, because it's something that a lot of people deal with and can relate to, but it's, it's really something that's difficult to put into words and, and explain to other people when they just don't get it. So emotional eating basically means that you're eating for reasons other than physical hunger, which is ultimately a lot of our behavior around food. I. Very few people do. I know. I think I've met a couple people in my ent life who purely see food as fuel and they literally eat to live. Everybody else I know, including myself, there's some kind of emotional aspect to food. So we generally, most of us are Emotional eaters. It just depends on how much of a negative impact it's having on us and how much control we feel like food has in our lives or over us. And again, how healthy or unhealthy our relationship with food is. So if we take that a step further and talk about emotional eating in terms of the stress it can create for someone, I explain it to my clients as using food for comfort, stress relief, distraction rewards, and even as a way to manage boredom. So it's not about the food you're eating, like chips and salsa versus cookies or salad. It's the role that food has when it comes to you trying to regulate any kind of discomfort you're experiencing. A couple common statements. I hear a lot from people who talk about emotional eating and say they're emotional eaters and that they struggle with this are I wish I had more willpower and my diet starts tomorrow or some version of that, right? Some iteration of my diet starts tomorrow or Monday or January 1st or whatever it is. When people say I wish I had more willpower, they're thinking that their emotional eating is going to be solved by having more willpower, right? Having more motivation. But emotional eating isn't solved by white knuckling it through the stressor and just having more willpower. It's about learning how to manage again that discomfort that you're struggling with. And then the my diet starts tomorrow or whatever version maybe you've said to yourself about that Diets tend to have a temporary connotation and they can fuel emotional eating. So when we restrict that increases food noise. And the more rules we have around food, the more or the higher tendency we have to trigger binge eating or to trigger overeating or to trigger more emotional eating. So the whole idea of like my diet starts tomorrow again is this concept that if I have a specific plan, I'm gonna white knuckle it and I'm gonna eat on plan. But then what happens when you're stressed? Right? We still need other ways to cope with life. So if we look at the connection between your mood and food, when you feel stressed or anxious, you feel like you're on edge, there's discomfort that you're experiencing, and naturally we look for ways to manage that discomfort to down regulate our nervous system. I feel bored, I feel angry, I feel sad, I want to make myself feel better. Like that makes sense, that's fine. And usually struggles with food are long standing people who talk about emotional eating or having a poor relationship with food. It did not just start last week. Right. My clients who struggle with this stuff, these have been going on for years, probably decades. Using food to cope with discomfort is not something that just like pops up overnight. It's something that we can often track back. So learning how to manage your emotions and discomfort is, is key to learning how to shift your relationship with food and then change the way you relate to it and establish different ways to cope. So when you're upset, bored, angry, sad, and you reach for food to feel better, you do alleviate anxiety or the stress or the discomfort in the moment. You give yourself a little dopamine hit and you allow temporary relief that happens, ooh, I feel better. You've alleviated the discomfort in that moment, but it doesn't truly teach you how to manage the discomfort or the struggle that you're experiencing. It's the feelings in the moment. But it doesn't change anything long term. And now you're only reinforcing that. Food is a great solution. So when we continue to use food to cope, we continue to like, negatively reinforce this idea that, hey, food's a great solution and we don't allow ourselves to figure out other ways, work through the discomfort of using a different way to cope other than food. So it's like immediate gratification versus long term benefit. I feel uncomfortable. I tried to journal, maybe I went for a walk. I'm still thinking about the chips in the pantry, so I eat them. Because that's immediate gratification. Yes. I tried a couple things to alleviate the anxiety or stress or whatever it was. I felt like it didn't work. And then the food did the trick. But I'm reinforcing that. Food does the trick, right? I need to figure out long term how to actually manage those emotions more effectively. So food has less power for me. So I want to touch on something specifically really quick before we move on. I mentioned boredom. When my clients explain their emotional eating to me so many times, they are also describing eating from a place of boredom and they don't even realize it. When we talk about emotions, think about boredom, we think about sadness or grief or anger or stress or anxiety. But so often boredom is a huge piece of it. And those are those times when you're watching TV at the end of the day and mindlessly snacking, or all of a sudden the food noise hits and you're laser focused on what you can eat. Boredom is an emotion. It is a state that we have that can cause apathy, lack of focus, uncertainty, et cetera. So it's usually for most people that I Experience at the end of the day when tasks are done, maybe the kids are in bed, there's some free time, and your mind starts to wander. Maybe you're watching tv and the boredom is what triggers the eating. The boredom is what triggers the food noise. You don't have to fill every moment of your day with things to do to make sure that you don't get bored. But if this sounds like you, you could probably benefit a bit more structure in the evenings or changing up your routine so that you can interrupt those typical patterns and establish a new way to round out your day. I'm telling you, a lot of different feelings and stressors can trigger the emotional eating. But boredom is largely overlooked and underestimated. Just something to keep in mind that if that sounds like you, it might be something to kind of think about a little more. So let's talk about like the mind body loop that we have with emotional eating and then what we're gonna do to manage it. How do we cope more effectively? This mind body loop that we get in, for example, when you're stressed, you experience a craving. So you reach for what you know, right? Maybe your food of choice. And usually that's something that you've identified that can help take the edge off or that will create the relief, that immediate gratification for you in that mom. You get a temporary calm from it, or a temporary high or happiness or joy. And then possibly additional feelings and thoughts start to come in. We see the guilt and the frustration and the thoughts that sound like, why do I always do this? Why can't I just get it together? Oh my God, I have to start over again tomorrow. So the frustration comes in because you didn't really alleviate whatever the discomfort was that was happening. Emotional eating isn't about the food. It's what's underneath the food. That mind body loop is, I feel something, I eat. That's what I've identified that has helped in the past. That's my pattern. So I eat, I have temporary relief, and now I have frustration. Now I'm upset with myself. And the feelings, the stress, the thoughts, the things in life that are possibly out of alignment, the boredom, those are all the things that are causing the chronic stress and anxiety, the things that really aren't truly being addressed that you're addressing with the food. So we have this loop that's constantly going on. I have an increase of anxiety or stress. I know food works. So I'm going to give in to the craving. I feel temporary relief, then I have frustration and guilt and whatever, all the thoughts that come with it. And now I'm down on myself and why do I always do this? And then I go to bed and I wake up and I try to start over again the next day. And then anxiety or boredom or whatever it is comes up again. And now I'm in that same loop. So if that sounds like you, we have to find a way to break the loop and fracture the patterns that while they work, they're not the most effective thing. Because if it was super effective and you loved it, you might not be relating to this episode right now. Right. You wouldn't feel the frustration or the guilt or being irritated with yourself about your relationship with food. So what do we do to better manage all of this? What do we do about emotional eating? One of the first things I teach my clients is to create awareness around their relationship with food. People can say, I struggle with emotional eating. I eat too much, I have binge eating habits. I'm a nighttime eater. People know what they do, but they don't have a ton of awareness, really around what's going on internally when it comes to food. So one of the ways I do this is that we take a moment before they're about to eat, whether it's a planned meal or a random trip to the kitchen on a Tuesday night. And I teach them to stop and create a little bit of window for themselves to check in. So you can do this and ask yourself, how am I feeling right now? What am I about to do? What am I about to eat? Am I stressed? Is there something happening that I need to manage in a different way? When you are about to eat again, whether it's planned or not, and you train yourself to check in, you start to have awareness around what's going on. And now with more awareness, we can create a pattern interruption. With more awareness, we can make different decisions. So if there is something going on, you can make a different decision or manage your stress or that feeling in a different way and implement a technique that works for you or you've worked on with your therapist or I've worked on with my clients. And over time, this helps reinforce other ways to cope. But if we always give in to that immediate gratification and always turn to food, we're reinforcing that. Food is the solution, and food is the answer. We want to create that awareness right before we're about to eat to figure out what is truly needed in that moment. And if we need to make a different decision, if we need that pattern interrupt. So the Emotional eating, it has to be addressed. And it's not effectively addressed by ignoring it, white knuckling it, or restricting your food intake. It's addressed by figuring out what the triggers are and establishing more effective ways to cope. And you have to remember the goal isn't perfection here. There's nights where I wander into the kitchen and I'm like, I want what I want and I'm having it. More often than not, I don't. And I have other ways to be like, wait, what's going on right now? Is this boredom? Do I just not have any structure? Am I tired? Is there. Am I stressed? Right? Is there something else going on right now, why I'm wandering into the kitchen and I'm not physically hungry? So this isn't about perfection. And you might not remember to stop and think every time, but I tell my clients all the time, you might have that moment where you say, forget you, Lori. I'm eating this anyway, like I just described. And that's okay. We're not robots. This is about raising your awareness and making changes over time and shifting how you relate to food so that you feel like you have more control over your life instead of food having control over you and it always being the thing that you turn to for comfort or regulation. The word control has such a negative connotation, but it can be used in a positive way. When we feel out of control, that can create a lot of anxiety. So being able to shift your relationship and how you relate to food and feeling like you do have more control over your reactions is a good thing. This isn't a bad thing. I don't want you to think about control in a negative way. It's all about your perspective and how you use that terminology. We want to feel like we have control over our emotions and our decisions instead of, like I said, food constantly having control over you and what you do and how you cope. You have to remember, emotional eating is a signal. It's a reminder that something's up, right? Something's going on that you're not maybe dealing with or you're not aware of or that you're not coping with more effectively. If you're not managing stress or you've developed maladaptive coping mechanisms, or you have things in your life that are out of alignment or not being tended to, like issues in a relationship or struggles at work or whatever it is, your mind and body are constantly going to try to get your attention. And so if you struggle with emotional eating, it could be a signal that something's going on. Maybe you're aware of it, maybe you're not. If you are someone who calls yourself an emotional eater, I really encourage you to seek support because we can interrupt these patterns. We can do something about this. It is going to take time and effort and resources. Learn to raise your awareness around your habits. That is going to be the first step. Figure out ways to help you cope with what is truly going on in the moment. If you find yourself trying to get through these kinds of moments and always resorting to food, change is possible. It can happen. Like I said, it will take some effort and and time to undo years of these patterns. But you don't have to continue feeling like you're constantly at the mercy of food and your feelings. Like I said, these are things for my clients and most people I know that didn't just crop up yesterday. These are long standing struggles and unhealthy relationships with food. So it's going to take some time and feeling like you're at the mercy of food and your emotions and can be undone. You just need the right support. Take a breath. This isn't going to be undone overnight. Even if you start to address it, it's going to take some time. There's going to be setbacks. Remember, we're not going for perfection here. We're not robots. This is going to take effort and time and patience. Patience is so huge when it comes to creating change and shifting our habits and shifting your relationship with food and how you relate to it. So just take a breath and know that help is available. I love to know your thoughts on this episode. Tag me on Instagram, share your thoughts where you're listening from, and I always enjoy seeing what you're up to. Until next time, take care of yourself. Thanks for hanging out with me today on let's Talk about it with Laurie Streeter. If this episode resonated with you, it would mean so much if you'd leave a five star review, share it with a friend, or come say hi on Instagram. Lori Streeter, your support will help this podcast grow and I so appreciate you being here today. I want to help people just like you feel like they're not alone and gain the tools they need to grow. Until next time, take care.