Are any of you emotional eaters, eat because you're happy, eat because you're bored, etc...?

What do you do to break this habit? How do you handle it?

Wishing You All The Best
Denise

I eat for almost any reason there is

No really, I don't know all the reasons I eat. I do know I eat because I'm bored. I was bored the other day and then realized I had been standing in front of the fridge looking for something to eat.

I also know I eat when I'm frustrated or stressed. During the final weeks of the classes I was taking last quarter, I was eating like crazy. I tried to keep things sensible but I just wanted to munch.

I am an emotional eater. And sometimes, I eat just b/c I feel like it (there must be some emotion behind that!). I struggle with it daily. Hardest time for me is right after I get done teaching and I pick up my kids. 4:00 til 5:00 kills me.

Count me in as one. I have been for most of my life and consider myself the Queen of Emotional Eating. <---That should have a piggy face!

Usually I eat to be comforted. It's a bad excuse I know and it usually makes me feel worse afterwards but that's the sick way that my mind works. "Hey, you had a bad day???? You deserve to eat a gallon of mashed potatoes (one of my favs!)." It's crazy but I'm trying to get better at it...baby steps. The baby steps for me right now are usually getting on the computer and posting my frustrations here or playing a computer game to get my mind off of whatever might be bothering me. I'm hoping that as the weather gets nicer and I feel comfortable walking outside (with all the people looking at me...UGH!) I will use exercise as my way to relieve the possibility of an emotional eating session. I'm also trying to stash snacky foods in my house that are good for me but yummy too.

Even though we may still have an occasional emotional eating binge, with "bad" foods, we can try our best to control it. Remember that we are here for you too...and we understand.


Sarah

I am absolutely an emotional eater.. that goes for GOOD emotions as well as BAD emotions.

It really has been something ive been aware of for awhile now.. and im working on it.

I wouldn't nessarily say my eating is because of emotional reasons I just like to eat whenever I use dumb excuses to eat and am constantly thinking about eating I think i have a general obbsession with food i wish I could get over!

Thanks for all the responses.

Nelie, you've lost a considerable amount of weight so you must be handling it
in some way. Keep up the good work.

Sag, I know evenings can be hard. I seem to do ok all day until 3:00 or 4:00 and I just want to eat.

Sarah, Thanks for the encouragement. I also find that exercise helps and
being on the computer. I eat sometimes for comfort too, but I'm
trying to break those habits. I don't know--you might have to give
up that crown though.

Supernurse You're working on it so you've already taken the first step.
You'll do great.

Kimberly You've already lost 20 lbs. Yaaaay you. Food can easily
become an obsession, but it's good to see you're working on it.

We eat for a lot of different reasons other than hunger, it's only food and I know we can take control of it and defeat it one baby step at a time.

Wishing You All The Best
Denise

Definitely an emotional eater. At work, I eat when bored or dissatisfied with my job. At home, I eat when upset or depressed. It's just ingrained, whenever I have a crappy day I think "oh, you deserve McDonald's for dinner, for suffering through that!"

I'm not sure why my brain sends those signals. I guess it's ingrained. I'm struggling to find healthier alternatives, and non-food alternatives, to treating myself when I have a crappy day. So far, it's not been too successful. I'm also capable of emotionally eating to the point of feeling sick. Shouldn't my brain have some sort of "off" valve for this? I don't know.

I'm doing it much less now, so that's a good thing, I suppose. I don't have much for answers, though. I try to work on eating healthy for at least part of the day, so that now my 'emotional eating' usually is half a day's damage, not a full day's. Only it can last a few days before I put on the brakes. I'm working on learning how to put on the brakes, too.

Ingrained habits are hard.

Wow, I guess if I had real good answer, I wouldn't still be battling food and weight
What has been working for me the past few weeks is:
1. not keeping snack foods in the house/keeping fruit and healthy snacks to grab
2. plan my days well - I am usually most stressed after I class or especially after clinicals, so as long as I don't bring any money with me, I can make it home without binge-ing (I have a 20 minute drive home from campus). By the time I get home, I am calmer and the urge has left.
3. get my husband to STOP SUGGESTING "MUNCHIE RUNS" uugh, in that way, he was totally non-supportive because he didn't know that I couldn't tell him "NO" when he suggested getting goodies for the evening. We have solved this by keeping snack foods for him in the house that we know I won't eat.
4. When I get overly emotional (justified or not), I pick up the phone and call my mom, my friends, whoever I can get ahold of; I come here and type it out; I play online computer games, and now that the weather is getting nice, I go walk it out - I try to be mindful of the situation before I reach for food.

What I haven't done yet is actually try to develop better coping skills... I am just shifting the issue to something other than food rather than dealing with it. I know that gaining good coping skills will be the true "fix" to my emotional eating.

Yup, me too. I eat for the emotions of anger, boredom, and stress. Stress is the biggest trigger. However, I have also noticed that I want to eat when I'm tired or thirsty. I'm trying to learn to go to bed or get something to drink. Don't always do what I SHOULD do though...

I'm guilty of this. I can eat when I am sad, angry , bored, pms you name it I have it. What I have tried to do is eliminate the food that I know I love to pig out on , ice cream , chips and when I do buy it for a treat it is baked chips and frozen yogurt. I also try and count my calories, and just remind myself not to eat too much. There are days that it really works, and other days that it goes out the window. But one step at a time is how I look at it.

I used to eat in front of the computer too. Now I have a sticker from TOPS that says....The Choice is Mine. I have these pretty much everywhere in my house!

Elva

I definitely look for food when I'm bored. Not necessarily other emotions, but I have noticed for sure that boredom can be relieved temporarily by some wonderful treat.

So I try and make sure I'm never bored. Not easy, but it really involves taking charge of your life. I have wide and varied interests, so when something bores me I challenge my mind to look for something else to do, or to learn or some new place to go.

The worst of this is when at work. Breaks used to always send me to the candy machines to "brighten up" an otherwise "boring" time. Actually when I'm working I'm not usually bored (I'm an electronics technician, so a lot of my job is like solving a puzzle to figure out what is wrong with a circuit). It is those little "time offs" from work for 15 minutes or so that always got me into trouble. I would go looking for a treat. With my current job, I just don't take breaks, and there are no candy machines nearby so I'm not tempted that way.

Still when my diet gets boring, I do start wanting to branch out and eat something different. All of that is allowed within the confines of my diet, so I need to keep my mind creative and active about what we can eat next time.

I do think some "boredom" in eating helps the dietary process however. Too much variety tends to make us eat too much. Think about it. How many times have you gone to a special meal where there are a LOT of choices (or a buffet) and eaten WAY more than you needed or wanted just because it "all looked so good" and you wanted to "try" the various options?

When we limit our choices, we tend not to do that as much.