Emotional or stress eating is more common than you think. It means you binge eat or overeat due to reasons bothering you emotionally. A lot of things happen in a single day, and not all of them goes according to how we want them to or in a planned way. A tiff with a close friend, break up with a lover, family issues, office workload are some of those things that might lead to the mounting stress and pressure on your life. Many a time, we are unable to share our feelings, thoughts, and emotions with someone and which paves a way for emotional eating. Excessively over thinking about an issue, circumstance or person and not being able to do anything about it is a big part of emotional dependency on food. It literally means filling up your emotions on food. This habit can get out of control and even lead to obesity if not paid a heed to. This habit is a pretty unhealthy one as it usually involves gorging on fast food mostly. People tend to prefer food that appeals to their taste buds when they're low because they think that good food can satisfy their emotional turbulence somehow and satitate their appetite.
A lot of people who become upset or stay sad for a while due to some reason turn to this unhealthy habit of emotional eating. This issue must be immediately dealt with if you or a close one is going through as it can lead to serious health issues such as obesity, weight gain, a collection of harmful toxins in the body, slow metabolism, irritability, loss of concentration, etc. Emotional eating or what is popularly known as stress eating basically has little to do with hunger. People tend to lose control of what and how much they are having once they are emotionally upset and tend to satisfy this emotional stress by filling up on mouth-watering delicacies or simple overeating. People who take up emotional eating or have been feasting on food (read junk food) more than their requirement for a long time, mostly seem to come out as having a casual outlook on what they are doing to their bodies. They couldn’t care less about the ways in which they are constantly destroying their bodies by feeding it with an unnecessary amount of food or unhealthy treats! Stress eating can be temporary as well. Some people tend to overeat and overindulge when they are extremely sad or upset over a temporary matter, and some people tend to do the same when they are extremely happy. Temporary stress eating involves overindulging over a short period of time, mostly ranging from a day to a week.
If the habit of stress eating is not paid a heed to and continues for a long period of time, it can even cause an eating disorder. An eating disorder is a serious illness that must be attended to as soon as you start noticing the signs and symptoms in the person. When a person starts becoming obsessed with food, it can cause a serious change in a person’s eating habits, making a person obsess or binge eat almost every day. The person becomes so drowned in his stress that he forgets to pay attention to the damage that he is causing to his own body. If you see a family member or a closed one make a change in his food habits or notice an unhealthy increase in their appetite, talk to them and help them out. There might be something eating them on the inside which they would be compensating by filling up on grubs, thinking that they deserve to ‘treat themselves’ with sumptuous food after a long day, which is a not just unhealthy but impractical.
#1. Realize Your Habits
To treat a disease, you first need to spot it. Notice the signs and symptoms or the drastic change in your appetite and weight gain that you might have undergone over a period of time. Pay close heed to the matters that you doubt, there might be a cause of the development of this habit. If it is a new relationship or your new job, unless you get rid of it or deal with it, then there’s a very less chance that this unhealthy habit might go away on its own. If it’s a toxic relationship, end it. If it's a new job where you are forced to work on things that you do not like or is making you rethink your life choices, then take a stand and find solutions to your problem rather than covering the situation emotionally by indulging on binge eating.
#2. Distract Yourself
Now that you have realized the problem that has been causing you to act this way, the next step involves keeping yourself occupied that’ll distract you from eating too much without even knowing. Join a gym, do yoga or keep yourself busy with work in order to avoid unnecessarily filling up on grubs. We often confuse getting bored with getting hungry. Consuming too much food may cause your body to change physically, hormonally and metabolically. Before gorging on a pack of nachos, ask yourself if you are really hungry or just doing it for the sake of boredom or out of workload and stress.
#3. Put Your Energies To Good Use
If you get annoyed over petty things and cannot get hold of an outlet to utilize this energy and take up stressed binge eating to compensate, rethink. Exercise is proven to be one of the best ways to get rid of not just toxins, but stress as well. Working out can be a stress buster and also a distraction if you keep idle most of the day. Work on your body instead of destroying it by feeding it with unhealthy junk food, sodas, and sugar-filled juices. A healthy body leads to a healthy mind, and after you start working out or working on your body, you will automatically start to focus on your quality and quantity of food intake as well.
#4. Seek Professional Help
If you have been a victim of uncontrollable binge eating or stress eating for a long time and the effects have started showing on your body, seek professional help on the matter. Old habits die hard, and now that you wish to quit, you might not be able to as your body has now adjusted itself to this amount of food intake. Changes in metabolism will also take place. Most of these things cannot be controlled by us, and we might need to seek a therapist on the matter. People suffering from obesity cannot simply cut off their food and expect to gain results from it. Sometimes a death of a closed one or a family member may also cause a person to resort to stress eating. Your body is a complex system and when sometimes things go out of hand or some things take place that is not in your control and shows up unexpectedly, seeking professional help on the matter seems to be the best option.
#5. Get To The Root Of Your Problem
If something specific is behind the development of your unhealthy habit, get to the root of it. Eradicating the problem from its roots will give you a clear view and a peaceful mind to carry on regarding the rest of the matters, which is crucial in order to avoid falling into this pit. If a fight, breakup or a family issue has been causing you to stress eat, talk it out to the person regarding the matter if possible. If talking to that person is not possible, then talk matters over with a loved one or a therapist.
#6. Have A Look In The Mirror
The effects of overeating are pretty clear on the body and in order to begin your treatment and gather motivation, take a look in the mirror. Think deep as to how your impulsive decisions caused your body to become the way that it is. Obesity is a serious issue that must be treated soon as developing an ignorant attitude on the matter can also lead to death in some cases. The effects of overeating not just constitute of obesity. Increase in appetite will cause an obvious weight gain, which may continue until taken care of.
#7. Indulge In Healthy Foods
If you have recently decided to treat this issue in your life and are finding it difficult to cut on the appetite, opt for alternatives. Binge eat on healthy foods such as fruits, home-cooked meal, boiled vegetables, etc., which will not just help in filling up the amount you used to earlier feed yourself with, but also help you lose weight, which is a win-win! Your body requires nutrients and vitamins for its proper growth, and by indulging on healthy alternatives, you are not just feeding your body with what it requires to survive but also taking a step towards making a healthy choice!
#8. Pay Close Heed To The Guilt Trip
Once you binge on your favorite outlet and treat yourself with a bucket of ice-cream and munchies along, pay heed to the guilt trip you encounter later on. Do not ignore your thoughts on being guilty of stress eating as it can actually help you avoid gorging unhealthily a lot lesser. The next time you think of going to your favorite junk food outlet on a healthy stomach, rethink your decision. If you have developed this habit of unhealthy binge eating at the office, where sitting at the desk for 8 hours and one meal makes you feel like you are starving to death, carry your own food from home. You can carry boiled eggs, fruits and your own lunch for that matter. A home-cooked meal is high on energy and less on fat as compared to junk food, as the latter is filled up with fat and is seemingly low on energy, which might also affect your productivity!
Here are a few tips on recognizing stress eating and dealing with it. If it was helpful, leave a comment below!
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