Solving Food Addictions
Food as an Addiction
Thinking of over-eating (or eating too little) as being a "food addiction" is helpful because it broadens the scope of what is happening and helps us be open to finding more solutions. If losing weight, for example, were as easy as simply doing a little exercise and eating less, then who would be fat? If a weight problem could be solved with eating foods with reduced fat and drinking diet sodas, then everyone would be running around skinny. But, our eating and getting rid of unwanted pounds is much more complex than changing a few of our eating habits and becoming determined to lose weight. (Did you ever wonder where all of the fat goes that is taken out of food to make it "low-fat"? There must be mountains of it somewhere.)
Food addictions are a very complex mixture of desire, bad habits, activated neural pathways and stress. The role of stress in eating is that food is being used as a way to regulate the stress you are experiencing in daily life. Stress, which is either external - what is 'happening to you' - or internal - what you are 'thinking about' - and usually a little of both, is a constant part of life. Because food is being used as a way to regulate stress then you get out of balance and it shows either in weight gain or weight loss.
Food addictions come in many forms such as:
- Severely limiting types of foods
- Going from diet to diet
- Binging
- Purging
- Hiding boxes of food
- Eating in secret
- Following 'crazy' schemes for losing weight
- Becoming obsessed with certain foods, either eating them or avoiding them
- Serving extravagant amounts of foods to loved ones or those in your care
- Becoming obsessed with what others eat
- Thinking about food all of the time
- Getting overly caught-up watching cooking shows
- Focusing on getting others (partners or children, for example) to eat more, or to eat less
- Obsessing about weight gain or loss
- Compulsive weighing
Emotional Hunger
In a battle between "physical-body hunger" and "emotional-body hunger", the emotional-body always wins. We are driven by our emotions, which are a function of the amphibian brain and/or reptilian brain. Emotions easily overpower our biological drives.
Be sure to get yourself emotionally back into balace before eating rather than using food as the balancer. Rapid and intense eating is a sign of using food as a way to get emotionally back into balance.
You know your eating is coming from 'emotions' rather than 'hunger' when you stop eating because:
- The food is gone
- Social constraints
- You're too stuffed to put anymore in
On Dieting
- Diets that restrict food intake (counting calaries) may seem to work in the short run, but over-time they do not work.
- The eating program that you use to lose weight should be the same diet that you will use to stay healthy and maintain weight.
- Eating our regular 'bad food diet' and throwing in a few healthy choices doesn't work.
- Whatever you eat, the body wants more of - this is true for all types of food:
- Eating sugary foods - candy, adding sugar to drinks, etc, makes you want more sugar
- Drinking coffee makes you want more coffee
- Eating bread makes you want more bread
- Eating cheese makes you want more cheese
- Eating greens, vegetables and fruit makes you want more of the same.
Changing the Wiring in Your Brain
Mindfulness & Meditation
We've lost our connection between our emotions and our body and meditation helps get reconnected. Becoming mindful, thoughtful and aware of what you are doing really helps you stop living the same life you've been living that hasn't been working.
Doing a regular morning meditation is a great way to become in touch with your natural self. Just 5 to 15 minutes of breathing in the morning helps reset your "cosmic clock" so you get more in sync with your life as it is showing up. A good way to meditate is to focus on your breath while doing "connected" breating. (Connected breathing is breathing through the nose, connecting the in-breath with the out-breath).
Mindfulness is a practice you want to develop doing regularly during your day.
EMDR Counseling
We use EMDR to help with weight issues in three ways:
- We use EMDR to help the brain get free from the emotional patterns that are locked in the brain that cause internal stress. Unresolved and untegrated emotions from past emotionally charged experiences can be driving your behavior and you probably aren't even aware it is happening. We can use EMDR to detect these stuck memories and help get rid of them. Unless this is done, you may never get free of emotional eating.
- EMDR can also be used to desensitize current eating triggers.
- After historical triggers are resolved, current triggers are desensitized then we can look into the future and use EMDR processing to help lower sensitivity and reactivity to eating patterns that have yet to arise.
"Wired for Joy" and "The Willpower Instinct"
The following are great resources for understanding how to change the wiring in your brain.
Emotional Eating
We've lost our connection between our emotions and our body. For example, if you eat a snack and are not satisfied, then it's because you're trying to use food to fulfill an emotional need.
The emotional drive for over-eating can be very, very strong. In order to be our 'natural' size we have to learn to manage and regulate our emotional states.
The Presence Process
A lot of eating, whether it's eating too little or too much is based on unconscious eating patterns. These are habits that were acquired in childhood and have been reinforced over time. These eating patterns become structured in the brain and must be recognized, weakened and undone. They are very complex and difficult to change.
One very effective way to uncover, understand and resolve these childhood patterns is by reading and doing The Presence Process, by Michael Brown.
What to do Different
Get Serious About What You Eat
Avoid Processed Foods - Processed foods don't have any 'life' in them. I've been hearing for years that eating 'processed foods' was not good for you but I never really understood what that was about. First of all, processed foods are any foods that have come from a factory, or from a box. Unless your diet consists mostly of fruit and vegetables, healthy fat and lean protein, then you are probably eating a diet of processed foods. Processed foods will keep the body alive, for years, but that doesn't mean it is good for you.
The dangers of eating processed foods:
Diabetes
Heart Disease
Joint problems
Cravings/
Obesity
Depression
Anxiety
Processed foods do not have any micro-nutrients, which according to Dr. Joel Fuhrman are essential.
Remember, adding healthy and nurturing foods to a bad diet is not enough.
Stop, Drop and Roll
When going for a snack:
Stop - and breathe
Drop - into the body
Roll - with the feelings
Give yourself time and the chance to make better choices.
Strategies for Conscious Eating:
- Remove your focus away from being about "losing weight" to eating the right foods and making healthy choices.
- Set a goal or intention to wake up in the morning hungry.
- Eat 'too many' vegetables and fruits, and then eat some more.
- Eat 'healthy' fats in moderate amounts
- Feel the way clothes fit as opposed to weighing
- Love your body just the way it is
See the Stress
- Practice "Mindful Moments"
- Breath
- Look into the body
- Notice and allow thoughts and feelings
- From "Wired for Joy"
- Do the Check-in
- Determine your brain state
- Practice the corresponding tool
- See all eating as stress related
- If you think about it, even hungry is related to the stress of being hungry
Types and amounts of foods
- Eat fruits and vegetables
- Healthy fats
- Lean protein
- Connect with others who have a healthy approach to life and to eating
- Join the free CompassionToday "Solving Food Addiction Support Group" by phone conference (contact Jordan for informatin).
More Resources