Cope With Your Emotions Without Using Food
Emotional eating is a concept that has a negative reputation. As we discuss the principle of Intuitive Eating related to coping with emotions, we want to start out by emphasizing that eating to soothe an emotion, eating to celebrate, or eating to comfort are not inherently wrong and they are not failures of intuitive eating. Eating out of an emotional need (not a physiological one) is an occasional part of normal eating and certainly has its place in a neutral and peaceful relationship with food. So this principle is not about teaching you to never eat from an emotional motivation. Rather, the seventh principle of Intuitive Eating simply encourages you to expand your toolbelt for coping with emotions beyond just eating.
Does food fix feelings?
Let’s start by answering this question. Many might say that “food doesn’t fix feelings” and therefore food can’t ever be a helpful response to a particular emotion. We disagree, though. Here at Halve Your Cake, our approach to food is more gentle and nuanced. For example, say you studied hard and did well on an exam (or passed some sort of professional assessment). Going out with friends or family to celebrate with ice cream sounds like a great response to the emotions of relief, pride and joy. Or maybe you have an extremely hard day and all you want is a big bowl of your mom’s chicken soup to soothe disappointment, grief or sadness. Sounds like a reasonable desire to us. Food is not an ultimate solution to all types of emotional distress, but it is certainly appropriate in some cases when it does help to improve or soothe your mood.
Why should food not be our main coping mechanism?
There are two main reasons that we encourage moving away from food as a primary coping strategy for difficult emotions or hard circumstances.
Food does not address or fix the root cause of the feeling.
When food can’t actually help change the circumstances or help you name and acknowledge your emotions, it often ends up being a crutch that allows you to numb yourself, distract yourself or just postpone when you will have to deal with the issue. Sometimes, feelings have to be felt, endured and named and then they will pass on their own. Sometimes, feelings need direct addressing through therapy, counseling or some other type of attention. If food is preventing you from acknowledging or addressing the feelings so that you can appropriately deal with them and move on to a more healthy state of mind, then it’s not being helpful, it’s being hurtful.
Physically it may not be health-promoting to regularly consume extra food to soothe emotions.
Your body’s energy needs are indicated to you by your hunger levels, but if you are consistently eating above and beyond what those hunger levels indicate you need, you risk losing touch with your hunger and fullness cues as well as simply feeling less than your best physically. Uncomfortable fullness (especially to the point of feeling sick) is not something we want happening with regularity. This is why working to make food just one of many available coping mechanisms is key. Sometimes, you do need to soothe or distract yourself when a particular emotion is coming on strong. It’s great to have a list of a few different options for distraction or enduring the feeling so that food doesn’t have to do all the heavy lifting, and your body doesn’t have to handle the consumption, digestion, absorption and storage of a lot of extra nourishment that it didn’t really need.
What do I do in the moment?
When you are experiencing a strong emotion and you realize that your go-to coping technique is to reach for food, what can you do instead to begin the formation of a new habit? Evelyn Tribole, one of the authors of the Intuitive Eating book, recommends asking a few key questions:
What am I feeling right now?
Naming the emotion is key in addressing it and also learning about yourself. It may not be immediately obvious to you what the name of the feeling is, but the more you practice asking this question, the easier it will become for you to name and specify what you’re feeling in a given moment.
What is the quality of the emotion?
Is it pleasant, unpleasant or neutral? Do you have any physical sensations in your body that are accompanying this feeling?
What do I need right now that relates to my feelings?
This may be the hardest one to answer, especially if you are just beginning this new practice of developing other coping mechanisms. It may be helpful to sit down one day (or even keep a running list in your phone that you can constantly add to!) and write down all the activities that make you feel genuinely good, that “fill your cup,” or that usually help decrease stress levels. For example, your list may include taking a walk in fresh air, listening to a favorite album, having a coffee date with a close friend, doing a tough workout and working up a sweat, preparing a home cooked meal, going to get a pedicure, making a list of things you’re grateful for, going to therapy or watching a favorite movie.
This is partly why it is helpful to have identified and named the emotion. If you know what you’re feeling, it can be easier to know what will help you to feel better. If what you’re really feeling is loneliness, then maybe the best response is to try and see or call a friend. If what you’re really feeling is overstimulation, then maybe what you need is the opposite: a quiet hour in the bathtub with a book. As much as possible, try to match your response to the specific feeling as opposed to grabbing blindly for a distracting activity off of your list. The goal isn’t to avoid emotional eating at all costs, it’s to make you more in tune with your feelings and to get to know yourself better so that you’re more competent at coping with difficult emotions in any kind of circumstance.
Over time, you may want to reflect more generally on patterns of distressing emotions that you feel routinely.
In addition to just reaching for a coping strategy off of your list, you will likely benefit from doing some work to uncover the root source of these emotions. Sometimes this root cause is something that you have no power to change or address, but sometimes there may be something you can tweak in your life to help decrease the frequency of these difficult emotions from ever arising.
For example, if you are frequently feeling overwhelmed and stressed with your parenting and household responsibilities, it may be helpful temporarily to find an activity that helps you destress and find some joy (like taking a walk with another neighborhood mom). But this activity won’t actually address the source of the stress, so the stress and overwhelm will continue to happen. As you dive deeper into the causes of distressing feelings, you may be able to identify some things you can do proactively instead of reactively. In this example, maybe you need to have a conversation with your partner about how you’re feeling and how you can share some responsibilities with them. Maybe you need to develop a new system or schedule for some of your household chores. Maybe you could sign up for a weekly menu plan service to remove the task of meal planning from your to-do list. Or maybe you need to make a plan for some regular weekly childcare to help you out.
Each individual’s experience with emotional eating will be different, and for some people implementing this principle of intuitive eating will be much more difficult than others. If you find that it’s not such a simple endeavor to develop other coping mechanisms and you are still reaching for food to soothe or numb yourself regularly, reach out to a professional. Working with a counselor or dietitian (or one of both!) who is well-versed in Intuitive Eating and weight-inclusive care can make a huge difference in your journey. Having someone else reflect back to you, ask questions, listen, hold space, make suggestions, and just travel the road alongside you can be immensely helpful and enlightening. If you’d like to discuss working with us here at Halve Your Cake, reach out here to book a free call!
Not ready for individual work? Download your free guide on 6 Steps to Heal Your Relationship with Food.
