How To Recover From Emotional Eating

Honor those pain points, instead of forcing them to meet expectations or deadlines, ask them what they need, and listen to them. It doesn't mean you need to necessarily leave your job, it means setting boundaries. Show people how to honor you by honoring yourself first. Release fears and be more present with what your true self actually needs right now.

Transcript

Hello,

My name is Beatriz and I'm a Family Constellations Facilitator and today I want to speak about specifically binge eating and emotional eating and what causes these things.

So I recovered from binge eating a really long time ago.

I suffered from binge eating in my early 20s and I recovered like mid-20s and it was because while I moved,

And you don't have to move to recover,

You just have to become aware of the pressures in your life.

Where in your life do you feel pressured?

Where do you have deadlines which cause stress?

And it can be something as simple as,

For instance,

Putting a goal for yourself to lose weight for December party or to the beach,

To go with your friends,

To meet your friends' expectations or your family's expectations.

It can be as simple as that and that can already cause enough stress to binge eat.

So it's important to become aware of this and dissolve,

Eliminate these things.

So I'm going to explain the difference between binge eating and emotional eating.

Binge eating is when you eat past your comfort level and when you binge eat,

People that binge eat,

Women that binge eat tend to binge eat on anything that they have available but not necessarily.

Like,

For instance,

When I used to binge eat in my early 20s,

I used to binge eat on sugar stuff,

Sugary,

Chocolatey,

Things that would increase my dopamine levels quickly because I was so much in pain emotionally.

So that was my escape.

So it's important to tune into yourself and get to know these things,

Right?

So once again,

So people binge on anything.

And this tends to happen,

This tends to happen privately,

Like people hide,

Right?

Women hide because there is also like a collective judgment around women eating in general and them having to be thin all the time and,

You know,

Be a good girl and not eat a lot,

You know,

Especially on some countries more than others,

Some cultures more than others.

So binge eating is,

Yeah,

Like hiding and binging on a food that numbs your emotions,

Numbs your pain in that moment,

Although after,

After you binge eat,

A level of shame,

Like a big level,

Large level of shame comes up.

And it's a cycle,

You know,

That makes you binge eat again or,

You know,

You go into depression because you're shoving your emotions down or numbing them with food,

Which doesn't resolve them.

So that's binge eating.

Emotional eating,

You can even eat,

With emotional eating,

You can eat around people,

You tend to eat around people,

You eat a lot of food,

You feel full,

Although you don't,

It's not binge eating,

It's not like binge eating.

It's not this level of shame that comes up.

Some guilt can come up,

But it's not like binge eating.

Binge eating,

You know,

Women that binge eat,

Hide,

They tend to become depressed,

Like it's a really intense level of shame that is really difficult.

Not to say that emotional eating is not difficult,

That it's also difficult,

It's just different.

So when you emotionally eat,

You may eat when you're content,

When something exciting happens and you,

You know,

And you eat,

Especially if you don't have like an activity or something that you're doing that makes you feel good during the day,

Like,

So you,

Like that brings pleasure to your life.

If you don't have that in your life,

You don't have enough of that,

Then it's understandable that you would binge eat or emotional eat to get pleasure,

Like quick dopamine,

Right?

So this can be as simple as getting some sun,

Sunlight,

And I know it's not the same,

This is important to mention and validate,

It's not the same to get some sun even though getting some sun is not the same as binge eating or emotional eating because it doesn't numb our emotions,

It still brings pleasure and the more pleasure activities,

Like simple ones that you include in your day,

The better because the reason why we're emotional eating is because we are seeking pleasure,

Right?

If we don't have,

We don't feel happy in our jobs or in our relationship,

Relationships,

Etc.

,

Then it makes sense that we would look for pleasure only in food,

So it's very important because the more that you find activities,

Like for instance,

Nourishing things like taking a hot shower with Epsom salts or sauna or going to a spa,

Getting a massage,

A relaxing one,

Or I don't know,

Doing some grounding,

Then the only source of pleasure wouldn't be the eating,

Right?

The candy,

The sugar,

The chocolate wouldn't be the only one,

Not to say not to do it,

Right?

That's not what I'm saying.

I'm not saying limiting yourself.

What I'm saying is to include more pleasurable activities in your day and to identify if you have pressure in your life,

Deadlines and taking care of that,

Right?

Learning to say no when it's something that stresses you,

Like for instance,

If a friend tells you,

Oh,

Let's commit to a diet together for December and you already feel pressurized and you feel stressed and it stresses you,

Then sometimes we're not even aware of it or unconscious of it,

Although it still stresses us in the same way,

Even if we're not aware of how much it stresses us because sometimes we push down the pain,

We shove it down.

So just become aware of that.

You have deadlines in your life,

Pressure,

Where in your life do you have it and how can you,

Where are the fears?

What are the fears?

Who are you afraid of disappointing?

Who are you afraid of saying no to?

What's the core fear as a high school highly sensitive woman?

And also,

Once again,

This can happen with binge eating or emotional eating and also looking for activities like,

Once again,

Pleasurable ones for you that you can include in your life and making a list and maybe including one or two a day,

Whatever feels best to you and,

Or a week actually.

But if it's a hot shower,

You can do it daily or that moment for you,

That pleasurable moment.

And not expecting that binge,

If it's binge eating,

It will just go away quickly and assume that it should go away quickly and you should heal from it really quickly.

It's very,

It's a nonlinear way of healing.

It's not a straight line.

It requires patience.

It requires becoming more conscious in our lives.

Once again,

Identifying what deadlines,

What pressure do I feel in my life?

Who am I trying to please?

Where am I abandoning myself?

Yeah,

Those things,

We could start there.

And including,

Once again,

These pleasurable activities that make us feel good.

Without the expectation that this will automatically disappear,

Binge eating,

Just asking ourselves,

Okay,

At what time do I binge eat or what time do I emotionally eat and what happens right before?

Because there may be some stressful situations that we forget and yeah,

When we become more aware of it,

That's when we can solve them because we start looking for support,

For tools to resolve these situations.

And also,

If we don't have a plan,

If we don't plan,

What causes this is also when we have stressful situations but we're not aware of them consciously other than deadlines and pressure.

Like for instance,

Intrusive thoughts,

What we call intrusive thoughts,

Right?

That make no sense.

That tends to happen to highly sensitive beings,

Highly sensitive humans and it is because we have this nervous system that tends to be in survival.

So we have a lot of fears,

We tend to feel everything much more.

So becoming aware of what am I afraid of?

What am I afraid of in my life?

Why am I not setting boundaries?

What are the fears that lead me to not set boundaries,

Etc.

,

Etc.

?

So journaling,

Right?

Journaling during the day to see what comes up.

It doesn't have to make sense to your mind,

Just write and see what comes up.

And once again,

Deadlines.

This is like the main thing I feel that causes emotional and binge eating.

For instance,

I'm going to tell you a brief story that has to do with emotional eating.

With chocolate,

I have had the tendency because in my lineage,

There is a tendency to eat,

There has been a tendency to eat chocolate a lot.

My grandma was a chocolate lover and there is nothing wrong with that.

Although in my lineage,

There is a lot of love for chocolate,

Right?

And it makes sense that I would look for chocolate,

Especially dark chocolate is my favorite when I am stressed out.

And I realized recently that when I feel like there is a deadline in my life,

I committed to something that I don't feel completely comfortable about and I feel pressurized.

Even if it feels subtle,

That can lead to emotional eating.

That can lead to me eating more chocolate than I would like to and that is healthy for me.

So when we identify these pain points,

Then it will become much easier to get past them and we will naturally feel more stress.

It won't be so forceful because sometimes if we feel pressurized for whatever reason,

Like we have a deadline at work or we have our own deadline like I need to be this thin for this date or etc.

Etc.

However it looks for us,

That's already a lot of pressure and stress.

So we are forcing something to happen for a date and we are forgetting that there is hormonal influence,

Right?

Like two weeks before our period,

If we are at that age,

It makes sense that we would feel all these emotions and we cannot commit to something that we force ourselves to do for a certain date,

Right?

Because we are not taking into consideration that we have a menstrual cycle and there is a lot of emotions that mood swings,

Etc.

Etc.

And cravings and things that happen naturally when we are a woman,

Especially as a highly sensitive woman.

So this is very,

Very important and there is also for women that are over 50,

There is also hormonal influence.

So at any age we have hormonal factors that have a lot to do with binge eating and emotional eating.

So imagine feeling that we have to meet people's expectations like for a date or we have to be a certain weight,

Like get to a certain goal of weight for a date and pressurizing that to be that way regardless of what's happening around us,

Things that happen that are out of our control around us that creates,

You know,

Generates stress,

Pressure,

Etc.

Etc.

There are so many things to consider.

So when we flow with our emotions and we validate our emotions,

Like for instance,

If we feel sad,

We place our hand on our hearts and tell ourselves,

I'm so sorry you feel sad.

I'm so sorry.

We validate our own emotions.

Starting there would be a really good start.

Like first steps,

It's important to take it slow and gradual.

So I'm so sorry that you feel shame.

I'm so sorry.

When binge eating happens or when emotional eating happens and we feel guilty or shame,

I'm so sorry that you feel shame.

I'm so sorry this is so difficult for you.

And once again,

Start journaling and becoming aware of what is affecting you in that moment because once again,

We may have a goal,

A weight goal,

And if we are committing to someone else or even to ourselves in a strict way,

Forceful,

For a date or for,

You know,

Let's say it's a travel,

Well,

Things may change up to that date.

Feelings may change.

Things may happen around us that affect us and affect our intentions,

Our goals,

Right?

So it's important to honor that.

So when we journal,

We become aware of that.

So I really suggest getting a journal for food and writing each day like what's happening that day.

What is affecting me that day?

What is,

Yeah,

What is feeling harder in me these days?

Can I honor myself?

Can I seek support?

Where can I seek support?

Once again,

Please honor yourself because honoring ourselves,

It all starts with ourselves.

And I do feel like it's important to seek support because this really,

Really helps.

This has really made a difference in my life as well.

There is many ways that we can look for support.

And there is another factor that I wanted to talk about and it is there is a collective belief in the binge eating community,

Binge eating help with binge eating community and support is that we're going to miss out.

If you don't take pictures,

We're going to miss out.

If we don't go to certain events and we don't feel like it and we feel down,

Then we're missing out.

Let's please release this fear of missing out.

If you don't feel like it,

You don't feel like it.

And people that honor you will understand and will let it go,

Right?

So this can also become a deadline.

This can also become pressure in your body.

You know,

People's expectations and you know,

People around you that want to do something.

I remember as a teenager,

I had friends around me that did not suffer from binge eating and I did and they were not necessarily highly sensitive so they were not tuning into me.

I was not tuning into myself either.

So they would pressurize me to go to parties or pressurize me to go to the beach and kind of,

Yeah,

Dismiss me because they didn't understand.

If I didn't understand myself,

Imagine the people around me.

So it's very important to honor yourself or let's say if you have a teenager and she's going through this and you're trying to help her,

This is also very important to honor her.

She doesn't want to go,

She doesn't want to go.

She doesn't want to put a bathing suit,

She doesn't have to.

Please,

Let's release this fear of missing out.

This is one of the things that can create more pressure than anything.

So and this is actually encouraged in binge eating communities.

Like,

Oh,

You're going to miss out,

Don't miss out.

Imagine how you're going to feel in the future.

That's another fear that is,

You know,

Being pushed into,

Us as women.

So please honor yourself and honor anyone that you have around you.

It's your daughter,

Your sister,

Whoever it is,

Your friend,

Your wife,

Honor her because she's having a hard time.

If it's you or someone else,

She's having a really hard time because suffering with binge eating,

Struggling with binge eating or emotional eating is hard.

It is hard.

So I hope that everything felt clear and I hope that you have a peaceful and grounded rest of your day.

And thank you for taking the time to take care of yourself,

To listen and to receive support.