Emotional Eating - Separating Your Feelings

Emotional Eating and separating your feelings can be difficult. Why Do You Eat When You Aren't Hungry?

Stress and boredom, among other things trigger your feelings. You turn to food for comfort, how do you overcome that?

This is a problem that you don't see happening to you.

But you learned very young that food is associated with love. As a baby being fed by your mother, when you were a child being rewarded for something good and even if you were upset, you'd get a special meal or treat to make you feel better.

As you grew up, you remember the good feelings associated with food. Your emotions turn on the hunger key and you use food for comfort.

The major triggers of emotional eating are depression, anger, boredom, loneliness, frustration and anxiety.

First Step - Aware of Your Eating Patterns

Do you over eat from boredom or stress at work? Do you over eat because you're anxious or nervous at social functions? Do you over eat from feeling bad because you didn't do something you were supposed to do?

Start a food journal, record what and when you eat, and how you felt. This gives you the patterns to help you determine if you are an emotional eater.

Once you are aware of the problems causing you to emotionally eat, things will start looking better. You'll be able to evaluate and understand the emotions causing you to eat when you aren't hungry. You can then deal with these emotions and overcome emotional eating.

Substituting Activities For Emotional Eating

Exercise
Relieve anxiety and stress through physical fitness.You not only feel great but it's a great benefit to your health.

Get Support
Call a friend or family member you trust. Getting support is a big help.

Walking
Go for a nice long walk…take the dog if you have one.

Wash the Car
You'll get exercise plus a chore done.

Try Meditation
Go to a quiet place where there is no food or disruption. Visualize yourself somewhere you'd love to be like the beach. Relax and let the urge pass and the stress fly out the window.

Run Errands
Get out of the house and go run your errands. You can forget your problems and accomplish some things you need to do at the same time.

Make a list of other things to do, anything not associated with food. If you're busy doing something, the urge to eat usually passes. Make sure to add things you really enjoy doing as well!

Don't expect everything to change over night... You've started... keep working towards your goal.

Books for Emotional Eating

When Food Is Food and Love Is Love: A Step-by-Step Spiritual Program to Break Free from Emotional Eating

Emotional Eating: What You Need to Know Before Starting Your Next Diet

Shrink Yourself: Break Free from Emotional Eating Forever

Breaking Free from Emotional Eating

Life Is Hard, Food Is Easy: The 5-Step Plan to Overcome Emotional Eating and Lose Weight on Any Diet

"Achieving A Healthy Lifestyle For Women's Health and Fitness"