I would appreciate suggestions on how to cope with stress without turning to food.
For the past 15 years, when things get very stressful (not just daily stress, but an "event" of some sort... medical crisis, divorce, deaths, money problems) I always comforted myself with food. I get that scared, anxious, upset feeling and I quell it by eating. Now that I am not doing that anymore, I am struggling with how to deal with the stress.
Seems like I have some kind of big crisis every couple of months (I guess everyone has them), and today my stress level quickly and unexpectedly skyrocketed. It's a compound problem: basically my ex is going to get visitation with the kids, and they all will likely have to fly 2000 miles away and be gone for Christmas. And I have to pay half the fares. And I do not have the funds, and my husband is estranged from me and refuses to give me any monetary help on this. So I am alone, with stress from my ex AND my husband and feeling like no one is on my side. I am scared and upset and don't want to celebrate Christmas with just my youngest child, and all the others gone away. They have never gone to visit him before.
Anyway the exact issue isn't really the point... the point is, I have a lot of upset feelings right now and I need to figure out what to do instead of stuffing my face. The constructive thing I am doing is continuing to try and find a counselor to talk to about this stuff, but so far no luck finding anyone I can afford. I thought there would be free counseling somewhere, but apparently it is harder to get than I thought.
So until I find a counselor... what do you do to deal with major stress without eating?