Stress Eating and Emotional Eating: What Might Help - Tips from a Registered Dietitian

Stress eating, emotional eating and eating out of boredom are common coping mechanisms. However, they are not usually the most ideal way to cope with emotions. It can get in the way of health goals, and often does not help address the root cause of the emotions.

Whether you're wanting a distraction from a task, feeling stressed, depressed, or guilty for eating a certain food, these feelings can be quite overpowering. In some situations, people may resort to eating as a way to feel better.

Emotional eating doesn’t mean you have less self control than other people. It is not something to blame yourself for. No one likes feeling those unpleasant emotions, and we all need comfort. If someone else was in the same position as you, with the same amount of stressors and unpleasant emotions, they might even do the exact same thing (especially if they haven't already developed alternative coping strategies).

It is, however, something that can be worked on. With time you can find alternative ways of managing your stress and emotions, and can also find ways to reduce the frequency of the stressors and unpleasant emotions.

Strategies that can help with reducing stress eating and emotional eating, include:

Step 1:

Reflect on what emotion you are experiencing and what is influencing it. What specific emotion is it that you feel? What thoughts, behaviours, or surroundings might be contributing to that feeling?

Oftentimes people are trying to ignore their unpleasant emotions, rather than thinking about what it is and what might be influencing it. Labelling the emotion and thinking about what is causing the boredom, stress, depressive feelings, or feelings of guilt after eating, is the first step to improving the situation.

For those who are feeling overpowering emotions, it could be helpful to go through this step with the help of a professional, such as a clinical counsellor, so that they can help you with processing the emotions.

Step 2:

Figure out what strategies that can help you deal with those emotions in an alternative way. There are other activities that you do that can help give you the comfort that you need. For example:

If it is boredom:

What would make your life more interesting or engaging?

Are there other activities you can do during the day that you would enjoy? 

It could be small, simple activities such as going outside for a walk, doing a hobby that you enjoy, or spending time with friends.

Perhaps you have been doing the same task for too long, and just need to get up and do something different.

If it’s stress:

How can you deal with the stress in a different way?

Stress-reducing activities could be activities that you enjoy or that are relaxing, such as listening to music, walking, or doing a fun activity with a friend.

Aerobic physical activity could be helpful for improving your mood and reducing stress. It doesn't have to be a structured workout at a gym- it could be a simple few jumping jacks in your office or dancing in your kitchen to your favourite song.

Taking breaks from work is important. Even if you feel like you have no time for it. Breaks not only help you feel more energetic, motivated, and in a better mood, it can also help you become more productive with your work.

If it's low mood:

Is there anything you can do in the day that might help you feel better (even if only a small amount)?

Some ideas for activities that could help you feel better include talking with others, doing an activity you enjoy, journalling, physical activity, or doing a task that gives you a sense of accomplishment for that day.

If you haven't already, it can also help to take the first step to seek support from health care professionals, including doctors and clinical counsellors, especially if the feelings are severe or persisting.

If it's related to guilt or emotional pain:

Guilt can create a very unpleasant feeling. We often attribute it to mean something about ourselves as well, such as "I am not good enough” or “I always mess up,” which makes us feel worse about ourselves.

It also might lead us to do more of the behaviour, such as overeating, because the behaviour makes us feel better in the moment, and temporarily relieves ourselves of the painful and uncomfortable feeling. It might even bring us to the point of wanting to punish ourselves for our behaviour or for “not being good enough.”

While this is a type of coping strategy, it is not the most helpful or healthy one. We end up compromising our health, and it just leaves us right back in the place we started, with the same feelings and thoughts. The cycle continues to repeat itself.

It does not address the root cause of the problem.

So how do you break the cycle?

We are often too hard on ourselves. Negative thoughts and beliefs about yourself make you feel worse about yourself, making life more difficult. A common place that these thoughts and beliefs come from is having too high of expectations on yourself. It’s helpful to remind yourself that humans make mistakes and that no one is perfect.

Forgive yourself and be gentle on yourself. Being loving and kind to yourself can help reduce the unpleasant emotions, to make it easier to get through the day. Whenever you catch yourself having a negative thought or belief about yourself, try replacing those thoughts with something more helpful. Examples of more helpful thoughts include "It makes sense why I feel this way," "I am not perfect and that is ok” “I can get better.”

Reminding yourself what is good about yourself, what you love about yourself, and what you are grateful for in life, can also help you take the focus off the negative things that you are telling yourself.

Sometimes simply taking some deep breaths can help to slow down the negative thoughts as well. Healthier ways of coping with your feelings, such as mindfulness activities, can help you to focus on the present, instead of ruminating on the past. Other healthy coping strategies include doing an activity that you enjoy or talking with someone, to give you a boost of the feel-good hormones and make it easier to deal with things.

If you are experiencing uncomfortable feelings of guilt, emotional pain, or self-directed hostility, it can also be helpful to speak with a professional such as a clinical counsellor, to get more support.

Step 3:

Emotions that feel unpleasant are often telling you something: that something needs to change. If the source of the emotions that you're experiencing is something that you can change, slowly working at making changes can help to reduce the frequency of the stress and unpleasant emotions.

Sources of these feelings could include:

• Lack of social connectedness

• Low self esteem

• Negative self-talk

• Relationship issues

• Changes in your life situation

• Uncertainty of the future

• Stressors in your life, such as work or financial stress

Some examples of ways to deal with these issues include:

• Opening up to the people in your life that you can trust can help to make you feel less alone in your struggles. If you feel like there is not someone in your life like this, or need someone with a more objective point of view, you could seek support from a counsellor.

• Taking steps forward in addressing your human needs, including working towards social connection and belonging, self-esteem, and self actualization (making progress to reach your full potential).

Everyday you have the option to take actions that could make your life better, whether it’s improving your relationships, making new relationships, changing your outlook on life, and seeing your strengths and accomplishments rather than just your failures. If you're not sure where to start or how to improve these areas of your life, you can try to learn more about it, through books, videos, presentations, or talking with other people.

In summary,

Finding new coping strategies is something that takes time, and doesn't just happen overnight. Taking one step in the direction acquiring alternative coping strategies and improving your life situation can make a difference, and each step afterwards can make things easier and easier.

There will still be times where you might eat for reasons other than health.

That is ok.

Eating can provide comfort at times, and that isn’t wrong.

The more you can make your situation better for yourself, and find alternative ways of coping, the less you might need food for that purpose.

If you would like more support with emotional eating, a registered dietitian can be a helpful resource. Dietitians provide support to help you develop healthy habits, including working through the barriers that are holding you back and helping you to set up systems that can help make it easier to make more nutritious food choices.

Disclaimer:

The content on this site is not meant to replace direct medical advice from your doctor or other qualified clinician.