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Emotional eating (or food addiction or stress eating, or comfort eating) is using food to suppress or soothe painful emotions, such as boredom, stress, anger, sadness and loneliness. Major life events or, even the hassles of daily life can trigger painful emotions that lead to emotional eating.
- Why Is Less Nutritious Food So Addictive? There’s a reason a bag of chips is so much tastier than a plate of carrot sticks and dip. Manufacturers who produce processed food have one goal in mind.
- Out of Sight, Out of Mind. Ever notice how quickly and easily you can finish a bowl of M&Ms when they’re right in front of you? One of the ways to help manage those cravings is to remove yourself from seeing the culprit in the first place.
- Stock Up on Nutritious Food. Focusing on improving your eating habits is a more positive and effective strategy than trying to stop eating processed food altogether.
- Try a Glass of Water. Before grabbing that last cookie from the lunch room, ask yourself whether you’re actually hungry or thirsty. It’s quite common for people to confuse signs of dehydration for hunger because the feelings of thirst are too subtle compared to those of hunger.
- Start an emotion diary. The more you understand your habits, the better. Eating in response to emotion can happen automatically. The more you understand how you feel when you do certain things, the better your chance at changing things.
- Find other ways to cope. Once you have more information about the emotions, situations, or thoughts that can trigger eating, you can start to make changes.
- Move your body. Moving your body can be a powerful way to manage stress and anxiety. Activity helps to reduce levels of stress hormones in your body. It also releases endorphins to give your mood a boost.
- Try mindfulness. Mindfulness has many benefits for mental health. It’s shown to be a powerful way to manage anxiety and depression. It has also been shown to reduce stress eating.
3 days ago · Put a stop to emotional and stress eating by identifying triggers, fighting cravings, and finding more satisfying ways to feed your feelings.
Do I need to distract myself from my emotional distress, emptiness, or boredom by turning to comfort food, or can I step back from them, experience them without resistance, and find a way to regulate them?
The first step to identifying emotional eating is to learn what situations or events trigger negative feelings for you and may tempt you to turn to food for comfort. Keeping a ‘ food and mood journal ‘ for a week can be a great way to help you identify patterns or triggers.
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Oct 19, 2023 · People who experience emotional eating may consume more calories than they need and eat convenient comfort foods that aren’t as nutritious. There are several ways you may be able to manage ...