What Happens When You Feed Emotional Hunger With Food
I feel a gnawing inside so I go to the cabinet. I find popcorn or chips and start eating, mindlessly putting my hand into the bag and shoving fistfuls into my mouth. I feel so hungry, yet even as I swallow down the whole bag, my hunger doesn’t recede.
I still feel the emptiness, like a pit in my stomach, and I go to the fridge. There are only healthy foods to choose from, because that’s what we have, but after an apple, some turkey slices, and a yogurt, I still feel the same. This vacuousness consumes me, yet my stomach feels full to bursting.
No amount of food will make this hunger go away. My mind and body are at odds and I can’t reconcile it. This hole inside will not fill with food, yet I keep trying to feed it.
If you’ve ever been an emotional eater, this scenario might be familiar. I’ve been an emotional eater for as long as I can remember. When you are not “allowed” to feel your feelings, you have to put them somewhere, and it’s common to eat them. That’s what I learned to do as a child.
As an adult, I have learned that no amount of food will satisfy this “hunger” because it’s not coming from the body, it’s coming from the heart/mind.
When you experience actual, physical hunger, you feel it in your stomach, often as a growling sensation. When you feel emotional hunger, you might feel it in your chest, throat, or head, somewhere other than your stomach.
In my newest book, Intentional Eating: Finding Peace and Balance in Your Relationship with Food, I describe the difference between Physical Hunger, which CAN be sated with food, and Emotional Hunger, which can’t, no matter how hard you try.
Physical Hunger
With [physical] hunger, your body is lacking nutrients so you need to feed yourself. Your body is seeking energy or fuel to repair itself, and once you eat, this hunger goes away for a while….This is the only type of hunger that becomes sated with food. You eat and it goes away.
Emotional Hunger
[Emotional] hunger will not be sated with food, no matter how much you eat. when you feel lonely, bored, stressed, anxious, tired, sad, or something else, you might turn to food to feel better….Unfortunately, no amount of food with make this type of hunger go away. It might change how you feel temporarily (like with a sugar high), but you will still crave.
It’s like trying to fill a void inside you with the wrong thing. When you try to put a square peg in a round hole, it just doesn’t fit. You can keep trying to shove it in, like when you put food in your mouth, but no square peg will appropriately fill the round hole. It’s the wrong shape. Trying to fill the emptiness you feel inside with food is the same thing. It’s not what your body actually needs.
Emotional eating is a form of addiction
Any type of addictive behavior starts by trying to avoid feeling. The substance that you use isn’t the problem (or isn’t the whole problem), it’s the behavior. When you eat your feelings, you are using food in an attempt at not feeling them. Unfortunately, the feelings need to go somewhere. If they don’t go out, they go in, and get bigger, louder, and harder to avoid.
Using food to suppress your feelings works for a while, until it doesn’t. Over time, you need to work harder/eat more to squash them down, as it takes more effort to keep them quiet and at bay. The only way out of this situation is by feeling your feelings.
It sucks, I know. Feeling seems so much harder than it actually is, mostly because of the stories we tell ourselves:
- If I start crying I will never stop
- Grief hurts too much, I can’t handle it
- Feeling lonely is too painful, I can’t tolerate it
- Boredom is uncomfortable and I can’t feel it
- I’m not supposed to feel angry
- I’m not supposed to show emotion
You may or may not be consciously aware of these stories, but often these are the drivers of emotional eating, or addiction of any type. Yoga, meditation, journaling, and therapy are all ways to start to uncover the stories that you are telling yourself so that they stop holding you back. Once you realize your stories, you can figure out what is actually true, and you’ll no longer have to eat your feelings.
Feel your feelings
These are just stories and are not actually true. Having feelings is part of being human. Humans have a whole range of emotions, each giving us information about our life experience. Emotions aren’t bad, they are information. They clue you in to what is happening inside yourself.
Somewhere along the way, however, you may have learned, like I did, that having feelings is not okay. This isn’t actually true. What was true at that time, was that someone else wasn’t able to tolerate your emotions. They gave you the impression, or told you outright, that you were too much and needed to be smaller and quieter. Just because someone else can’t tolerate your emotions doesn’t mean that you aren’t allowed to have them and feel them.
Feeling is the only way through
When it comes to emotional eating, the only way out is through. No amount of food will quell how you feel, you need to just feel it. Feeling hasn’t actually killed anyone yet, as far as I know, that’s just the story you tell yourself.
Start with a pause. When you find yourself going to the cabinet/fridge/kitchen, pause and breathe. Notice the sensation and where you feel it in your body. If you feel actual hunger, then eat. If you feel something else, breathe.
Give the sensation permission to exist. This can be challenging at first, but it gets easier with practice. Close your eyes and place your hands where you feel the sensation. Breathe and feel it. It might intensify, it might dissipate. Stay with it and notice, without trying to change it in any way.
After a short time, you will notice that the sensation lessens and disappears, especially when you are not feeding it with stories. When you tune into the sensation and allow it to be as it is, it softens and releases. In the end, this is so much easier than trying to suppress it.
Check out the live video I did with Tim Ebl about Intentional Eating, the concept and the book.
Intentional Eating
There are many diet books out there that tell you to eat this food but don’t eat that food. Eat this many calories, this ratio of macros, etc. You won’t find any of that type of advice in this book.
Intentional Eating is a mindset reset to help you find peace and balance in your relationship with food and with yourself. You will learn to be kinder with your self-talk, as well as ways to stop eating when you aren’t hungry.
Intentional eating means eating on purpose, with attention and mindfulness. Yoga teaches principles such as Non-harming, Contentment, Compassion, and finding “Enough,” and when you apply these principles to how you approach food, you feel more in control over your actions. You can make mindful decisions and enjoy your food more while eating exactly what your body requires.
Click the button below to get Intentional Eating: Finding Peace and Balance in Your Relationship with Food! I appreciate your support!
I also teach a 6 week online course on this topic, the next round will start in September. I intentionally keep this group small, limited to 5 people, to provide a safe, supportive experience. Click the button to join the waitlist for the September group!
