{Video} How to Overcome Emotional Eating
Emotional eating isn’t about the food or food addiction. It’s not even about willpower or self-discipline. Emotional eating happens because we have emotional needs that are not getting met, and we use food to soothe, distract or numb.
Eating for emotional reasons can lead to overeating and bingeing. This happens when emotions drive food choices to the point that connection to our body is offline and we eat mindlessly, too quickly and past fullness. This may lead us to believe our appetite is out of control and can’t be trusted.
But contrary to popular belief, your appetite does not drive emotional eating. Restriction and suppressing non-food needs is what actually leads to feeling out of control around food.
Watch the video above to learn four steps that will help you understand your triggers and stop emotional eating. Then, download the free guide below to help you through this process. It includes some journal prompts, an emotion wheel and a few guided meditations, all designed to help you get clear about what your physical and emotional needs are right now, and how best to get those needs met.
I lead a six-week group program called Make Peace with Food. The first group of 2022 begins this Friday, January 14th,, and I hope you’ll join! In the video below I explain why I'm so passionate about offering this group.
This has been my go-to salad dressing all summer long. I make a big batch for the week and drizzle it over my favorite summer salad (shown in the video below) or a quick lunch of a poached egg over grilled asparagus, or toss it with grains, Fattoush, pasta, beans or grilled shrimp.
I'm sharing a short clip from the workshop I gave a few weeks ago, Nurturing the Wise Mind for Conscious Nourishment. In the clip I talk about a psychological concept called window of tolerance to explain how and why we use food to soothe, escape, numb, or create a sense of control.
Why is it important to address tricky food habits? Because they keep us stuck and make us feel bad on many levels. And there are techniques and mindsets we can adopt to free up mental and emotional bandwidth, find ease in our food life, and have more energy for what really matters.
Intuitive Eating is a powerful evidence-based and weight-inclusive approach to health I use to help my clients cultivate a healthy relationship to food and body. The framework supports those wanting to make more mindful, intentional food and self-care choices as well as those looking to address emotional eating, bingeing, restriction, yo-yo dieting and other forms of disordered eating.
The health of our gut influences our whole health. Everything from cravings, mood swings, low immunity, brain fog, and chronic aches and pains can be tied to poor digestive functioning.
But HOW we eat and interact with food throughout the day impacts our digestion just as much as WHAT we eat.
Do you struggle with cravings? Maybe you crave something specific like salty or sweet foods, or perhaps you crave food at a certain time of day, like mid-afternoon or after dinner?
There’s more influencing our food choices than we may realize. Often, when we serve ourselves another helping or reach for a snack we know our body isn’t craving, we blame our lack of discipline and willpower. In reality, the reactive, compulsive, and automatic ways we engage with food are, in part, a downstream effect of living with unprocessed body grief, shame, and neglect, or feelings of unworthiness and disappointment in our bodies and ourselves. learn about the five mindsets and practices I turn to in order to help my clients gently process the emotional discomfort often tied to food, so they can begin to feel more at home in their body as it is and move forward in a healthier and more complete way.