Signs That You're An Emotional Eater

The link between your health and diet is undeniable. If you eat healthier food, your body will feel healthier. This connection is easy to make, but there is one connection between food and health that isn’t as easy to see: why are you eating? It’s easy to answer as you’re eating because you’re hungry, but are you really? There is an important connection between why you are eating and the state of your emotional health. Emotional eating is tied not to how food makes your stomach feel, but how it makes your heart feel. This type of eating can very quickly spiral out of control, so it’s important to keep an eye out for signs of emotional eating.

You Eat When You’re Stressed

Is your boss on your case to finish up the project not just on time, but early? Are the kids riding your last nerve like the latest hit roller coaster at the amusement park? It is very easy to turn towards food for comfort in these stressful times. Food is an easy coping mechanism, as it triggers pleasure centers in the brain. This cycle feeds the cycle of emotional eating. The next time you feel stressed, you don’t feel the guilt of turning to alcohol or worse. It’s just food, after all. Unfortunately, the types and amount of food that satisfy this need often are unhealthy for you in the long term. If you eat when you’re stressed, especially on a regular basis, you are acting as an emotional eater.

You Find Comfort In Food

As noted before, food can be a very satisfying coping strategy. If you find comfort in food, you’re not alone. There is a reason there is a whole category of food referred to as 'comfort food.' However, this is one time when you don’t find safety in numbers. Being one of many individuals who indulge in an unhealthy coping mechanism is still unhealthy, it just means you’re likely to have company while you’re doing so. Take a close look at your reaction to food: if you likely feel not only physically, but also emotionally sated after a good meal, it could be a sign you are an emotional eater.

Your Eating Is Out Of Control

Indulging in something good every so often is no issue. The problem arises when this habit gets out of control. If you find yourself planning to stop eating after one handful of chips but not stopping until you hit the crumbs at the bottom of the bag, it’s possible your eating is out of control. Take a closer look at your eating patterns. Do you often find yourself having more helpings than you thought you’d have? Do you steal goodies from an office candy dish, or find yourself going by someone's desk just to pick up a snack? Sometimes the sign is just straightforward: you feel like your eating is out of control. A lack of rational control often indicates emotions are out of control as well.

You Eat To Feel Happy

Of course your mother’s classic, secret recipe makes you feel good because it reminds you of home and the comfort your mother gave you as a child. And there is no denying the joy a good piece of chocolate can spark something beautiful in your soul. These culturally acceptable food connections can lead you to eat to feel happy instead of finding happiness within yourself or from healthier, more beneficial activities. Eating certain foods can produce the right mixture of hormonal responses to make you feel happy, but if you eat to feel happy as your only or main source of happiness, an unhappy and unhealthy outcome is certain.

You Eat When You’re Not Hungry

Everyone eats to satisfy hunger. But emotional eaters eat even when they are not hungry. Imagine this: You open the fridge for the tenth time in an hour. You pull out yet another snack. You’re not hungry; you’re bored. If you eat when you’re not hungry, you have just seen the ultimate indication you are an emotional eater. Eating to satisfy any need besides hunger is a dangerous path to take, and it’s a very well traveled path. Sometimes this type of eating is a habit. Because food has made you feel good in the past, you plan to banish your bad mood with a bonus meal. Yes, you already ate; no, you’re not hungry; goodness, does it feel good. For a moment. If you eat when you’re not hungry, you are feeding into a problem bigger than the emotion you are trying to feed.