Emotional eating leads to weight gain, unhappiness and stress. People eat for other reasons than hunger and to nourish their bodies, and those reasons relate to emotions such as anger, fear, sadness and happiness. You might eat to celebrate your daughter's marriage or to push down feelings related to your job loss. Stopping emotional eating can help you lose weight and keep it off for good.
Understand It
The first step that you need to take to stop emotional eating is to understand that sometimes you eat to cope with emotions. You won't be able to stop unless you recognize this.
Decrease Stress
Ask yourself if you ever eat to deal with stress. If you're the type of person who grabs a container of cookies when you have to meet a big deadline at work or devours a bag of chips after a horrible date, you eat when you're stressed. Learn to cope with stress in positive ways such as exercising, meditating or talking to a friend.
Fight Boredom
People often eat because they're bored. If you've eaten a container of ice cream while watching television, you're guilty of boredom eating. Add new things to your life to decrease boredom, such as taking cooking classes, joining a book club or learning to knit.
Eat When Hungry
Before you put a bite of food in your mouth, ask yourself if you're really hungry. If you're not hungry, figure out why you want to eat and deal with that emotion.
Keep a Food Diary
Make yourself accountable for the things that you eat by keeping a food diary. Write down everything you consume, including beverages.
Eat Without Distraction
Geneen Roth, author of several bestselling books on emotional eating, recommends that you eat in a calm environment. This means you need to turn off the television, put away your crossword puzzle or book and eat while sitting at a table.
Check In
As you eat each meal, check in with yourself every few bites to make sure you're still hungry. If you're not, stop eating.
Enjoy Eating
Allow yourself to enjoy eating. If you're going to have that piece of chocolate cake, enjoy it. You're not really getting pleasure from it if you gobble down the food. Taste each individual bite and concentrate on the flavors and consistency. If you do this, you'll eat less.
Regulate Temptation
Make a grocery list each week and stick to it while you're at the store. You'll be less likely to eat a bag of cookies if you have to go out to get them when the mood strikes.
Seek Help
If you're depressed, suffering from severe anxiety or having other emotional problems, you might not be able to stop emotional eating on your own. You might need medication or therapy before you can gain control of your eating. Seek help from a licensed mental health professional.
