Speaker 1: Hello everybody, and welcome back to the Psychology of Your Twenties,
Speaker 1: the podcast where we talk through some of the big
Speaker 1: life changes and transitions of our twenties and what they
Speaker 1: mean for our psychology. Hello everybody, Welcome back to the show.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to the podcast. New listeners, old listeners. Wherever
Speaker 1: you are in the world, it is so great to
Speaker 1: have you here, back for another episode as we break
Speaker 1: down the Psychology of your twenties. Before we get started,
Speaker 1: in this episode, we are going to be talking about
Speaker 1: some concepts and ideas and experiences that might be a
Speaker 1: little bit hard to hear, particularly around eating disorders, weight gain,
Speaker 1: weight loss, and associated topics. Please just take a moment
Speaker 1: to check in with yourself and decide whether this is
Speaker 1: what you need to be hearing right now. This episode
Speaker 1: is still going to be here in a few weeks,
Speaker 1: a few months. If you want to come back to
Speaker 1: it when you're in a better place to receive this information,
Speaker 1: it is obviously your choice, but I thought I would
Speaker 1: just give you a heads up. Today we are going
Speaker 1: to be talking about emotional eating. Our relationship with food
Speaker 1: is so much more psychological then we think. It is
Speaker 1: so much more emotional so much more intricate and nuanced
Speaker 1: than just hunger and fullness and nutrients and energy. Food
Speaker 1: can be used to self medicate, to manage our emotions.
Speaker 1: It has a biological impact on our mental state, and
Speaker 1: I think with a rise in things like diet culture,
Speaker 1: it's also become really equated with ideas of self worth
Speaker 1: and self esteem, such that it's no longer just the
Speaker 1: thing that we use to fuel ourselves. It has a
Speaker 1: much more complicated relationship with how we see ourselves and
Speaker 1: how we process our emotions. I want to be really
Speaker 1: candid here. I don't think that I personally have ever
Speaker 1: had a perfect relationship with food. I think right now
Speaker 1: where I'm at is probably the closest I've ever gotten,
Speaker 1: And I haven't spoken it much about in the podcast
Speaker 1: before because it is really vulnerable. But you know, I
Speaker 1: grew up in the time of finsbow and Tumbler, and
Speaker 1: for a long time food really controlled my life in
Speaker 1: an unhealthy way, whereby I was either highly restrictive, especially
Speaker 1: in my teen years, constantly needing to eat the right way,
Speaker 1: being worried about calories, or on the flip side, I
Speaker 1: felt completely beholden to food and to my cravings. I
Speaker 1: never really experienced hunger. I used food as a coping
Speaker 1: mechanism to elevate my mood or counter my stress, or
Speaker 1: feel emotionally fulfilled when I was lonely or felt rejected.
Speaker 1: Part of that, part of that journey was to do
Speaker 1: with emotional eating, responding to what I was feeling through
Speaker 1: consumption rather than self reflection. And I think I've come
Speaker 1: to realize that in many ways it has damaged my
Speaker 1: ability to really listen to my body. It's also brought
Speaker 1: a lot of shame that I think is still present,
Speaker 1: shame that I think doesn't really have a place when
Speaker 1: it comes to taking care of our bodies, taking care
Speaker 1: of our vessel, our home. So what I really want
Speaker 1: this episode to be for you is a guide to
Speaker 1: unpacking the kind of psychological distinction between emotional and physical hunger.
Speaker 1: And I want you to be able to see why
Speaker 1: your own relationship with food may have been impacted by
Speaker 1: things like diet culture, like social media, like your stress response,
Speaker 1: like childhood experiences, like emotionally charged events and big life changes.
Speaker 1: And it's impacted how we see bodies such that we
Speaker 1: no longer really know what our bodies need. So in
Speaker 1: today's episode, we are going to break down the very
Speaker 1: definition of emotional eating, the links to stress and biology
Speaker 1: and cultural influences. I also want to explore some of
Speaker 1: the shame that we have towards food, where that comes from,
Speaker 1: why we feel the need to eat certain foods in
Speaker 1: particular when things are distressing or when we are bored,
Speaker 1: and how to recognize that urge. As always, though, this
Speaker 1: is a show about giving you back your power through information,
Speaker 1: through psycho education, through science, so we're also going to
Speaker 1: discuss some of the research around kind of the road
Speaker 1: to quote unquote food freedom, how to control your emotional
Speaker 1: urge to fuel your body in a way that may
Speaker 1: not be physically or mentally satisfying, and also kind of
Speaker 1: what the actual dealers was with, you know, intuitive eating.
Speaker 1: I had my doubts around intuitive eating. I get asked
Speaker 1: to talk about it all the time, and this felt
Speaker 1: like the perfect episode to have a discussion around you
Speaker 1: know what that kind of that kind of way of eating,
Speaker 1: that way of almost dieting really does for our bodies.
Speaker 1: So there is a lot to cover, and there will
Speaker 1: also be some resources in the episode description if you
Speaker 1: need them. I know that this topic can sometimes be
Speaker 1: kind of heavy, but we're here to inform, so please
Speaker 1: just make sure that you're in a good place to
Speaker 1: hear this without further ado. Let's get into the psychological
Speaker 1: underpinnings behind why we emotionally eat. So what actually is
Speaker 1: emotional eating, Because it's a lot more than just kind
Speaker 1: of eating your feelings, which I think is definitely a
Speaker 1: phrase we need to retire. It feels very very much
Speaker 1: reminiscent of those early two thousand's mean Os movies where
Speaker 1: someone is shamed for just choosing to eat what they like,
Speaker 1: when emotional eating is actually so much more than responding
Speaker 1: to what your body craves and fulfilling that need. I
Speaker 1: want that to be really clear. Emotional eating isn't just
Speaker 1: the opposite of eating quote unquote unhealthy or eating foods
Speaker 1: that society may deem as bad every now and again.
Speaker 1: Emotional eating is not just having a poor diet. It
Speaker 1: occurs when we eat for reasons other than hunger or
Speaker 1: physical necessity. It's where we use food as a way
Speaker 1: to cope with difficult feelings, uncomfortable feelings, or as a
Speaker 1: distraction to some deeper problem that's bothering us. Maybe it's
Speaker 1: bothering us consciously, but more often than not, it's unconscious,
Speaker 1: it's subconscious. So emotional eating is a form of emotional
Speaker 1: regulation that becomes an automatic behavior in response to stress,
Speaker 1: rather than using our mental coping skills. And although there's
Speaker 1: been some studies, including one conducted in twenty sixteen, that
Speaker 1: sometimes sees emotional eating in response to positive emotions and
Speaker 1: positive moments, I think it's mainly in relation to the
Speaker 1: moments when we are really struggling and the kind of
Speaker 1: shame and guilt that comes with that. So here are
Speaker 1: some examples of how this might show up in your life,
Speaker 1: how we see emotional eating in our everyday kind of
Speaker 1: dietary behaviors. Say, for example, you've just gone through a
Speaker 1: really terrible breakup and you use food for comfort. You're
Speaker 1: really overly stressed at work, you're worried about money, you
Speaker 1: use food as a distraction. You're feeling lonely or disconnected.
Speaker 1: Food becomes a way to feel fulfilled physically when mentally
Speaker 1: or socially you are quite dissatisfied. There are so many
Speaker 1: other examples, each of them really, you know, very much
Speaker 1: unique to us as individuals, and sometimes really extreme. There
Speaker 1: was two researchers in twenty twelve who even conducted a
Speaker 1: study on emotional eating in the wake of a natural disaster.
Speaker 1: They assessed eating behavior in Christchurch, New Zealand, so our
Speaker 1: neighbors to the south back in twenty eleven. I believe
Speaker 1: they were struck by a really major earthquake, and the
Speaker 1: results of this study showed that women in particular reported
Speaker 1: an increase in overeating after the earthquake, especially when they
Speaker 1: had experienced high levels of earthquake related to stress, showing
Speaker 1: how food is not just fuel. Food is a way
Speaker 1: for us to process or sometimes suppress emotions. So I
Speaker 1: think no matter this scenario, the main premise is that
Speaker 1: in these situations, food loses its original purpose is something
Speaker 1: to sustain us, and becomes a tool to kind of
Speaker 1: somewhat feel an emotional void that we are not capable
Speaker 1: of recognizing or managing in the moment. And it's not
Speaker 1: just you. It's not just you who is struggling with
Speaker 1: this problem. The American Psychological Association estimates that around thirty
Speaker 1: three percent of adult Americans are overeating or eating foods
Speaker 1: that they crave when they are stressed or to distract
Speaker 1: from stress. It's interesting because sometimes people go the other way,
Speaker 1: you know, during stressful scenarios, they lose all of their
Speaker 1: appetite and they completely deny themselves food, which just kind
Speaker 1: of goes to show how eating behavior is so linked
Speaker 1: to our emotional state. But also both of those tendencies,
Speaker 1: the tendencies to perhaps overeat or eat particular foods, and
Speaker 1: then that loss of appetite or that kind of denying
Speaker 1: your sustenance, denying your self food, both of those tendencies
Speaker 1: are not their own disorder. Rather, they are a symptom
Speaker 1: of disordered eating. And disordered eating is what can escalate
Speaker 1: into an eating disorder like binge eating disorder like anorexia
Speaker 1: or bolimia, but it's typically associated with eating at a
Speaker 1: regular times, being really strict with your food choices, or
Speaker 1: obsessive thoughts about food, finding that you can't stop eating,
Speaker 1: feelings of guilt and shame towards your eating habits, which
Speaker 1: is often associated with labeling some foods as good and
Speaker 1: some foods as bad. I think the increasing tendency that
Speaker 1: diet culture has pushed on us to see certain foods
Speaker 1: as pure and even virtuous, and other foods as sinful
Speaker 1: or dirty or bad is so problematic and such a
Speaker 1: huge disaster for our relationship with food to be able
Speaker 1: to acknowledge that it is fuel. It is one of
Speaker 1: the primary sources of life. Nowadays, it's so much more
Speaker 1: than that, which is I think why many of us
Speaker 1: see it as something more emotional, something more mental, because
Speaker 1: suddenly it has all of these really weird links to
Speaker 1: very intangible ideas of good and bad. Food is a
Speaker 1: lot more plentiful, but it's also a lot more complicated,
Speaker 1: and so we use it to self sooove. We use
Speaker 1: it to punish ourselves at times. We kind of use
Speaker 1: our consumption of certain foods as a proxy for our
Speaker 1: self worth, which is why we observe those eating disorders
Speaker 1: like anorexia. Yes, there is this preoccupation with weight loss
Speaker 1: and body image and thinness, but it's also the use
Speaker 1: of food to test self discipline, because maybe we can't
Speaker 1: control what else is going on within our lives, but
Speaker 1: we can control what we eat. Something I always like
Speaker 1: to remind myself and you guys as well, is that
Speaker 1: food does not have a moral label or a moral value.
Speaker 1: The foods you eat do not determine your worth as
Speaker 1: a human. It's literally an inanimate object. How can something
Speaker 1: inanimate be good or bad? It's just food. It has
Speaker 1: no deeper attachment to who you are, to what your
Speaker 1: value is. And yet we have been convinced that to
Speaker 1: eat some foods is to be hurting our body, is
Speaker 1: to not have self discipline, is to not care about
Speaker 1: our wellbeing. So of course we have begun to treat
Speaker 1: it as a way to self punish or to mediate
Speaker 1: our emotions. I think the easiest way we can identify
Speaker 1: when we're eating from a place of needing emotional comfort
Speaker 1: or fulfillment is by noticing the difference between physical hunger
Speaker 1: and emotional hunger. So physical hunger develops over time, whilst
Speaker 1: emotional hunger comes on really suddenly, often in response to
Speaker 1: some kind of trigger that causes you to become stressed
Speaker 1: or overwhelmed, So you're looking for something to kind of
Speaker 1: mediate those emotions to make you feel better. When we
Speaker 1: are physically hungry as well, we notice being full and
Speaker 1: we take it as a queue to stop eating, whereas
Speaker 1: when we're experiencing emotional hunger, we really don't feel completely
Speaker 1: full until after we've stopped, till the aftermath of whatever
Speaker 1: we've just eaten and we don't feel well, we feel sick,
Speaker 1: We wish that we had kind of stopped earlier. We
Speaker 1: don't feel like we've actually given our body the proper
Speaker 1: nutrients that maybe it deserves. Physical hunger is often predictable
Speaker 1: if we haven't eaten in the last four hours or so,
Speaker 1: maybe longer. We know that our body is going to
Speaker 1: start craving nutrients and energy, it's going to start grumbling,
Speaker 1: whereas emotional hunger is just going to happen whenever, wherever.
Speaker 1: The reason for this is that food means more to
Speaker 1: our body than just nutrients and energy. It's cultural, it's mental,
Speaker 1: it's social. We see that, and how food is a
Speaker 1: massive part of how every single culture in the world
Speaker 1: celebrates or connects. We see that, and how different foods
Speaker 1: make us feel a different way. The fact that we
Speaker 1: have concepts such as comfort foods, the foods that elicits
Speaker 1: some kind of emotional reaction of either nostalgia or warmth
Speaker 1: or contentment. And then it comes down to things like
Speaker 1: taste and flavor, the impact of certain ingredients or contents,
Speaker 1: how they impact our brain, particularly through their influence on
Speaker 1: our hormones and our neurotransmitters. Essentially, both of those things
Speaker 1: are the building blocks for our everyday emotional state. So
Speaker 1: from a biological point, we all know that we need
Speaker 1: to eat to sustain our physical well being. But currently
Speaker 1: from all the recent studies conducted on this, we also
Speaker 1: know that it has a lot to do with pleasure.
Speaker 1: All acts of eating increases dopamine in our brains and
Speaker 1: it lights up our reward system. But that is especially
Speaker 1: the case when we eat foods that are high in
Speaker 1: fat and sugar, because if we think about this evolutionarily,
Speaker 1: those foods are often the highest in energy, such that
Speaker 1: they are more likely to provide us with those fat
Speaker 1: stores that previously were crucial for our survival. So our
Speaker 1: brains will create queues, internal cues pleasure cueues to moti
Speaker 1: bad us to consume these more by making us feel
Speaker 1: happier in association. So food has this inherent impact on
Speaker 1: our brain through its impact on the dopamine system, which
Speaker 1: is responsible for the release of things like dopamain of course,
Speaker 1: but also serotonin oxytocin. And this is the biological basis
Speaker 1: for emotional eating, consuming foods in order to improve our
Speaker 1: mood through that biological relationship, rather than for hunger or
Speaker 1: some physical advantage. For example, when we are feeling bored,
Speaker 1: we often gravitate towards food that offer a really rich
Speaker 1: flavor profile, or we'll eat more, not because of actual
Speaker 1: taste or that biological impact down the line, but because
Speaker 1: the act of eating in itself is a task that
Speaker 1: can keep our mind entertained. By chewing, by tasting, by
Speaker 1: putting things in our mouth, by swallowing. That is a
Speaker 1: physical life activity. It gives us something to do when
Speaker 1: we feel stressed, though, we often crave things that are
Speaker 1: high in carbs, high in sugar because stress depletes our
Speaker 1: energy through the excessive release of things like cortisol and adrenaline.
Speaker 1: That puts pressure on our body, so we want to
Speaker 1: build back up those energy stores. And then when we're sad,
Speaker 1: when we're heartbroken, we often have it less of an
Speaker 1: appetite due to that distress and that deep hurt, So
Speaker 1: our bodies want to get the most energy from consuming
Speaker 1: as little food as possible. That means high fat, high
Speaker 1: energy ice cream, chocolate, very much what we would call
Speaker 1: the heartbreak diet of Hollywood, what we see in movies,
Speaker 1: but it's probably also scientifically correct. We crave these foods
Speaker 1: because of an inconsistent release of the hunger hormone, and
Speaker 1: after a period of intense heartbreak. That means that we
Speaker 1: are more inclined to go for those sugary snacks without
Speaker 1: really understanding our hunger. A lot of these examples, as
Speaker 1: you may have gathered, have to do with attempts to
Speaker 1: rain in our stress response, and that is because the
Speaker 1: act of eating certain food groups, certain foods, and our
Speaker 1: experiences of anxiety are causally related. They're correlated in quite
Speaker 1: a multidirectional way. So, firstly, according to Harvard Medical School,
Speaker 1: the foods we eat actually can mimic some of the
Speaker 1: symptoms of anxiety or stress or even panic attacks that
Speaker 1: we normally associate with high periods of stress, especially foods
Speaker 1: high in sugar or caffeine. So whilst we might search
Speaker 1: for some type of food we think is going to
Speaker 1: make us feel better in a time of heightened anxiety,
Speaker 1: it kind of has the counter effect makes it worse.
Speaker 1: But it's not just what that food provides. Like we
Speaker 1: spoke about with emotional eating and response to boredom, sometimes
Speaker 1: the physical act of consuming something or not consuming something
Speaker 1: using food to provide them, you know, an emotional catharsis
Speaker 1: to symbolically act to fill your stomach and feel like
Speaker 1: you're fulfilling your emotional needs. That is so satisfying and
Speaker 1: it causes us to emotionally eat. And when we talk
Speaker 1: about the stress responds the experiences of fear. Some studies
Speaker 1: have shown that when we eat, we provide a queue
Speaker 1: to our brain that we are safe. You know, if
Speaker 1: we are actively in fight or flight mode trying to
Speaker 1: escape some threat, we're not going to stop for a snack.
Speaker 1: Our appetite is suppressed when we feel danger and we
Speaker 1: are focused on overcoming whatever we are experiencing, whatever we
Speaker 1: are fearful of. But when we eat, when we force
Speaker 1: our bodies to consume something, to sit, to have a
Speaker 1: meal or a snack, our brain goes, okay, well, we
Speaker 1: can't be in immediate danger because otherwise we wouldn't be
Speaker 1: doing this right now. We wouldn't be doing this, so
Speaker 1: we must be okay. It gives your brain a queue
Speaker 1: to down to stop panicking. So that is another way
Speaker 1: that stress is mediated by what we choose to eat.
Speaker 1: When we choose to eat it not from a place
Speaker 1: of physical hunger, but an emotional need. You know what
Speaker 1: I think that scientific explanation tells us. What I think
Speaker 1: is most crucial to take from this is that we
Speaker 1: can't really blame ourselves for using food to self medicate
Speaker 1: or regulate our emotions. Nor can we just see it
Speaker 1: as an us problem that we lack discipline, that where weak. Therefore,
Speaker 1: I think what happens when we take on that perspective
Speaker 1: is that we self inflict a lot of shame around
Speaker 1: the foods that we consume when we're sad, or we're bored,
Speaker 1: or we're overwhelmed or we're stressed, because the nature of
Speaker 1: this is that this habit comes from a lot of
Speaker 1: factors outside of our control. Some of them are just
Speaker 1: innately biological, like our stress response. Others are societal and cultural,
Speaker 1: and a lot of them are to do with diet,
Speaker 1: culture and how our health system approaches things like weight
Speaker 1: and things like calories and things like energy intake. Our
Speaker 1: current approach to food, especially in a lot of Western societies,
Speaker 1: has become increasingly focused on restriction, or focused on nutritional
Speaker 1: and energy intake, on BMI and what is and is
Speaker 1: not a healthy weight, as well as kind of you know.
Speaker 1: Alongside that, as we see social media grow, a whole
Speaker 1: series of trend or fad diets that come and go,
Speaker 1: but those diets are really all kind of telling us
Speaker 1: the same thing. There is a right way to eat,
Speaker 1: and if you are not doing it this way, you're
Speaker 1: doing it wrong. It tells us that what we choose
Speaker 1: to put in our bodies needs to be carefully controlled,
Speaker 1: whether it's something like the keto diet or intermittent fasting,
Speaker 1: or a raw food diet, whatever it may be, even
Speaker 1: a juice cleanse. And you know what that does. It
Speaker 1: puts us at war with food. It completely damages and
Speaker 1: disrupts our relationship and our perception of what food is
Speaker 1: as something that needs to be regulated, rather than as fuel,
Speaker 1: rather than as one of the main sources of life.
Speaker 1: Alongside you know, it's water, air, and food. Those are
Speaker 1: the three things that we really need. And I think
Speaker 1: it's really interesting because you never see someone controlling how
Speaker 1: much water they drink or trying to stop how much
Speaker 1: they breathe. But we do have this intense feeling that
Speaker 1: food needs to be disciplined, whereas these other sources of
Speaker 1: life we don't have that feeling. We don't feel like
Speaker 1: there's a problem when we feel made to put something
Speaker 1: on a pedestal like that. That is the easiest way
Speaker 1: to get something to control you. When we are taught
Speaker 1: to avoid something like certain food, the more you want
Speaker 1: them because they feel more important, they feel more elusive.
Speaker 1: And so when we face something like intense emotions, a
Speaker 1: lot of stress, and our impulse control is lesson because
Speaker 1: we're trying to navigate so much else. The first thing
Speaker 1: you're going to do, you're going to go and eat
Speaker 1: those foods that have previously been off limits to you.
Speaker 1: You are going to push back against this restriction that
Speaker 1: you have been imposing on yourself. You're not going to
Speaker 1: be aware of your appetite and you'll overeat, and then
Speaker 1: afterwards you'll probably feel shame. And you'll feel that shame
Speaker 1: not because you deserve to feel shame, but because there
Speaker 1: is so much information coming from so many sources telling
Speaker 1: you that if you binge eat, if you eat a
Speaker 1: certain food, that makes you an unhealthy person, that makes
Speaker 1: you a bad person, that eating that food is bad,
Speaker 1: and all your brain is actually trying to do in
Speaker 1: that moment is just emotionally regular, it's just trying to
Speaker 1: get you back to a safe mental place. I think
Speaker 1: part of understanding This is acknowledging that your environment is
Speaker 1: going to impact behaviors like diet based on what we've
Speaker 1: been convinced is normal or good for us. And social
Speaker 1: media is part of that environment. So we really need
Speaker 1: to deinfluence ourselves a little bit when it comes to
Speaker 1: managing our emotional eating. And the best thing for you
Speaker 1: to do in that moment is to realize that what
Speaker 1: someone else is doing, what someone else is saying on TikTok,
Speaker 1: you know, whatever's in there, what I eat in the
Speaker 1: day video is probably not going to be right for you.
Speaker 1: There's always going to be some fad diet or craze
Speaker 1: or new way to fuel your body or lose weight,
Speaker 1: and that leads us to form an unhealthy relationship with food,
Speaker 1: one that is not based on feeding our body with
Speaker 1: what it needs, but intertwined with things like our self worth,
Speaker 1: our self esteem, our sense of value. It's more based
Speaker 1: on our mood, particularly how we use food once again,
Speaker 1: to make us feel better or make us feel worse,
Speaker 1: depending on how we're feeling in the moment. That's why
Speaker 1: we emotionally eat. We feel like eating is no longer
Speaker 1: this natural thing, it's this has this bigger deeper role,
Speaker 1: has this bigger, deeper meaning rather than just this normal
Speaker 1: natural purpose to feel our bodies. I want to state again,
Speaker 1: I know I just spoke about it, but there really
Speaker 1: shouldn't be any shame around this if this is a
Speaker 1: behavior that you find yourself engaging in. Like I said,
Speaker 1: it's something that I've acknowledged I do quite a bit.
Speaker 1: And I used to think that meant I was weak,
Speaker 1: or that I didn't care about my body that I
Speaker 1: had I should have had more control. And what I
Speaker 1: realized now is that that was really the influence of
Speaker 1: diet culture being the angry, little kind of devil on
Speaker 1: my shoulder. You know, this tendency comes from so many
Speaker 1: things outside of our control, but they make us feel
Speaker 1: like food controls us. Makes us feel like what we're
Speaker 1: putting in our body is necessary for handling our emotions,
Speaker 1: and that can have a lot of impacts. You know,
Speaker 1: emotional eating can have really distressing effects by leading to
Speaker 1: feelings of guilt, but it can also make us feel
Speaker 1: really ill, or it can give us a big sugar
Speaker 1: crash a few hours later, it can leave us feeling drained.
Speaker 1: As one nutritionist to put it in her article about
Speaker 1: this subject, which I link in the description. It's really fascinating.
Speaker 1: One of the issues with emotional eating is that it affects,
Speaker 1: of course, how you feel physically, especially when we overeat,
Speaker 1: because it reduces our energy levels, It can cause headaches,
Speaker 1: It generally just causes some discomfort, and we're not really
Speaker 1: resolving the problem, so we're just kind of at a
Speaker 1: loss loss. So how can we have that more intuitive
Speaker 1: relationship with the things we're putting in our body and
Speaker 1: notice the emotional triggers or causes of our dietary behaviors.
Speaker 1: How can we remove food as a coping mechanism and
Speaker 1: place it with strategies that are probably more productive and
Speaker 1: sustainable in the long run, that are going to leave
Speaker 1: you just feeling better. Well, all of that and more
Speaker 1: after this shortbreak, let's get one thing straight and clear
Speaker 1: right now. Sometimes you've had a rough day and that
Speaker 1: just really calls for samuberads, some pizza, an iceberger, some
Speaker 1: ice cream. There is nothing wrong with that. You don't
Speaker 1: need to feel guilt about wanting a certain food as
Speaker 1: long as it's not masking and underlying emotional need that
Speaker 1: you're not fulfilling. But food can be really comforting and
Speaker 1: maybe the exact thing that you need in that moment
Speaker 1: to energize yourself to restore those levels. We also naturally
Speaker 1: experience cravings for certain foods that don't have an emotional basis,
Speaker 1: even if they are psychological, and I want to explain
Speaker 1: that a little bit further. So, cravings are an intense,
Speaker 1: specific desire for a certain type of food, and it's
Speaker 1: a response to needing a certain kind of nourishment that
Speaker 1: our bodies are maybe not getting. But they also come
Speaker 1: from our environment, like advertisements, which are deliberately created in
Speaker 1: a specific way to target you, to make you want something,
Speaker 1: to make you buy it. So sometimes that can get
Speaker 1: confusing because we don't actually know what our body is needing.
Speaker 1: We are being cued by our environment. We do have
Speaker 1: those emotional needs, and sometimes our body just needs that nourishment.
Speaker 1: It's kind of impossible, right, you know. On one side,
Speaker 1: the side of diet culture, we're being influenced to always
Speaker 1: make perfect decisions towards food, as if there is actually
Speaker 1: a definition of perfect or that means anything. And then
Speaker 1: on the other side, this mass marketing side, they're trying
Speaker 1: to get you to buy that burger, to buy that
Speaker 1: chocolate bar those you know, constant opposing narratives makes it
Speaker 1: so once again, food is no longer just food. So
Speaker 1: how do we ignore all of that? How do we
Speaker 1: tap into what our bodies actually need? And what is
Speaker 1: the role of emotional eating in that equation? Firstly, I
Speaker 1: don't think that demonizing certain foods or restrictive eating is
Speaker 1: going to help you at all, especially if what you're
Speaker 1: struggling with is emotional eating. It just doesn't work for
Speaker 1: most people because a it assumes that your behavior is
Speaker 1: due to a lack of self control. Therefore it's something
Speaker 1: that you need to restrict, which just is not the case.
Speaker 1: Be you're using food to fight an emotional problem, and
Speaker 1: so it's the emotional problem that we need to work on,
Speaker 1: not the actual food consumption. So restricting is only going
Speaker 1: to elevate that emotional stress because it's just one more
Speaker 1: thing to manage, one more thing to control. Eating may
Speaker 1: feel good in the moment, restricting may feel like you're
Speaker 1: doing something, but the feelings that triggered you to emotionally
Speaker 1: eat are still going to be there. And finally, demonizing
Speaker 1: imposes shame. When we think that we've slipped up, we
Speaker 1: get stuck in the shame cycle of why did I
Speaker 1: do that? I feel so guilty, I have no self control,
Speaker 1: And rather than just realizing that there's a lot more
Speaker 1: going on there than just self discipline, maybe you're lacking
Speaker 1: the deeper coping skills and you just don't have them yet,
Speaker 1: what you're really doing is just making yourself feel once
Speaker 1: again guilt. You're making yourself feel guilty for something that
Speaker 1: perhaps you've only just started to recognize, something that comes
Speaker 1: from a lot of deeper factors that is going to
Speaker 1: take work, and I think it's just identifying that you
Speaker 1: can cope in a way that's going to leave you
Speaker 1: feeling better in all facets and areas of your life,
Speaker 1: not just by reducing that current feeling, but feeling more
Speaker 1: capable of handling all of those future situations where you're
Speaker 1: going to be stressed, you're going to be sad, you're
Speaker 1: going to be tired, and food doesn't have to be
Speaker 1: your only solution. So in terms of overcoming navigating emotional eating,
Speaker 1: the first thing we really need to do is identify
Speaker 1: our emotional triggers. The biggest one is, without a doubt, stress.
Speaker 1: When we experience chronic stress, as is so often in
Speaker 1: our twenties, when we've got a whole lot of things
Speaker 1: on our plate. Financial stress, relationship stress, career stress, all
Speaker 1: of that and more, your body produces high levels of
Speaker 1: the stress hormone known as cortisol. So cortisol triggers cravings
Speaker 1: for salty, sweet, fatty foods, foods that are going to
Speaker 1: give you a that burst of energy and that burst
Speaker 1: of pleasure. The more stress, particularly uncontrolled stress, you have
Speaker 1: in your life, the more likely you are to turn
Speaker 1: to food for emotional relief. So we need a better
Speaker 1: way to deal with that, one that is more mental,
Speaker 1: one that is more cognitive based in our thoughts. The
Speaker 1: best way that I have found to manage this is
Speaker 1: by doing something called a brain dump, which is the
Speaker 1: act of just writing everything down that's going on in
Speaker 1: my brain, without judgment, without prejudice, putting those emotions out there.
Speaker 1: You know, I always say a problem written down is
Speaker 1: a problem halved. Other ways to manage stress is to
Speaker 1: find an outlet for that excessive cortisol, that is you
Speaker 1: to emotionally eat. Because cortisol is really just your body's
Speaker 1: hormonal response to danger. It's released from our adrenal glands.
Speaker 1: It's a steroid hormone. It gives you more energy to
Speaker 1: fight your stresses. It releases more energy for you. So
Speaker 1: directing that into something that's going to use those those
Speaker 1: sources up, use that excess amount up that's gonna make
Speaker 1: you physically exhausted or mobile, is great in those situations.
Speaker 1: My recent favorite has been boxing. I cannot shut up
Speaker 1: about it. If you are a close friend of mine.
Speaker 1: I'm obsessed, I'm addicted, and you know, there's really nothing
Speaker 1: like punching a bag over and over again to give
Speaker 1: yourself an emotional release and to use up that excessive
Speaker 1: cortisol in your body. But running, cycling peak your poison.
Speaker 1: It's all good, but especially if it's aerobic exercise rather
Speaker 1: than anaerobic exercise, that kind of cardio that's gonna get
Speaker 1: your heart rate up, it's going to allow you to
Speaker 1: use more energy, and all of that energy is just
Speaker 1: energy that's not being placed on your mind, energy that
Speaker 1: is being released from your body in a positive way. Also,
Speaker 1: when you know that you're kind of entering into a
Speaker 1: stressful season or period of life, this may be hard,
Speaker 1: this may not be something that you feel capable of doing,
Speaker 1: but I would definitely say reduce how much caffeine you're consuming.
Speaker 1: Caffeine not only impacts our appetite, but it also makes
Speaker 1: and heightens those levels of anxiety. I actually no longer
Speaker 1: drink caffeine at all for that very reason. It just
Speaker 1: made me so much more stressed. Even though it would
Speaker 1: increase my focus and concentration, you know, it also meant
Speaker 1: that I wasn't in control of my energy levels, and
Speaker 1: I would plummet or I would be either too high
Speaker 1: or too low. I'd need to eat food to kind
Speaker 1: of bring me back in the middle. And nowadays I
Speaker 1: don't find myself as depleted at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: needing that sugar rush, you know, that fat rush, that
Speaker 1: car brush to push me back up. I can kind
Speaker 1: of listen to my body better rather than trying to
Speaker 1: use something external to release or heighten or decrease my emotions.
Speaker 1: The next trigger I think most associated with emotional eating
Speaker 1: is boredom. You know, when you're having a little lazy
Speaker 1: day at home and you keep opening the fridge, closing it,
Speaker 1: opening the pantry. You're not really hungry, right, You're just
Speaker 1: wanting something to do That might seem innocuous, but that
Speaker 1: is emotional eating, eating in response to your emotional state,
Speaker 1: that being boredom, food is a way to occupy your
Speaker 1: time and your mind. So instead of needing to find
Speaker 1: excitement in food, in taste, in flavor, look externally for
Speaker 1: something to do. Go for a nice long walk, call
Speaker 1: a friend you haven't spoken to in a while that
Speaker 1: is always so lovely, do some life admin whatever it
Speaker 1: may be. I think it's important, and obviously, if you
Speaker 1: want to stack, go for it. But what we want
Speaker 1: to break here is this pych of disrupting our natural
Speaker 1: hunger for emotional hunger and boredom can really interrupt that
Speaker 1: relationship and those cues that we receive from our body.
Speaker 1: If you're exhausted, take a nice bath, put on some candles,
Speaker 1: if you're lonely, engage in some nostalgic TV shows or movies.
Speaker 1: You have no idea how comforting that is, and just
Speaker 1: realize that you do have the agency and the mental
Speaker 1: strength to regulate your own emotions in a way that
Speaker 1: feels healthy, in a way that feels good for you. Secondly,
Speaker 1: to identify those triggers, we need to be curious, if
Speaker 1: I'm not eating for hunger, what am I feeling here?
Speaker 1: And understanding the why am I feeling that? And why
Speaker 1: do I feel compelled to eat when I might not
Speaker 1: necessarily want to in this moment. So I would say
Speaker 1: time is really important here. Pause when those cravings hit
Speaker 1: and ask yourself, could I put off eating for five
Speaker 1: or ten minutes? Is it real hunger that I'm experiencing?
Speaker 1: Is this mental or physical? And you make the decision
Speaker 1: from there. It's okay to appreciate the impact that food
Speaker 1: has on your mood because it's a scientific one that
Speaker 1: serves a purpose. And to hold off completely, like we said,
Speaker 1: starts a pretty severe cycle of restricting. So savor, don't consume.
Speaker 1: When we emotionally eat, we tend to do so very
Speaker 1: quickly and sometimes without even tasting the food. But by
Speaker 1: slowing down a we learn not to fear the feelings
Speaker 1: that make us want to emotionally eat and just enjoy
Speaker 1: food when we want it. Food is not something that
Speaker 1: is on a pedestal. Food is not something that you're
Speaker 1: not allowed to have and be It actually allows us
Speaker 1: to listen to physical hunger instead of emotional hunger. Also,
Speaker 1: eating a nutrient dense quality diet has associations with minimizing
Speaker 1: our risk of some of those mental health effects and
Speaker 1: experiences that we are trying to regulate with food. So
Speaker 1: there was a twenty nineteen study that showed eating a
Speaker 1: great variety of nutrients and vitamins is associated with better mood,
Speaker 1: reduced risk of depression, and a lot of other benefits.
Speaker 1: Food is fuel. Food is energy. Food is a resource.
Speaker 1: It's not something that A needs to control you, B
Speaker 1: needs to be restricted, or C needs to play any
Speaker 1: other part in life. There's also been a lot of
Speaker 1: buzz recently behind this idea of intuitive eating, and honestly,
Speaker 1: I wasn't sure whether to talk about this because at
Speaker 1: first glance, I was kind of like, is this just
Speaker 1: another fad diet, you know, especially when Gwyneth Paltrow is
Speaker 1: a big proponent. I'm a little bit skeptical. But I
Speaker 1: did my research and I do think it's really valuable
Speaker 1: to speak on because for some it is a solution.
Speaker 1: It treats food the way that I think a lot
Speaker 1: of us should be treating it, and it does move
Speaker 1: us towards a better relationship with what we eat. So
Speaker 1: intuitive eating, the key principles of this is basically kind
Speaker 1: of the antithesis of restrictive consumption. It's about rejecting the
Speaker 1: diet mentality, which we a plus for that big tick
Speaker 1: of approval. Honoring your hunger once again important when we're
Speaker 1: trying to counter emotional eating. Feeling your fullness, respecting your body,
Speaker 1: treating it with kindness and compassion and not shame. It's
Speaker 1: really about eating according to the cues that your body
Speaker 1: is giving you and about what it needs and wants,
Speaker 1: rather than according to your emotions, to some deeper perspective
Speaker 1: on what you should be eating. If your body wants carbs,
Speaker 1: give it cabs. If it wants a bee old salad,
Speaker 1: give it salad, go for it. Have some sugar, have
Speaker 1: some salt. All of those things we've been told to
Speaker 1: avoid for some misinformed reason have a place. But it's
Speaker 1: about balance. It's about once again being intuitive. I think
Speaker 1: one of the major benefits, according to some studies published
Speaker 1: in the National Library of Medicine, is intuitive Eating is
Speaker 1: just somewhat better for our psychological well being is we're
Speaker 1: eating in accordance to our biological urges and what is
Speaker 1: natural for us, rather than according to something that a
Speaker 1: diet is trying to tell us to do or to
Speaker 1: kind of the roller coaster of our emotions. People experience
Speaker 1: fewer amounts, fewer levels of food guilt or shame, they
Speaker 1: have improved body image. But to eat intuitively, you really
Speaker 1: need to relearn the distinction that we've been saying this
Speaker 1: whole time, physical hunger and emotional hunger. You need to
Speaker 1: trust that feedback loop between your stomach and your brain,
Speaker 1: because our bodies have an exceptional, finely tuned way of
Speaker 1: telling us what we need nutritionally, biologically, hunger wise, rather
Speaker 1: than just emotionally. And what's really happening. I'm going to
Speaker 1: say it one more time. When we emotionally eat, we
Speaker 1: no longer see food is fuel. We see it as
Speaker 1: a way to regulate our emotions, to make us feel better,
Speaker 1: but only temporarily, only in the moment. I want to
Speaker 1: finish of this episode by just restating a few key
Speaker 1: points here. Firstly, emotional eating does not make you a
Speaker 1: bad person. It does not make you faulty, and of
Speaker 1: course it's subjective as to whether you think that's a
Speaker 1: problem for you. Sometimes what we think we are controlling
Speaker 1: is emotional eating, when really it's just actually restriction and avoidance.
Speaker 1: If you find your behavioral intentions towards food, or about
Speaker 1: controlling your calories or your weight that I think is
Speaker 1: more in response to diet culture than I think emotional eating.
Speaker 1: I think that emotional eating is only part of the
Speaker 1: problem there, because you have been restricting yourself too much,
Speaker 1: avoiding it too much, that food has now been put
Speaker 1: on this pedestal such that when your emotions are heightened,
Speaker 1: you are more inclined to go for them because you
Speaker 1: have less impulse control. Secondly, this is obviously just my
Speaker 1: advice and my perspective on this. In my research, there
Speaker 1: are different perspectives and different opinions, and you have agency
Speaker 1: when it comes to decisions you want to make towards
Speaker 1: your diet and how you process your emotions. But I
Speaker 1: do think that we can benefit from feeling like we
Speaker 1: are in control of our behaviors, whether that has to
Speaker 1: do with eating or exercise or spending, or self destructive behaviors,
Speaker 1: whatever it may be, you are in control of them.
Speaker 1: We do not want food to feel like it controls
Speaker 1: us and we have no power to stop or to start.
Speaker 1: And Thirdly, I just sincerely hope that you enjoyed this
Speaker 1: episode and that you feel informed. I think these things
Speaker 1: are rarely spoken about in a modern day culture that
Speaker 1: is obsessed with things like diets and fads and right
Speaker 1: or wrong and weight loss and calories. Our relationship with
Speaker 1: food is so much more psychological than we think, and
Speaker 1: I hope that that comes across and that you're able
Speaker 1: to look at your own eating habits and see when
Speaker 1: you're responding to emotional hunger instead of physical hunger, and
Speaker 1: if you want to make a choice around that, have
Speaker 1: the agency, have the information to be able to do that.
Speaker 1: So thank you so much for listening to today's episode.
Speaker 1: I really do hope that you enjoyed it. This is
Speaker 1: something I'm learning with you. I find that talking about
Speaker 1: this is so interesting when I talk about it with
Speaker 1: friends and family, and you really do examine how mental
Speaker 1: your dietary habits are. It's something that I think I've
Speaker 1: been learning the better my relationship with food has become.
Speaker 1: So I hope that you got something out of this.
Speaker 1: I hope you enjoyed it. As always, please give us
Speaker 1: a follow if you want to be notified when new
Speaker 1: episodes come out. Please also feel free to leave a
Speaker 1: five star review wherever you get your podcasts. If you're
Speaker 1: listening on Spotify, if you're listening on Apple, Google Podcasts,
Speaker 1: whatever your cup of tea is, please feel free to
Speaker 1: give us a five star review and give us a
Speaker 1: follow at that Psychology podcast on Instagram. If you have
Speaker 1: an episode suggestion, you just want to see some behind
Speaker 1: the scenes content and video clips, We've got it all
Speaker 1: over there, so we will be back next week with
Speaker 1: another episode.