Many
overweight people, especially us women, tend to eat to comfort ourselves. Believe
it or not, what we are doing is a considered to some as a psychological
disorder, a bad dietary habit known as emotional overeating. We eat certain foods to pacify negative
feelings such as anger, grief and disappointment. Emotional overeating can also be classified
as a reaction to stress.
EMOTIONS CAN MAKE YOU FAT
Emotional
overeating is not a big sin but it can make you fat. These a stressful times we
live in and when you were a kid your mom probably made you feel better about
bad things that happened to you during the day by giving you some kind of
treat. Usually it was something rich and laden with loads of carbs like ice
cream, cookies or potato chips.
STUFFING YOUR ANGER
A nickname
for emotional overeating is “stuffing your anger.” The urge to stuff our faces
is very primal and according to evolutionary biologists and comes from a time
when we felt very aggressive as we tore into our prey. Often overeating in women is related to
aggression or anger. Women are not allowed to display anger in this society as
it is considered unattractive so we express it by biting into food instead.
GUILT
The irony is
that most of us do not enjoy how we feel when we are “stuffing down our anger”
by overeating. They feel comforted but
guilty for letting themselves down at the same time. Many times, we don’t even
really taste the food while we are binge eating.
REBELLING
It is an act
of rebellion that backfires and makes us feel worse than before. This creates a
condition where you can become angry at yourself and you want to eat even more. The worst case scenario is the development of
a dangerous disorder such as anorexia or bulimia.
QUICK FIXES
Carbs, fat
and sugar can temporarily make you feel better emotionally because they have a
way of fueling the feel good chemicals in the brain. The problem is that this
is just a quick fix that wears off and has you craving yet more of the same
comfort foods to feel the same “high” again.
THERAPY
The only way
to stop emotional overeating is to figure out what life situations are
triggering your bad feelings and then try to get rid of those situations in
your life. You literally try to figure out “what’s eating you” so that you will
stop eating every time you feel lonely, frustrated, angry or sad. Recognizing
the source of the stress is half the battle because sometimes even if you
cannot get rid of the situation entirely you can at least catch yourself before
you react to it by overeating.
GET CONTROL
The good news
is that this is a type of behavior that you can control. Once you recognize the
situation that drives the emotion that in turn drives you to overeat you can
stop emotional overeating just the same way you can stop any other bad habit.
Talk to your
doctor if you think you are motivated to eat too much because of depression or
anxiety. You might be prescribed an antidepressant. However keep in mind that although the antidepressant
might stop compulsive or obsessive eating, the side effect of almost all of the
brands of antidepressants on the market is weight gain.
Labels: Fitness
