Emotional Eating: Is It Even a Problem?

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Full Episode Transcript:

Emotional Eating: Is It Even a Problem?

Hi there, welcome to the podcast. If you’re a regular listener, then welcome back and thank you for being a “groupie” so to speak. I really wish I could be talking with you in person, as it would be easier to converse and connect, however I am grateful that there is this opportunity for talking with you in an indirect way, via podcasting.

So, today’s main topic of emotional eating is near and dear to me as I would have classified myself as an emotional eater in the past. I broke that habit and broke it rather quickly I might add. For me, it was causing a negative result, meaning unwanted weight gain.

My choice of foods also were not great when I was eating in response to negative emotion, so I noticed that my energy levels were low too. Probably because I was eating a lot of breads, pastas, pretzels, crackers, and cereals. All carbohydrates, and more specifically all refined and very mechanically and somewhat chemically processed carbohydrates.

Also, I was doing all of this emotional eating and not feeling any better emotionally. In fact, I was feeling worse overtime.

But, not all emotional eating is a problem. Or, if it does have some negative results, there are parts of emotional eating that can actually be helpful.

This is why I wanted to do this podcast episode today. I want to talk to you about not just emotional eating in general, but talk about if it’s even a problem, how to know that, and when it might not be a problem.

Before I dive in, I do want to invite you to a free virtual workshop I’m hosting on Ending the Emotional Eating Cycle. So, after listening to this podcast episode, if you feel that you might be emotionally eating and it might be causing a problem for you, you are going to want to join this workshop. You can sign up at https://katemjohnston.com/workshop. You can also find the link on the episode page.

In the past, my workshops were a little bit more teaching and then open to question and answers at the end. However, this one is going to be a little bit different. Of course there’s going to be some teaching, however there’s going to be more interaction.

You won’t be on video camera, so when you join the workshop, don’t worry, your audio and video will be completely off, but I’m going to be asking you questions as I go, that you can answer on a piece of paper that you have with you or by typing in the Q&A.

I think it’s really important to apply what you’re learning as you’re learning it, as you’ll get better results. But also, just participating really helps you to feel like you’re not alone in this. You’ll realize that there are other women in the workshop who have very similar struggles as you.

Also, I have also had similar struggles as you, and similar negative thoughts and feelings as well, but I haven’t done a great job of sharing that with you. I promise though, I will start to share more of my experiences, so I can help you more.

So again, the workshop is on ending the emotional eating cycle and it is online and completely free. It is on Thursday January 26, at 7:00 PM Eastern Time. There will be a replay available, so if you can’t attend live, sign up anyway. I will send you the replay if you’re signed up. also, it’s very common to have the thought that if you can’t make the live workshop, then why bother signing up.

However, you will get just as much value from watching or listening to the replay. So, if that time and date don’t work for you, then sign up for the workshop, get the replay, and watch it at a time that does work for you. When you don’t have distractions and when you can interact and apply what you’re learning during the workshop. So, sign up at https://katemjohnston.com/workshop. You can also find the link on this podcast episode page.

OK, so let’s dive into this podcast episode. First, I wanna just quickly define emotional eating. It’s just simply eating in response to an emotion. More specifically, eating in response to an emotion in order to try to decrease the discomfort from the emotion. The emotion doesn’t have to be a negative emotion.

Some people find positive emotions uncomfortable, depending upon their past experience or the context of the emotion. most of the time however, emotional eating is a response to a negative emotion.

It doesn’t have to be a strong negative emotion like anger, depression, or stress. It can be a less negative emotion like boredom. I would classify boredom as a less negative emotion because it’s not extremely uncomfortable like anger or stress can be, where there’s this sort of urgency to get out of that emotion. But, boredom is uncomfortable enough, that sometimes you can seek out food to decrease that boredom, partly as an escape but also partly as just an activity to counteract the boredom.

Emotional eating can be infrequent or it can be frequent. If you experience a specific uncomfortable emotion frequently, and also eat in response to that emotion frequently, it could develop into a habit. Something that you feel less control over, something that is more automatic. in this case, it would potentially develop into a habit because the behavior is done frequently and it’s in response to the same emotion, so that has more likelihood into turning into a habit.

If you don’t frequently eat in response to an emotion, it’s not likely to be an actual habit. This is the case where emotional eating is not necessarily a problem. If it’s not done frequently enough, and it’s not an uncontrolled habit, it’s probably not going to cause negative results.

Now, the exception would be if you are not emotionally eating frequently, meaning if you’re only emotionally eating maybe once a week, but you’re eating an excessive amount of sugar or food in general during that emotional eating session, if you will. Week after week after week of doing this, you probably will feel some negative health effects. Whether that be weight gain, or your blood work starts looking not so great, etc.

In general though, the more frequently you emotionally eat, the more likely it’s going to be a habit, and the more likely it’s going to have negative effects, meaning you feel that it’s become a problem for you.

And like I mentioned, if it’s more episodic, it’s typically not going to be much of a “problem” for you. In fact, most people do emotionally eat episodically to some extent. I no longer have an emotional eating habit, however I still sometimes notice that I will get up and get a snack at night if I’m bored. I immediately notice that I’m not really that hungry, and that I’m only going to the “snack cabinet” as we call it, because I’m looking for that hand mouth stimulation or whatever you call it. I can’t think of the proper term right now.

So really, how you would know if emotional eating is a habit for you, or if it’s just episodic, is if you’re doing it multiple times a week. Especially if you notice that it’s the same emotion causing the reaction.

Now, I just want to briefly talk about some of the downsides or negative results of emotional eating, both episodic and habitual, but mostly from habitual emotional eating.

So one of the downsides of course is that it can cause weight gain. If you’re eating when you’re not really hungry, that makes it really easy to overeat in calories for the day. Done over and over again, you’re going to gain weight. If it’s just simple math. If you consume more than you burn off for the day, when that occurs over and over again, your body will store that as fat.

Another downside to emotional eating is when you’re trying to decrease the discomfort from the emotion, that is done best with a pleasurable food. A pleasurable food meaning something sweet, fatty, or salty. Something like cookies or macaroni and cheese.

As you know, these are not the healthiest foods, as they tend to be higher-calorie, lower-nutrient foods. So if you’re emotionally eating frequently, you’re likely putting foods into your body that won’t make you feel great and won’t make your pants fit great after awhile.

Another downside is that when you are using food to try to decrease the discomfort of an emotion, overtime that emotion is actually becoming stronger. Because you’re not naturally letting that emotion pass through you, it’s almost like stuffing it into a jar. The more times you keep stuffing this uncomfortable emotion into a jar, the more pressure that builds up into this jar. Then, you’re going to experience the emotion more intensely down the road.

This can be a real problem for emotions like anxiety or depression. Also, stress. I was emotionally eating mostly due to anxiety, stress, and feeling inadequate. I continued to feel these things more and more and was so confused as to why nothing I was doing was helping.

At the time, I didn’t realize that I was just making these emotions stronger over time by covering them up with bread, pasta, crackers, pretzels, every time I was feeling them. I say covering them up, but other common terms are escaping or buffering. You may have heard these terms before as well.

So, what you think is helping the emotion, is actually making it worse over time. So frequent emotional eating causes negative physical effects to your body as well as negative emotional effects.

OK, now that I’ve just been a complete Debbie downer and told you all of the negative things about an emotional eating habit and the difference between episodic and habitual emotional eating, I also want to share something positive that can actually come out of if you’re emotionally eating.

Emotional eating because it’s a response to an uncomfortable emotion, can really clue you in to what you’re feeling and also what you’re thinking that is causing that emotion. So what’s on your mind that’s causing that emotion.

Most of the times, it is going to be a negative emotion, so you’re definitely going to want to just ask yourself what emotion it is and what is on your mind that is causing you to feel that emotion. If it is a positive emotion, a good question to ask is why is that positive emotion uncomfortable for you. You can really just be curious and sort of investigate a little bit.

So, let the action of emotional eating can clue you in to getting really aware of how you’re feeling in your body, meaning what emotion you’re feeling, and why you’re feeling that way. Meaning, what are you thinking about that is causing this feeling within you.

This is really useful data and can help you to become more aware of your thoughts, what may be bothering you, and also find solutions. If you can find solutions, then you can essentially treat the underlying issue of the emotional eating.

If you want to try to manage that emotion a little bit better, not with food, finding the thought that is causing the emotion is extremely helpful. Once you know the thought, you can work through that thought and if you need help with that, that’s what I can help you with. I don’t just help with the eating behaviors and actions, but also help to find the root causes of these and work through them.

Alright so just to recap, is emotional eating even a problem? I would first answer this. Is it episodic or is it frequent enough that it’s become a habit? If it’s episodic, is it causing you some noticeable negative effects? You may not notice the physical effects so much, but you may notice that the emotion is becoming a little bit stronger because you’re not allowing yourself to experience the emotion and investigate why you are experiencing it. But, you could still episodically emotionally eat and not have it be a problem for you.

If the emotional eating is frequent enough that it has become a habit for you, what negative effects has it been causing for you? These are the things that you really want to be honest about. And, once you are aware of these negative effects, just know, you don’t have to live with these. Emotional eating is something that you can completely overcome.

And if you are enjoying this podcast, please help to keep it going by giving it a quick rating and review on the podcast app that you’re listening on. This actually helps to circulate it more so that it comes up as a suggestion for other people who are looking for help with their eating habits.

Just doing that simple action will probably help at least one other person and will make you feel so good. Thanks so much for listening and for leaving a review if you do. Take care and I’ll talk with you soon.