In this past Wednesday’s blog post I opened up about my struggles lately with emotional & stress eating. I know a lot of people can relate to this and struggle with night eating and binge eating as well. Today, I’d like to share a few tips to deal with the emotional eating struggle.
My tips to help deal with emotional & stress eating (in no particular order)…
- Find someone to talk to about your feelings (a friend, Dr, psychiatrist, counselor).
- Ask yourself WHY you’re eating. Is it to fill a void emotionally? Is it to procrastinate working on a project? Is it to self-sabotage yourself? Are you happy or sad?
- Try to keep busy… take a walk, do some yoga, or call a friend.
- Ask yourself if you’re REALLY physically hungry. If yes, then try to enjoy whatever it is that you’re eating.
Foods and tips for when your eating is just out of control… and you need to eat something – now!! #allofthefood
Sometimes you have the best intentions, but you just end up falling down the hole and keep stuffing food into your face. Here are some tips to help minimize the damage and potential feelings of guilt:
- Figure out what your trigger foods are & keep them out of the house. If that’s not possible, don’t make them as accessible. For example, nut butter is a big one of mine, but I don’t want to go without it completely, so I put the jar in the fridge (somewhat of a deterrent for me). Cold and thicker PB just isn’t quite as appealing as the warm gooey stuff.
- Keep fresh veggies on hand to snack on. I sometimes keep raw green beans around to snack on since you can eat a lot without many carbs and/or calories.
- Edamame is another thing I like to snack on at night. I buy the frozen organic edamame in pods & warm them, salt them, then snack on them. They’re full of protein, take time to de-shell & eat, so they keep my hands & mouth busy for awhile.
- If you eat grains – organic popcorn in coconut oil and sea salt may be an option. The fiber will help fill you & you can eat quite a large amount for the calories.
- A few warmed cheese curds with a bit of garlic salt on them taste AMAZING & help to satisfy the craving for something decadent and salty.
- Fruit: I always keep a fruit basket in plain sight for easy accessibility, stocked up with apples, bananas, or pears, & cuties. If I’m feeling hungry I’ll typically reach for a piece of fruit first – it often satisfies the sweet craving & is a snack that has fiber & nutrients.
- Drinks: I sometimes try reaching for a LaCroix sparkling water, Zevia, or kombucha. Often times the carbonation helps fill me up & satisfies the need to eat or drink something.
Obviously, all of my tips may not work for you, but some of them sometimes help me when I’m feeling like stress eating and/or emotional eating at night. The BEST solution is going to be getting to the bottom of WHY you do it and other constructive ways to deal with your issues.
The bottom line is – realize that you’re important and worthwhile… don’t hurt & sabotage yourself with overeating and eating your stress or emotions. I think this quote from Dr. Gail Dines says a LOT about today’s society: “If tomorrow, women woke up and decided they really liked their bodies, just think how many industries would go out of business.” We all need to work on loving ourselves & the bodies we have now, feeding them good food with love.
