Emotional Eating, it's Not About the Food

When your mind is constantly preoccupied with food, weight, and your body, it may be difficult to recognize that your struggles are really not about food at all. Most people who struggle with emotional eating have a deeper understanding of food in relation to studies, diets, and health than they’d care to share. When we can explore our food history to begin to see where our patterns were first picked up, we can more clearly see how it’s not information we are lacking. Rather, we want to explore how it came to be that food became the most accessible coping tool for emotional pain, which is about emotional avoidance and really has nothing to do with the food itself. 

If you have been stuck in yo-yo dieting struggles for much many years, gaining and losing the same X amount of weight over and over again, it feels like “it must be me, I must be the problem.” However, the awareness that it is actually NOT about the food can be difficult to wrap your head around because food and body thoughts constantly preoccupy your mind. When this awareness, it’s not about the food, can be fully internalized, it can begin to set free the feelings of failure and shame that a yo-yo dieting history can create. Diet culture has instilled the belief that a diet can save us, that it IS about the food, that a diet can solve all of our body-image struggles and give us confidence and happiness. We now have a lot of research and data that shows quite the opposite, that diets actually have a nearly 96% failure rate, and yet they make the dieter feel as though it’s their fault. The culture is changing, however, it’s slow as these beliefs are deeply embedded and extremely pervasive.

Most people have a food story. A story that begins with their body being up for discussion from a very young age. One that begins with being put on a diet very early in their life. One that begins with not being allowed to eat things their siblings were allowed to because of their body size. One that begins with food being offered as the only sign they received from care givers of being loved or cared for. One that begins with food being an escape from loneliness, isolation, fear, and pain. One where they were told to ignore their hunger/full cues in order to clean their plates, or due to guilt of hungry children in other countries. One where access to food was scarce and inconsistent. One where food was a punishment. One where a parent actively restricted their food, commented on their own and other people’s bodies with constant judgement. No matter what your food story is about, the middle, the place where we can recognize that it’s not about the food, is where there is an opportunity to seize the moment and develop a deeper self-awareness. When we can fully understand that it’s not about the food, then we are free to explore, then what is it actually about?

Writing out your food story can be deeply healing and meaningful. In both my online course and workbook, I offer guidance to go through this process as an exercise as it’s an essential component in the process of healing your relationship with food. Ideally we all want food to be just food. We all want food to be something we eat for nourishment, pleasure, connection, and to feel good. We want to stop the food noise, body checking, and just feel good. If you have a complicated relationship with food, or one where food is both a problem for you as well as the solution to your problem, we have to interrupt the cycle and begin to create openings for the relationship and patterns to change. With any relationship, there needs to be awareness, honesty, shared experience, and open, respectful communication. In order to heal and transform our relationship with food, as well as with ourselves, we have to unlearn the old beliefs, stories, and fear of food and our bodies from the toxicity of the past to one of mutual respect and care.

When you examine the past, it’s not about drudging up pain and suffering, or pointing fingers and blaming, it’s about awareness. When we have a deeper understanding of how and why our relationship to food has become one of struggle, shame, and even contempt, we can begin to unravel, understand and hold the past with curiosity and compassion. When we start with awareness we can begin to develop a roadmap for ourselves to what we want from where we’ve been. When you know it’s not about the food, you know that there is no diet, wellness plan, or workout that will make you satisfied with food or your body. When you know it’s not about the food you can take a deep dive and excavate the roots of the emotions, the hurt, the struggles, and the external noise that became internal dialogue. When you know it’s not about the food, you can clearly see that healing is possible by walking through the wounds of the past, and into the hopeful space of the vision you can create for yourself. 

When time allows, spend some time writing out your food story and examine your own history. Then take anything that feels harmful, toxic, and just untrue, and begin to rewrite your story, write out your desires for your new, more loving, inclusive, and compassionate story going forward from today.

Beginning to Heal Body-Image with Body Neutrality

I have never met a person who was satisfied with their body as it was right at that very second. Particularly among women I work with in my psychotherapy practice, I hear complaints, self-deprecating comments, and how something they are doing related to food, exercise, or anything else just isn’t quite right.

Instead of purely enjoying a dessert or other decadent and delicious food, we often say, “I shouldn’t be eating this.” Why can’t we just say, “This tastes amazing, I love it so much!” This often comes from internalized beliefs about food, and patterns of restrictive diets that lead to food guilt and shame. When given a compliment about an outfit, I often hear it thrown back with a negative, self-rejecting comment, like, “If only I were five (or more) pounds lighter, it would look better.” I hear, “I should be exercising more. I should be eating healthier.” I should, I should, I should… Why is this? Why do so many women hate their bodies and struggle with body-image most of their lives? Why do so many women put so much pressure on themselves to look like what society has deemed to be beautiful, attractive, hot, and sexy?

For those who struggle with emotional eating, disordered eating, or an eating disorder, body-image tends to be the last layer to heal. For so many people, body-image is deeply entrenched and entangled with emotional eating. The long-standing history of feeling less than because of their physical body is old, deeply rooted, and very difficult to shift. Learning how to practice body neutrality allows it to become more possible to shift into gratitude for our bodies, and eventually, maybe even lead to body positivity. Mindfulness, particularly the element of nonjudgment, is essential in this work of true self, and body acceptance in mind, body, and spirit.

So what is body neutrality and how does it help with healing body-image? Body neutrality is a mindfulness practice that creates a neutralizing impact on our relationship with our bodies. Mindfulness is paying attention from moment to moment with a nonjudgemental awareness. Mindfulness allows us to recognize and release judgement in a way that can be neutralizing and have a profound emotional impact. Body neutrality as a mindfulness exercise allows us to focus on facts and functions versus size, shape, judgements, and emotions. When I walk my clients through the process of body neutrality, often there are areas of their body that they struggle with to get to a place of neutrality, however, with time, practice, and more practice, they often find it is indeed possible to accept, and even to love their bodies.

Body neutrality is an exercise that first I have people do in their minds eye. I talk them through each area of their body and encourage them to neutralize any judgements, and consider a fact and/or a function about each body part. For instance, if someone doesn’t like an aspect of their nose, rather than focusing on the judgement or emotion around their nose, can they name a fact, it's this particular shape, it’s in the middle of my face, it has a bridge and nostrils… and so on. And then can they name a function, I use my nose to breathe and to smell. Once we get to a place of neutrality consistently, most people notice a decrease in their self-judgement and emotional distress when experiencing their body.

Then, if possible, we search for gratitude. Is it possible to be grateful for your nose, just as it existing is in this moment? Can you experience feeling your nose in space? If so, experiencing their nose from a space of nonjudgement and gratitude, it often begins to continue to shift from discomfort to neutrality, and then over time, maybe even positivity—although this is not the goal, just a possible outcome. I encourage you to try this practice, to observe your body in your mind’s eye as a whole, and just see if you can be present with your body as the container that lovingly holds you, in this moment, just as it is. Then slowly move through your head and face, neck and shoulders, arms and hands, torso, hips, legs and feet. With each part of your body, consider a fact and/or a function. Notice how that feels. If an emotion or judgement comes in, notice it and let it go. If possible, see if you can offer gratitude to each part as you go through the exercise, not to force it, just to see what occurs.

When practiced consistently over time, body neutrality can transform your relationship with your body, as well as with yourself.

Break Through Limiting Beliefs with EMDR Therapy

Identifying limiting beliefs is one of the most important elements within the EMDR therapy process. We take time to really understand, what are the negative cognitions, or internalized negative limiting beliefs that are holding you back, and causing you discomfort within your present life. These limiting beliefs may be keeping you from feeling grounded and centered, from taking action in your life, and from allowing yourself to feel and express your worthiness. Once we know what these core wounds are, we can work to reprocess, heal, and release them.

Some of the questions I ask my clients to help identify the limiting belief are:

• Consider what you say you want, such as a goal, a plan, a desire that you seem sabotage unconsciously, or that feels like it won’t happen no matter how hard you try. Now write down all of the reasons you can’t have it. When you reflect on why you believe you can’t have it, what do these reasons mean about you? 

• After reading through why you can’t have what you want, how does this make you feel about yourself?

This is your limiting belief, your core wound, in EMDR we call it a negative cognition. Our brains store the memories and experiences that have created or reinforced those beliefs in the memory network associated with this negative cognition. If your negative cognition is one of the following: I am not good enough, I am unworthy, I have to be perfect to be loved, or I have to please others to be loved, or I am unsafe, or I will fail, or I can’t handle it and so on… then we look for the target memories that have created or reinforced those beliefs. A target memory is a memory that still has a charge, or it still activates your nervous system when you bring it into your awareness in a way that feels uncomfortable. 

These negative cognitions, or limiting beliefs, when triggered, loop through these memories within that specific memory network, and can cause you to feel fear, ungrounded, or disconnected from your body. Feeling fearful, ungrounded, and disconnection from yourself will hold you back from taking action towards what you want. When this happens subconsciously, we wonder, “what’s wrong with me.” Because this is happening on a subconscious level, and this just further triggers the limiting belief or negative cognition. When this occurs, we then usually feel hopeless, frustrated, and this only further reinforces those limiting beliefs. This is where we often get stuck in harmful or non-useful coping strategies, such as emotional eating or any other escape or numbing behaviors. This can also cause us to become emotionally dysregulated and to generally feel overwhelmed. 

EMDR therapy helps to release limiting beliefs through the desensitization and reprocessing phase of the therapy. This is where bilateral stimulation is used while being present with the memories or experiences, and processed within the safe container of your therapy experience. The goal is to fully reprocess the memories, which frees or unravels the negative internalized belief from the memory. The memory now is relinquished to your long-term memory. At this point we create a positive cognition that supports integrating the desired feeling state. This process creates a new inner resource and it’s practiced, once the positive cognition feels true and accessible, using cognitive rehearsal and future templates.

Once all of the target memories have been reprocessed, and they are now relinquished to your long-term memory, and you have the creation of positive cognitions for all of the target memories, the way you desire to feel about yourself is now possible. For example, if your belief is, I am not good enough, a positive cognition could be, I am ok as I am, if your negative cognitions is I am unworthy, your positive cognition may be, I am always worthy. Once you’ve completed the work of EMDR, there is no longer room for the negative cognitions to overwhelm you.

EMDR therapy also includes the components of somatic release through the body scan phase of treatment with each memory. We get curious about any stuck emotions within the physical body. This process creates self-awareness, and through using curiosity and compassion to invite the emotion to process and release somatically, we do this with bilateral stimulation until your body feels clear and grounded when you bring up the target memory.

Throughout the work of EMDR, we get really curious about why an emotion is stuck within your body. We practice emotional awareness and exploration and understand the message of the emotion—why is this emotion here and what does it want us to know—we can then view the emotion as information versus judging the emotion. With this information it makes it more accessible and possible to determine how to respond to the emotion. This allows the processing of your past trauma to move forward with more emotional awareness and acceptance.

When you provide compassion for any emotion you are experiencing, comfortable or uncomfortable, you change how you show up for that emotion, as well as how you show up for yourself. When you respond to the emotion with curiosity and ask what it needs, you can offer it just that with an attitude of compassion and care, allowing you to make space for the discomfort. This process allows the opportunity to invite the emotion itself to flow away from your body, once it’s processed, with intention.

EMDR therapy is a very useful way to help identify, breakthrough, and heal limiting beliefs. Please know that there are many therapeutic modalities out there that can support healing, growth, and that support you to move closer towards a more integrated, whole self that operates from a place of empowering beliefs. No matter how you find the courage and inner strength to address what is holding you back so that you can move forward with hope, growth, and inner-strength, know that you deserve to heal.