Why Do You Eat When You Eat?
Have you ever given thought to why you eat when you eat? I am not referring to eating because you are hungry or because we need to eat to sustain life. I am talking about when you keep eating even though you probably should have stopped a plate ago. I am talking about when you are questioning why you are still eating when you are not hungry. I am talking about those moments when you cannot stop going back to the bag of cookies or bag of chocolates. Have you asked yourself, “Why do I eat when I eat?”
The tips I share in this post came out of me realizing I needed to understand why I ate when I did. Before then, I had never considered thinking about when it was that I ate. That all changed after looking at pictures of myself after a trip to San Francisco in the summer 2014.
I developed these tips to help me stop the cycle of losing weight, then gaining weight again. These tips changed my life.
Attention Grabber
What had caught my attention? Looking back at me was a picture of me. In the photo, I was standing in my newly purchased orange warm-up jacket, the one I bought the night before leaving for the trip, because I had outgrown my clothes from the previous trip only a couple of months prior. My face was round, almost looking puffy, and a couple of other things (wink wink) gotten large too.
Over the three to four years prior to that photo, I had many others where I look about the same. There may have been some variations of me being bigger or slightly smaller, but there was nothing significantly different about me in that picture compared with the others. The only clear difference was my reaction to seeing the photo.
The furrowing of my brows was the same. The disgust with myself for getting to that point was the same. What was different was that, in that moment, as the eyes in that photo looked back at me with a slight smile, I had finally gotten to the point of having enough of me. I wish I could tell you what it was about that day, about that photo, that brought the change in me. I honestly cannot tell you. All I can tell you is, like the words of Fannie Lou Hamer, I had gotten sick and tired of me being sick and tired of me.
That Moment When You’ve Had Enough of You
But something more happened in that moment. I did not simply say to myself that I needed to change what I was currently doing. At that time, I was doing nothing of what I knew needed to be done to change my situation. I had traveled the weight-gain to weight-loss road before. I knew I needed to exercise and stop eating like I had no sense. I determined that I needed to not only lose weight but make certain that this time I never ever, ever, ever gain it back again.
Know What’s Really Going on with You
That is the point you will have to reach as well. It is not enough to decide you will lose weight and start exercising and changing what you eat. You must be prepared for what losing weight and keeping it off entails. You have to understand the behaviors you possess that got you where you are now. You have to understand what triggers those behaviors. You also need to be sure you understand when your behaviors and triggers hit. Armed with this knowledge about yourself, you will be well on your way to making your weight-loss outcome last a lifetime.
3 Tips to Help You Dig Deep into Why You Eat When You Eat
Here are three tips to help you out. If I had giving these tips some thought nine years ago, I would have never gained 100 pounds at one point.
1. Identify and write down every moment, event, or situation in your life that is related to your weight. What you are looking for here are patterns. When I took programming classes and later went to graduate school, those were pivotal moments in my life where I gained significant weight. I gained 50 pounds and 100 pounds, respectively. You do not have to have gained as much weight as I did for this assessment. The goal is to identify what situations and circumstances and when you have a tendency to fall off track and stay off, or gain weight.
2. Write down your emotional state for each of those life events. How did you feel? Were you sad, anxious, worried, or mentally and physically fatigued? Whatever you felt during that time, write it down. I, for instance, had put a great deal of pressure on myself to get good grades while in both the computer programming courses and in graduate school. Accomplishing that while working full-time made me feel anxious and stressed. In addition, because I had gotten into the habit of staying up late to complete projects and coursework, I also was extremely tired most of the day.
3. Identify and write down your reactions to your emotional state. You may need to think hard about this, because you may not have realized that you had taken on certain behaviors as a result of your emotional state. When I was in graduate school in 2007, I did not realize it, hence the reason I became so far gone. To deal with the anxiety, stress, and sleep deprivation during that time, I sought out comfort to make me feel better. I found that comfort in chocolate candy, fried chicken after class, and other fattening foods lacking nutritional value.
Continuously Review Your Relationship with Food
Before now, had you thought about why you eat when you eat? Now that you have these tips, take time to pause and consider how food relates to certain situations in your life. When your memory is sparked, go back to the lists you wrote above and add to them or modify them accordingly. You will be amazed how much you will learn that your mental state affects your reaction to food and your waistline.
Start the Discussion: What healthy methods have you used to assess your relationship with food? Share in the post comments, on Facebook, or Twitter.