In the past 2 weeks I have gained back nearly everything I had lost. I cannot seem to get a grip on my emotional eating. These past couple of weeks I have had a very strained relationship with someone who I considered a friend but who also is in a position of authority over me. Angry words were said, feelings were hurt, and all-in-all it felt like a very threatening situation (with me being the one being threatened). I have felt many things in these past two weeks: anger, fear, betrayal, embarrassment, disappointment. And I have eaten over them. I don't want to respond this way to emotionally fraught situations but I guess I haven't figured out another way to cope when I am overwhelmed with my feelings. How do people learn coping skills? I wish I knew.
I can start fresh again this week doing the things I know I need to do to lose weight. And I guess I need to revisit my Day 1 of 100 Days of Weightloss post where I reminded myself "I used to be that way." It is easy to say I used to soothe my emotions with food. It's hard for me to come up with something else to replace it with. To be honest, I am at a bit of a loss.
What do you do to avoid overeating when your emotions are getting the best of you?
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6 comments:
I wanted to say thank you for your honesty. Weight loss is not easy. I started following your blog last week. I started working on weight loss in July, it has been slow coming. I went to one of my weight watcher meetings today and we talked about having someone on your team. I am cheering for you all the way. Keep working on it! You can do it.
Oh, girl! If I had that one figured out, I'd certainly be the first to let you know. I struggle with that every single day. Some days I fail miserably.. actually most days. But there are a few when I beat the compulsion. It usually involves trying to stay in the moment and talk my way through it. I am at my worst when I haze over, push all thoughts out of my head and binge. When you find yourself eating emotionally, even if you can't stop at first, talk yourself through it.
Hang in there, I completely get where you're coming from - I'm actually in the seat next to you - waiving. :)
I'm sorry to hear about your rough couple of weeks. Good for you for starting fresh this week - your Days 1-4 posts were terrific, and I'm sure the tools you built will help you get back on track.
I also struggle with stress eating . . . for whatever it may be worth, here's what I do to try to make it harder for myself to go off-road when I'm stressed out.
(1) Clean out the cupboards - throw out everything that doesn't have a place in my healthy eating plan.
(2) Plan meals in advance - avoid making any food-related decisions on the fly.
(3) Include some healthy snacks/treats in the plan, and choose things that are self-limiting, so that even overdoing it with them is a wide-road event rather than an off-road event. For example, one of my favorite planned treats is a sliced medium apple with 1/2 oz melted dark chocolate for dipping. It has about the same calories as one serving of chips or cookies, but it has real nutritional value and is much more filling, so it's a lot harder to do too much calorie damage.
(4) Avoid mindless eating while doing other activities. If I'm eating anything that is not specifically on my plan, I try to do NOTHING else while eating it. If I have to choose between (a) continuing to work, read, surf the net, watch a DVD or whatever I was doing and (b) eating, I'm less likely to eat since I don't really want to stop whatever I was doing.
I'm rooting for you to kick those pounds out before they have a chance to settle back in!
I find if I have something to do with my hands it keeps me from throwing food in my mouth, but that isn't much help with emo-eating. Is there any way to resolve the conflict that's stressing you, so it's not undermining you? (I know - easy to say, not always easy to do)
I think it was Jessica at "Oh The Joys" who said she knew she was going to eat compulsively so she kept baby carrots on hand for those times. She could still chew and chew her way through the moment but without all the calories piling up.
It's hard girl, but keep on trying. Every day is a fresh beginning and you are not alone!
Hey Deb, I wish I knew. Some days are better than others. Sometimes I work out or write. Sometimes I pout because I really want to eat. On the days when I do stress or emotional eat, I try to be kind to myself. It happened, move on. I'm sorry that you had such a rough week. Please be kind to yourself. Maybe write down some realistic things you can try next time instead of eating.
Hang in there!!!
You messed up and regained lost weight. The important thing to do is to forgive yourself for being human and then start brand new. You can't do anything about yesterday, but you can do something about today. I wish I had learned that lesson a long time ago and saved myself years of self flagelation for being imperfect.
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