7 ways to overcome emotional eating - and lose weight!

Adopting strategies that thin people use all the time will help you avoid cheating on diets; show you how to resist tempting food, even when it’s on a table right in front of you; and teach you to cope with hunger, cravings, stress and strong negative emotions without turning to food for comfort.

1 CHANGE YOUR THINKING
You may not be aware of it, but you always have a thought before you eat. Let’s say you see an open package of biscuits on the counter. You don’t just automatically reach for one and put it in your mouth. Your thoughts influence what you do. If you think, “It won’t matter if I have one,” you’ll probably go ahead and put it in your mouth. But if you have the thought “I’d like to eat that, but I won’t because it’s not on my diet”, then you won’t pick up the biscuit.

The thoughts that lead you to act in unhelpful ways are sabotaging thoughts. The thoughts that lead you to act in more productive ways are helpful thoughts. The key to keeping a diet on track is to turn thoughts like “This is a celebration so it doesn’t count” to “I can say no to this, and anyway I’m eating out in a few hours”. In this way, instead of eating something you shouldn’t, you’re strengthening your tendency to resist. Think of your brain as having two diet “muscles”. One is the ‘resistance’ muscle - the other is the ‘giving-in muscle’ and it’s the former muscle you need to flex more.

2 ELIMINATE EMOTIONAL EATING
Some people eat when they are anxious, others when they are overwhelmed, lonely, bored, angry or sad. Food can certainly be an effective distracter - temporarily - but it doesn’t solve the problem that led to the distress in the first place.

There is nothing wrong with having negative emotions. They’re just nature’s way of telling us there’s a problem. What you can do is find ways to not let normal blues-inducing events and thoughts get to you. For example, you can use mindset techniques when emotions threaten to get the better of you. So when distress hits, use it as a trigger to label precisely what it is you are feeling. For example, tell yourself, “I’m upset because I’m disappointed… this has nothing to do with being hungry” and then stand firm about not straying from your food plan.

You can also use behavioural techniques to decrease distress. The best strategy is distraction: distract yourself by turning on the television, picking up a magazine or book, running a bath, or picking up the phone to call a friend… anything but opening the fridge and pulling out a tub of ice cream.