We go through our daily lives with a number of different feelings: anger, sadness, breaks, crashes, joy, surprises, change, and change…a group of different feelings that are affected by our psyches and which in turn are reflected either negatively or positively. The body is a mirror of the internal psychological reactions. I mean, in cases of stress, some people resort to biting the lips, crackling fingers, biting nails, or pulling out hair Another example, is a result of psychological pressure or tension or a feeling of brokenness and sadness and the result of bullying and ridicule, some individuals resort to emptying negative energies by eating food. Also, some cases of joy, happiness, and a feeling of victory and success are also expressed by eating large quantities of food, which is known as emotional eating.

Emotional eating is a form of eating disorder and is defined as “an increase in food intake in response to negative emotions.”

It is also known as eating for reasons other than feeling hungry. It is also defined as a change in a person’s eating patterns, as a person’s eating for emotional reasons may decrease. But it is usually characterized by an increase in eating in general, and by eating certain foods in particular when feeling psychological pressure.

Emotional eating causes

  • Social factors: Increase eating in the presence of others, especially in women when they go out with their friends
  • Factors as a result of dieting and eating regimens: Many obese people have a negative image of their appearance and value, which results in emotional eating.
  • Childhood habits: Some people have a psychological attachment to food, especially food associated with beautiful and lovable memories of themselves. Or if they used to be rewarded by their parents with food, especially sweets
  • People who have been accustomed since childhood to improving their mood as a result of eating a certain food.
  • Cholesterol hormone: The stress hormone in our bodies and its presence in a high percentage may increase the feeling of desire to eat foods, whether salty or sugary.

Unfortunately, it is indicated here that the most targeted groups of emotional eating are adolescents and women: as a result of the social pressures and fluctuations that the two groups go through, and mood fluctuations resulting from hormonal differences in women and mood swings constitute one of the most important causes of eating for emotions.

 

Signs of emotional eating

  • Eating without awareness, especially food and pastimes; Whereas, if a person is actually hungry, he will be fully aware of his feeling of hunger.
  • Excessive inclination to certain types of food, most of which are unhealthy.
  • A sudden and rapid feeling of hunger, as normal hunger, is a gradual and slow feeling.
  • The feeling of hunger is usually accompanied by negative and unhappy thoughts.
  • Do not stop eating even after feeling full.
  • Reward yourself with eating after a hard day or feeling angry.

Unfortunately, most people who suffer from emotional eating tend to eat unhealthy food often, such as chips, soft drinks, and foods rich in saturated fats to release negative energy and bad feelings.

The question now is: How do we stop emotional eating?

Every problem has a solution, but we appreciate our problems and confront them; In other words, internal motivation is required to get rid of the problem of emotional eating.

We need to take several steps to face this problem:

Not being affected by pressures, in other words, we don’t have to be emotionally affected by any transient problem that can be resolved in one way or another.

You must increase the individual’s self-confidence more and learn to accept himself better and if he wants to solve his problems related to weight, the self-desire is not caused by being affected by the negative talk of the world every day for 5 minutes. He stops the woman and repeats: I am successful, I am capable, I am a beautiful person as I am Controlling the amount and type of food consumed and always looking for healthy alternatives to eating that raise the hormone of happiness, meaning: fruits rich in fructose sugar or pieces of dark chocolate in which the percentage of cocoa exceeds 45%.

Develop a 100% healthy diet to get rid of harmful fats, sugars, and excess weight. This particular step enhances self-confidence and makes the individual feel psychologically comfortable. Exercising on a daily basis and hydrating the body with sufficient quantities of water to refresh the body.