July 2014 - Are You An Emotional Eater?

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This is one of the first questions I ask my new weight-loss clients. More often than not, the answer is “yes”. We have all heard the expression that ideally we should eat to live, not live to eat -- that is, eat for nutrition, not emotional reward. Why does emotional eating affect so many people?

First off, eating in general brings up ancient feelings and programming in our DNA from our ancestral past. In more ancient times, gathering for a meal with tribal members and family was a deep form of connection and represented safety and well-being.

Many of us also have fond or comforting memories from childhood of certain kinds of food or treats that perhaps a favorite grandmother or aunt made us when we were feeling down. These connections are wired into your brain and control about 90% of your food choices and behaviors.

In addition, there’s the “pleasure center” of our brains. According to CNN Health online, “A new study in rats suggests that high-fat, high-calorie foods affect the brain in much the same way as cocaine and heroin. When rats consume these foods in great enough quantities, it leads to compulsive eating habits that resemble drug addiction.”

If you’ve ever felt out of control with your eating, there’s a reason. The same CNN article states: “Doing drugs such as cocaine and eating too much junk food both gradually overload the so-called pleasure centers in the brain, according to Paul J. Kenny, Ph.D., an associate professor of molecular therapeutics at the Scripps Research Institute in Jupiter, Florida. Eventually the pleasure centers ‘crash,’ and achieving the same pleasure -- or even just feeling normal -- requires increasing amounts of the drug or food.”

Add to all of this that we are bombarded daily with what the media thinks we “should” look like. As a result, we are also being subtly brainwashed that we are not “good enough” as we are, and that the answer lies in some product or pill. 

Low self-esteem often leads to negative body image and, in turn, emotional eating. It's a negative cycle that continues and can be passed down from generation to generation.

Emotional eating is not only a common issue among women, but nowadays among men, too. Emotional eating can occur with people of all shapes, sizes and ages. You may use food to avoid something in your life you don’t want to address. Perhaps you say it’s to cope because you’re stressed, or angry, or you deserve it as a reward. Whatever your reason for emotional eating, you can begin to change those patterns that are running your life.

The first step is to be aware that you are an emotional eater. Some people use food diaries to track what emotions they are feeling when they eat certain foods or overeat. By becoming aware of your behavior, you are beginning to set an intention to not live your life unconsciously. If you’ve ever eaten a whole bag of chips or cookies and didn’t notice until you finished the last one, you know what “living unconsciously” means. Hypnotherapy can help you release those behaviors easily and permanently, and can get your unconscious mind to begin supporting you instead of sabotaging you.

Normal eating is not just defined by what or how you eat, but by how you think and feel about yourself. How and what you eat is a reflection of your own inner world and feelings.

Hypnotherapy is an easy way to unlock and release deeply-rooted beliefs that are limiting and outdated. Unlocking these beliefs frees a client's thinking and changes attitudes and behaviors. For me as a Hypnotherapist, it's a beautiful process to be part of someone's change -- seeing a client go from an unconscious, unhappy, emotional eater to a person taking care of themselves, listening to their body and, in turn, losing weight.

In closing, I want to reinforce here that 90% of your life is already run by your unconscious mind. That’s how your brain is wired. The difference is, you can have your unconscious mind running programs that actually work for you, instead of ones that are counter-productive. Are you ready to dump those outdated programs once and for all? Call or email us for further information or to make an appointment.

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