Emotional Overeating

WHAT IS EMOTIONAL BUNING

Emotional BUNING is one of the main causes of obesity, it is addictive and pushes us to overeat, where the person consumes enormous amounts of food out of control. It is very different from true hunger, in which the person consumes food to satisfy a natural need of their body.

Emotional overeating usually begins in adolescence or early adulthood and can occur consciously or unconsciously, and is estimated to be the most common eating disorder. It can also begin after a traumatic event or loss.

Chronic stress or intense and recurring negative emotions that we have difficulty managing in our lives, push us to resort to food to feel relief. Food can easily become a means of coping with our problems.

The type of food we choose in such situations is mainly high in calories and high in sugar, fat, salt and usually highly processed. This type of food slows down the activity of the thyroid gland, which is responsible for the secretion of dopamine and serotonin in our brain, which are responsible for all the positive emotions we experience.

Quite often, however, after an episode of binge eating, negative emotions such as remorse and shame dominate, thus affecting the person’s self-esteem and creating the vicious cycle of binge eating, a cycle that occurs in all addictions (e.g. alcohol, smoking, drugs), as shown in the figure below.

The emotional state, precisely during overeating, is quite interesting, as many report that they do not realize that they are doing it at that moment. Later, however, the bad feelings return, the person is overwhelmed by extreme guilt and shame for having lost control again and will gain even more weight.

They usually follow with compensatory promises to assuage the guilt. Some examples are that they will start going to the gym next week, that they will not eat anything tomorrow, that they will walk to work. The complacency of promises lasts for some time, until the guilt and self-deprecation become strong and unbearable enough to start another cycle of binge eating.

The characteristic of binge eating, like any addiction, is that the phases of complacency become shorter and shorter and therefore, the repetitions of the episodes become more and more frequent. The vicious cycle leads to even greater self-deprecation and self-blame, usually much more intense than the possible criticism of others.

The main characteristic of emotional binge eating therefore lies in the consumption of excessive amounts of food, in a dysfunctional attempt to avoid painful emotions.

REASONS THAT LEAD TO EMOTIONAL OVEREATING

The reasons that lead a person to emotional overeating vary. In many cases, overeating is associated with depression. However, the complex causal relationship between them continues to be the subject of research.

The person feels intense dissatisfaction and discomfort, even anxiety, when they do not have access to food. For example, we have people with overeating who do not go on an excursion, for fear that they will not have immediate access to food, or who rush to leave a pleasant social gathering, in order to find food.

It is worth noting that emotional overeating, and especially binge eating episodes, usually occur in isolation. The person may not eat anything during a social gathering, with the excuse of dieting, but when they are at home and alone, they are out of control.

According to recent research, sugar and high fat are addictive to the human body and, as with any other addiction, we will always seek these ingredients in our food to feel full.

Therefore, the type of foods chosen in overeating are, for example, French fries, hamburgers, pizzas, chips, chocolates, croissants, soft drinks and generally processed foods, which, in addition to being unhealthy, are designed to stimulate the sense of taste, to the point that healthy, natural foods seem indifferent.

In some cases, biological causes may contribute to the addiction of overeating, such as when the hypothalamus does not send the correct signals to control appetite and satiety.

Another suppressive factor is the media, which convey very negative messages about food. Every day, we are bombarded with new products from the food industry that promise new experiences for our palate.

Advertisements with chocolate bitten in slow motion, cheese melting, TV cooking competitions with their obsession with detail, give the message that food is the most important thing we can think about during the day, but also perhaps the only source of satisfaction and pleasure today.

On the other hand, of course, the media exerts enormous pressure to have unnaturally thin bodies, leading the viewer to conflict and confusion. Models who are advertised to eat sweets have the most unnaturally thin bodies. A contradiction, which people who are emotional overeaters, are unable to cope with, further reinforcing their anxiety and feelings of inadequacy.

The deeper causes, of course, must be sought in the individual’s psyche itself and the symbolism that food has acquired during their psychosocial development. Emotional neglect in childhood, criticism from parents, lack of love, often contribute to the need to seek substitutes for ’emotional food’, which in some cases is identified with material food.

Some parents, for example, feed their children when they are sad, to stop them crying, or buy them sweets as a sign of love. The child thus learns the connection between food and love and maintains this connection in adulthood.

Although food cannot meet the human need for love and communication, the individual has learned to relieve temporary feelings of sadness, loneliness or anger with food, that is, he treats himself exactly as his parents treated him. Of course, painful emotions don’t always come from childhood, they can come from a recent loss, such as a layoff or divorce.

TREATING EMOTIONAL OVEREATING 

• Self-esteem

  The first and most important step is to stop criticizing yourself and putting yourself down because you are overweight or because you can’t stop eating. Loving yourself unconditionally, just as you are, is a way to deal with addiction. Only when you can love yourself will you have the motivation and strength to change this dysfunctional habit.

• Food Journal
  

  Creating a journal in which you record what you eat, when you eat, how you feel at that moment, and your goals for the next day will help you manage your emotions and improve your relationship with food.

• Separating Real and Emotional Hunger

  Taking a few minutes to breathe slowly helps reduce the urge to eat emotionally and activates long-term thinking. Give yourself some time to think about whether it will actually make you feel better and whether you need to resort to food at that moment. Before you eat, ask your body if it is hungry, ask your stomach how it feels, not your emotions.

• Choose an alternative activity
  

  A relaxing shower, exercise, which is the most effective way to combat negative emotions, a favorite song or book, a beauty mask, a walk in the park or in your neighborhood, are some ways to escape negative thoughts and emotions without resorting to food. When you are calm and not in a negative mood, write a list of some of the possible activities that you could do during times when you are in emotional overeating.

• Meal preparation
  

  Planning meals and snacks in advance will help maintain normal glucose levels and reduce the feeling of physical hunger, as it is possible that one form of hunger can trigger the other. The foods we have at home should be as healthy as possible, avoiding foods rich in saturated fats and unnecessary calories.

• Guilt-free food
  

  Try to be with friends or family the next time you eat something “guilty” so that you stop triggering your lonely and guilty relationship with food.

• Sleep
  

  A clear relationship has been confirmed between lack of sleep (less than 7 hours a day) and overeating, as the person tries to regain energy through food when they are tired when in fact they need sleep.

• Communication
  

  Communication is very important. Do not hesitate to discuss your thoughts and concerns with people you trust, or with a specialist.

Individual or group psychotherapy can help with emotional overeating, as can appropriate pharmacotherapy in difficult cases.

It is also important that diet and exercise programs are designed with the help of specialists. A balanced Mediterranean diet, which can be maintained for a longer period of time, is preferable to a sudden and large weight loss.