Stress eating is different from emotional eating. Stress eating typically happens when the sympathetic nervous system (fight or flight response or stress response) becomes out of balance.
Emotional eating is eating as a way to cope with, soothe, or expand positive or negative emotions, such as stress, anger, fear, boredom, sadness, celebrating and loneliness. Major life events or, more commonly, the hassles of daily life can trigger negative emotions that lead to emotional eating and disrupt your weight-loss efforts. These triggers might include:
• Relationship conflicts
• Work or other stressors
• Fatigue
• Financial pressures
• Health problems
• Celebrating (holidays, birthdays, promotions)
Our emotions can become so tied to food that we create sub routines in our brain that eventually form the habit of eating when we feel a certain way. Now we eat without thinking about it or even in the absence of hunger.
How To Cope
To help stop emotional eating, try these tips:
• Keep a Food Diary
• Prioritize Rest & Recovery
• Rest & Digest
• Tribe Up
• Fight Boredom
• Take Away Temptation
• Don’t Deprive Yourself
• Snack Healthy
• Form Your Identity
• Learn From Setbacks
The solution always starts with being aware. Keeping a journal and associating your stress and emotions with food is the first step in beating your stress or emotional eating.
