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Breaking the Food-Mood
Connection
This
article is another installment from the class A New You: Health for Every Body.
Food has many emotional associations. For example, celebrations of holidays,
birthdays, weddings and religious events often include a feast or special foods.
These positive food-mood connections are greatly valued by society.
However, some food-mood connections are not so positive, as when food is
habitually used as a way to cope with emotions.
Occasional emotional eating is normal, but frequent emotional eating leads
inevitably to weight gain. Many people with weight concerns eat in response to
stress, boredom, anger, loneliness, joy or as a reward.
These questions can help determine if emotional eating is a problem. Consider
what is true most of the time for you.
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Do you
tend to snack more when you are alone?
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Do you
treat yourself routinely with food?
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Is eating
a favorite food one of the most pleasant things you do for yourself?
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Do you
have a hard time recognizing when you are physically hungry or full?
-
Do you eat
when you are stressed, even if you are not hungry?
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Do you
‘feel’ hunger in your mouth rather than your stomach?
Someone who
has been using food to cope with emotions for years can find it difficult to
know when they are physically hungry, and as a result tend to overeat. One
helpful suggestion to determine which type of hunger you are experiencing is to
locate where in the body you feel the hunger. True physical hunger is felt in
the stomach unless ignored for too long when it may cause headache. Hunger felt
in the chest, throat or mouth but not the stomach is likely to be emotional
hunger.
The next time you reach for food, pause long enough to ask yourself the
following:
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Am I
physically hungry?
Tell yourself you can eat, but wait 5 minutes to check your feelings. If you
are still hungry, honor your hunger and eat. If you are not physically
hungry, try to sort out what you are feeling.
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What am
I feeling?
This can be difficult to answer. Are you angry, bored, anxious, depressed,
nervous, happy? One way to discover feelings is to keep a food journal.
Record not only when and what you eat, but also if you ate fast or slow and
how you felt emotionally and physically before and after eating. Review this
journal to discover what feelings may trigger eating. You may not be able to
identify an emotion, especially at first, and that is okay too.
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What do
I really need?
◦ Something to drink
◦ Rest
◦ Comfort
◦ To express feelings
◦ To be heard, understood and
accepted
◦ Intellectual or creative
stimulation
◦ To feel needed or respected
◦ Movement
In the
Health for Every Body class, we use the following activity to explore ways
to break the food-mood connection. Below is a list of emotions or feelings.
Lonely
Grouchy
Elated
Nervous
Sad
Excited
Discouraged
Confident
Bored
Jealous
Happy
Irritable
Anxious
Hopeful
Mad
Angry
Scared
Confused
Worried
Disappointed
Ashamed
Frustrated
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Mark the
ones you experience frequently, or write down others more pertinent to you.
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List the
food you associate with 2 or 3 of those moods.
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Write down
the first non-food action that comes to mind for those moods.
What would
happen if you broke the mood-food connection and went straight to the
action?Cross out the foods and go straight to the activity to make a
mood-activity connection.
Developing
this connection will take persistence, patience and commitment. Experiment with
different responses and allow yourself the flexibility to sometimes eat in
response to emotions.
Most of the
time, the emotions, moods and stressors that trigger eating are the everyday
garden variety. In these cases, trading actions for foods is a beneficial and
positive way of coping. However, when problems have existed for a long time,
interfere with the joy of living and seem to have no solution, professional
counseling may be advisable.
Having trouble
thinking of activities to replace eating? The handout Fun, Non-food Activities
is available for free from Linda Rellergert. Her contact information is on page
1.
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