Food Part 5. Eating with your Emotions.

As I was thinking about this topic, I also couldn't help but think how fortunate we are to be even having this conversation.  We have an abundance of food in America.   There is NO reason that anyone should be hungry in America, let alone around the world.  NONE.  We have the resources.  But that's a topic for another day and not intended to guilt trip anyone.

The hardest thing about making any dietary change is the emotional eating.  I'm not talking about when you are sad and depressed and go eat ice cream. Which, lets be honest, doesn't help anything long term.  I'm talking about eating a bun on your hot dog.  Eating s'mores at a campfire.  Eating corn at a late summer picnic.  Pizza and cake at a birthday party.  OH, and my old favorite, Popcorn.  ANYTIME.  It had to be Jolly Time, blast o butter.  All others were acceptable, but not as good.

Just like certain smells and aromas, we attach an emotional feeling with certain types of foods we eat.  The reward system in our brain is activated, releasing dopamine.  When you celebrate a week of work complete and eat pizza and ice cream on friday night, your brain treats this a reward.  A big reward.  A huge rush of dopamine is released.   Food becomes an addiction.  The craving isn't for food, it's for the dopamine rush.  But the food will release that dopamine because that's what we've trained it to do. All week we will look forward to friday night.  This will cause friday night to be a huge party.  And maybe...that party spills into monday night, for getting through monday.  And then it turns to every evening.  

Holidays.  We splurge so bad.  The big three within a month of each other.  Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years.  All known to have huge family gatherings where you eat your heart out.  You associate that food with the good times you have with friends and family.  So that time of year your brain learns to expect a huge dopamine rush and it gets it from the consumption of food.

I would add that emotional eating can be paired with not
only an upsetting emotion, but a pleasant emotion as well.

Good news.  You can reverse that.  But food addiction is not a joke.  It is a real thing.  And a serious thing.  I'd be willing to guess that almost everyone is addicted to food in at least a small way.  It's not something to joke about.  There are even overeaters anonymous groups.  But you'll need help.  You'll need support.  You need to admit to yourself why you are making a change and understand exactly what you need to do.  You need to find a motivational source.   A word of advice, don't let that source be another person.  That's not fair to the person, or you.  You aren't doing it for them, you are making this change for you.

Food is powerful.  You live and die by food.  Third only to air and water.  If you've been struggling with impulsive eating, don't beat yourself up.  Often times those that really struggle, hide it from people.  And this can lead to depression and low self esteem. But chin up!  It's likely you don't have a lack of will power.   You could very well have a serious addiction that can be fixed with help and support.  You are stronger than you know.

How can we help change this relationship we have with food?

Well, how many times have we told our kids to clean their plate, there are hungry kids in Africa?  Lots of times.  It's probably been engrained into all of us.  THIS causes guilt.  But the truth?  The leftover food on our plate will never make it to Africa.  And it's only guilting us into eating food when we aren't hungry creating a psychological eating problem.  Or this phrase said to a child who says they aren't hungry.  No dessert till you finish all your food!  So...you reward them with junk food for overeating?   Rather, don't make dessert a reward.  Have dessert at random times throughout the week.  Not after a meal, maybe even for the meal.  Seriously, the spaghetti you ate for dinner will not somehow counter the dessert you will eat and make them both ok to eat just because you ate a salad too.  

To wrap this up.  Eating isn't just for survival anymore.  And because of this it creates all kinds of imbalance in our bodies and minds.  After 5 parts of this talk on dieting.  I will say that a Ketogenic way of eating has been the ABSOLUTE VERY BEST decision I've ever made in my life.  Not only for weight loss, but a significant decrease in my depression symptoms, mental clarity has increases, my mood is stable, my skin is clearer, and so many other positive health benefits that I've never expected to come from my diet.  

If you want to make a change, don't count on your friends to do it with you.  Their reasons are not the same as yours.  But they do need to support you, if they don't, get new friends.  Seriously.  What friends are they if they don't care about your emotions?   I'll be your friend.  I'll support you.  We have groups on Facebook for that too.  See the links to those in part 4.