Tired, Stressed, and Snacking? How to Break the Emotional Eating Cycle

Who hasn’t done a little stress-eating at some point when the pressure’s on? Unfortunately, just one binge-eating session with your favorite potato chips can evolve into a cycle that’s difficult to break. In addition to the guilt and low self-esteem, the results of emotional eating can lead to extra pounds.

If you’re currently trying to lose weight, emotional eating can disrupt your efforts. However, once you understand what emotional eating is, you can take steps to curb it and develop a healthier relationship with food.

What Is Emotional Eating?

A person typically engages in emotional eating not because they’re physically hungry, but to alleviate or suppress negative feelings, like boredom, sadness, anger, anxiety, or loneliness. Significant life events, such as a loved one’s death or relational dissolution, can trigger emotional eating, as can everyday experiences, like fatigue, boredom, relational conflict, or stress.

For many people, emotional eating can feel like self-medication. It may seem to provide relief or escape from negative emotions, but its effects are temporary. It’s also important to note that not everyone binge-eats when facing stress or other stressors; they may instead reduce their food intake.

The Harmful Effects of Emotional Eating

Turning to food during emotional distress can eventually become habitual. When eating becomes your first response to a difficult or complex emotion, you can fall into an emotional eating cycle:

1. You already feel guilty and powerless about emotional eating.
2. You experience a strong negative emotion in response to an adverse event.
3. You feel an urge to reach for something to eat.
4. You eat more than you should, often something unhealthy.
5. Emotional eating contributes to the guilt and powerlessness you already feel about food.

This cycle makes it increasingly difficult to turn to healthier ways of dealing with challenging emotions, such as journaling, taking a walk, or talking to a trusted friend or licensed therapist. Without positive coping mechanisms, it gets increasingly difficult to drop pounds or manage your current weight.

Ways to Halt the Emotional Eating Cycle

When you recognize a tendency to eat emotionally, it becomes easier to get this pattern under control and even reach your weight-loss goals. One of the most critical steps to arresting emotional eating is to understand the differences between emotional and physical hunger:

Being able to spot the triggers of emotional hunger makes it easier to stop yourself before you automatically grab that donut. Instead, you can try other strategies to stop emotional eating in its tracks:

• Try deep breathing or a yoga pose if stress is triggering your cravings.
• Write down what you eat in a food diary, how hungry you are every time you eat, and how you’re feeling. Over time, you might see some patterns that shed light on the connection between your emotions and food.
• Ask yourself, “Am I really hungry?” Give yourself a few minutes to let your cravings subside.
• Get rid of any tempting foods at home, and don’t include them on your grocery list.
• Maintain a support network, and identify a few individuals you can turn to when your emotions seem overwhelming.
• If boredom is a common trigger, try distracting yourself with a walk or calling a friend for a chat.
• Don’t be hard on yourself if you emotionally eat. Think back to what triggered it and learn from the experience. Strive for progress, not perfection.

Medical Support for Weight Loss and Emotional Eating

Kicking the emotional eating habit can be challenging, especially if you’re trying to lose weight. If you’re looking to shed some extra pounds and struggle with emotional eating, a systemized weight loss plan from Happy Hormone Cottage can help you stay on track and achieve long-lasting results. Our holistic Weight Management Program includes weight loss medication, supplementation, lifestyle and diet recommendations, and regular check-ins to monitor your progress and make adjustments to your plan as needed.

Start your weight loss journey today! Send us a message, or call our weight loss coordinator at 513-788-3191 to set up a FREE discovery call and learn more about our program. We have locations in both Cincinnati and Dayton and can also schedule telehealth appointments.