Emotional Eating – A Favorite Disguise For Anxiety
After all, all of us know how hunger feels. When your stomach is empty and you need something in your mouth, you are hungry. Of course, you can identify situations where you are really hungry after not eating for a while. But do you know how to distinguish it from emotional eating?
Experts do not recommend being hungry. They also don’t recommend not eating for more than four hours, even if it’s a snack. But we don’t always eat because we are hungry. Sometimes we eat to mask our feelings. Stress, sadness, anxiety… They try to hide behind unhealthy food that only makes you feel worse in the long run.
Do you want to stop the vicious cycle of eating evil where you feel better and then guilty because you eat? I encourage you to learn how to differentiate between emotional hunger and lack of energy due to lack of body energy. Take the bull by the horns and learn to recognize the signs of emotional eating. Then you can take control of your life and eating habits.
Let’s get acquainted with some of the characteristics of emotional eating.
1. Himot
Emotional hunger never asks you to eat a plate of vegetables or a salad. Usually, it prompts you to eat high-calorie and low-nutrient foods. You crave sweets or food that is high in saturated fats. In other words, junk food.
2. It is unsatisfactory
When you find yourself hungry, you usually know how much food you need to eat. However, in emotional eating, you can eat so much until you are too full. Emotional eating limits the feeling of satiety. As a result, we don’t feel full until until long after we really are.
3. It tries to fill the vacuum
This vacuum is not in the stomach itself. It responds to some kind of mental imbalance. Instead of trying to figure out what the problem is, we bury it under all the food we eat to try to feel better. The relief is momentary and lasts as long as it takes time to digest. But it is not a sustainable solution. When it’s over, we’ll probably feel even worse.
4. It pressures you to eat alone
People almost never devour food when eating with others. Binge eating is a kind of ritual that is practiced when alone. Often this binge eating is caused by loneliness itself. However, you may do it on occasions such as weddings or birthdays to hide your feelings.
5. It makes you feel guilty
You know very well that you don’t need that chip bag. Chips make your cholesterol rise, they are full of saturated fats and on top of that, you are not even hungry. You know it, but you can’t overcome lust. When we eat this kind of food, we feel guilty. We feel the need to punish ourselves for losing control.
6. It’s whimsical
When you eat to satisfy emotional hunger, you do it without thinking about it more specifically. It’s whimsical. You go to the store and buy everything that looks good at that very moment.
7. It is used to evade obligations
You have to go to work, you promised to go to the gym or study… But you don’t feel like it at all and you stay home. Deep down, you know you haven’t done what you said you were doing. Anxiety doesn’t last long when it’s already knocking on your door and keeping you company. That’s the moment you go to the fridge. You are looking for something you crave, something that will calm you down.
When you have eaten something bad for your health, you realize that you are only feeling worse. Now you feel guilty about two things – you haven’t fulfilled your duty and surrendered to your lust. In addition, you realize that while you were eating, you did not feel anxiety. So you go back to the fridge to get more… and repeat this until you are very, very full.
Ideas for satisfying emotional eating without riding the fridge
All those qualities are related to emotional eating. You just have to study them in your own ways to identify the problem. Then it is time to fight that problem. Here are some ideas to help you.
1. Try to eat something healthy
If you want to eat but think it’s due to emotional eating, test it by eating something healthy. If you are not physically hungry, you will either either eat or become full very quickly. Your body tells you it’s not really what you want. Then you know for sure that that feeling of hunger is not genuine.
2. Think about what might be causing the problem
When you know that the feeling you are experiencing is lust and not real hunger, think about what could be the crux of the problem. Do you feel anxiety at work? Do you have interpersonal problems? Have you been running around all day without stopping at all?
3. Exercise
Exercising helps in two ways. First, it is a way to release negative emotions. Exercise produces endorphins that improve mood. Endorphins also help in the fight against anxiety. After exercise, your body needs energy and will be excited to get healthy food.
4. Make a meal plan
This will help you avoid whimsical eating. If you keep track of when and how you eat, you’ll get a better idea of when you really need to eat more. This makes it harder for your body to trick you. Plus, you’ve already pre-selected what you’re going to eat, so it’s more likely to be a more sensible decision.
5. Indulge in your lusts every now and then
Although emotional eating usually means junk food, it’s a good idea to surrender to your cravings every now and then. Just make sure it doesn’t become a habit.
6. Eat with others
When you eat with others, you eat more slowly. Plus, you probably won’t focus solely on your problems. Another benefit is that you share the pleasure between the company and the food you eat. So it is not necessary to continue eating to feel better.
7. Don’t use food as a reward
Sometimes when you’ve had a bad day, you try to make yourself feel better by eating junk food. You say to yourself, “I deserve this”. If you get used to healing a bad day with junk food, you won’t be able to focus on developing healthier eating habits.
8. Seek help for the mental problems that lie beneath
Be it a friend, family member, partner or professional, look for someone who can help you. Your attempt to hide the problem and cope with it alone has not worked.
9. Think before you buy junk food
Why am I buying this? Do I really need this?
10. Make a shopping list of what you really need
And don’t buy anything other than what the list says. We don’t usually write our desires on the list. They tend to be impulses.
The best method is definitely to be aware of the real needs of your body and to know that they correspond to your physical or mental body. It is important to actively deal with difficult mental situations. You need to find out the cause and then decide how to deal with it. Instead of eating your emotions, work on a physically and mentally healthy life.
