Emotional Eating: What if Weight Loss Isn't about the Food? | Tricia Nelson | TEDxWestMonroe

Summary

The speaker candidly shares their struggle with emotional eating, revealing how diets failed to bring long-term change. They discovered that addressing the underlying emotional triggers, such as using food as a painkiller, escape, or punishment, was key to overcoming their weight issues. The speaker emphasizes the importance of self-care, stress reduction, and community support in establishing a healthier relationship with food and oneself.

Takeaways

• 🍨 The speaker struggled with emotional eating, using food to cope with emotions, escape from stress, and as a form of self-punishment.
• 🔄 The speaker experienced a cycle of weight loss and regain, highlighting the ineffectiveness of yo-yo dieting and the difficulty of maintaining weight loss.
• 📊 Research indicates that diets often fail in the long term, with participants regaining weight within a year, despite the abundance of diet books available.
• 🧘 The key to overcoming emotional eating involves developing healthier coping mechanisms, such as addressing the underlying emotions and stressors rather than relying on food.
• 🤔 The acronym 'PEP' stands for Painkiller, Escape, and Punishment, which helps identify the reasons behind emotional eating and create a connection between emotions and eating habits.
• 🏋️‍♀️ Stress management through self-care practices like meditation and journaling can lead to emotional balance, reduced cravings, and better energy levels.
• 🙅‍♀️ Learning to say 'no' and avoiding people-pleasing behaviors can help reduce stress and the tendency to overeat as a coping mechanism.
• 👥 The importance of community support for emotional eaters is emphasized, as it can increase weight loss results and provide comfort and accountability.
• 👗 The speaker's personal journey illustrates how changing perspectives on food, managing stress, and seeking support can lead to a healthier relationship with food and oneself.
• 🔑 The speaker suggests that the solution to emotional eating is not a magic diet but a change in lifestyle and mindset, focusing on emotional well-being and self-care.
• 🌟 The message concludes with the belief that everyone can achieve a peaceful and self-caring relationship with food by looking beyond the food for answers.

Q & A

What is the main struggle the speaker describes in the script?

The speaker describes the struggle with emotional eating, binge eating, and the cycle of weight gain and loss, as well as the feelings of guilt and shame associated with these behaviors.

What is the acronym 'PEP' and how is it related to the speaker's experience?

PEP stands for Painkiller, Escape, and Punishment. It is related to the speaker's experience as it represents the three main reasons they used food to cope with life: to numb painful emotions (Painkiller), to escape from stress (Escape), and as a form of self-punishment (Punishment).

How did the speaker's perspective on unhealthy foods change?

The speaker's perspective changed from focusing on the negative effects of unhealthy foods to understanding what those foods were doing for them, such as providing temporary relief from pain, escape, or punishment.

What role does stress play in the speaker's eating habits?

Stress plays a significant role in the speaker's eating habits by increasing cortisol levels, which in turn increases appetite and causes the body to store fat. High stress levels also led the speaker to overeat as a coping mechanism.

Outlines

00:00

🍦 Struggling with Emotional Overeating

The speaker describes a personal battle with emotional overeating, recounting a binge episode that left them feeling sick and disgusted. They express a cycle of guilt and shame, and a history of unsuccessful dieting attempts. The speaker also reflects on their weight struggles from a young age, including feelings of self-loathing and extreme measures they considered to lose weight. They hint at discovering a solution that wasn't a 'magic diet' but rather an understanding of the emotional triggers behind their eating habits.

05:02

🧘 Addressing Emotional Eating with PEP

The speaker introduces the concept of PEP (Painkiller, Escape, Punishment) to explain the emotional reasons behind overeating. They discuss how they used food to numb pain, escape stress, and punish themselves for perceived failures. The speaker emphasizes the importance of recognizing these emotional triggers and suggests that understanding the 'why' behind eating can help break the cycle of emotional eating. They also touch on the role of stress in overeating and the need for self-care practices to achieve emotional balance.

10:04

👫 Finding Support and Balance in Overcoming Emotional Eating

In the final paragraph, the speaker highlights the importance of community support in overcoming emotional eating. They argue that the societal acceptance of overindulgence makes it difficult to change eating habits without support. The speaker shares a personal story of a woman named Sarah who, with the help of a supportive community, was able to address her dependence on sugar and other stimulants, leading to a significant reduction in stress and anxiety. The speaker concludes by encouraging viewers to take steps towards a peaceful and self-caring relationship with food, which includes understanding emotional triggers, managing stress, and seeking community support.

Keywords

💡Emotional Eating

Emotional eating refers to the act of consuming food in response to emotions rather than physical hunger. In the video, the speaker describes her struggle with emotional eating, using food as a coping mechanism for stress, anxiety, and negative feelings, which is central to the theme of understanding the relationship between emotions and food consumption.

💡Binge Eating

Binge eating is characterized by consuming large quantities of food in a short period, often to the point of discomfort, and is associated with a lack of control. The speaker mentions binge eating as a part of her emotional eating behavior, illustrating the concept with personal experiences like finishing an entire container of ice cream and other foods, despite feeling sick afterward.

💡Self-Sabotage

Self-sabotage is the act of unconsciously behaving in ways that undermine one's own goals or well-being. The video discusses how the speaker's emotional eating led to a cycle of self-sabotage, preventing her from maintaining weight loss and contributing to feelings of guilt and shame.

💡Yo-Yo Dieting

Yo-yo dieting describes the cycle of repeatedly losing and regaining weight, often associated with crash diets and unsustainable eating habits. The script mentions the speaker's history with yo-yo dieting, highlighting the ineffectiveness of temporary diets and the need for a more permanent lifestyle change.

💡PEP

PEP is an acronym introduced in the video for 'Painkiller, Escape, Punishment'. It is a tool for self-reflection to identify the emotional reasons behind overeating. The speaker uses PEP to analyze her emotional eating, connecting food consumption to numbing pain, escaping stress, and self-punishment.

💡Cortisol

Cortisol is a hormone associated with stress and has been linked to increased appetite and fat storage. The video explains that high cortisol levels due to stress can contribute to overeating and weight gain, emphasizing the importance of stress management in overcoming emotional eating.

💡Self-Care

Self-care involves activities that an individual performs to take care of their mental and physical health. In the script, self-care is presented as a key strategy for managing stress and emotional balance, with practices like meditation and journaling being suggested as effective methods.

💡People Pleaser

A people pleaser is someone who prioritizes the needs and desires of others over their own, often leading to stress and resentment. The video identifies people pleasing as a trait of emotional eaters, contributing to stress and overeating, and suggests learning to say no as a way to reduce stress.

💡Group Support

Group support refers to the assistance and encouragement provided by a community of individuals with similar experiences or goals. The speaker highlights the benefits of group support in overcoming emotional eating, noting that it can increase weight loss results and provide comfort and accountability.

💡Stress Management

Stress management encompasses a wide range of techniques and strategies used to cope with stress, aiming to reduce its negative effects on mental and physical health. The video discusses the role of stress management in addressing emotional eating by suggesting self-care habits and addressing ingrained habits that cause stress.

💡Accountability

Accountability is the expectation to report on one's actions or decisions, often leading to increased responsibility and adherence to goals. In the context of the video, the speaker finds support and accountability through connecting with a community of emotional eaters, which helps in maintaining her commitment to healthier eating habits.

Highlights

The struggle with emotional eating and its impact on physical and emotional health.

The ineffectiveness of diets and the high rate of weight regain after dieting.

The importance of understanding the emotional reasons behind overeating.

The acronym P-E-P as a tool to identify the emotional triggers for overeating.

The role of stress in emotional eating and its impact on weight loss.

The benefits of self-care practices in reducing stress and emotional eating.

The negative effects of people-pleasing on emotional health and eating habits.

The necessity of community support for overcoming emotional eating habits.

The story of Sarah, who overcame her dependence on sugar and other stimulants.

The transformation in Sarah's life after learning to process her emotions and stress.

The importance of addressing emotional needs to achieve a peaceful relationship with food.

The practical steps provided for managing emotional eating, including the PEP test.

Transcripts

[Music]

[Applause]

i reached my spoon down into the pint of

praline pecan

it's the perfect last bite

gooey caramel swirling around creamy

vanilla ice cream with two delicious

maple pecans that will add just the

right amount of crunch

but i can't enjoy this bite

you see i've not only eaten the entire

container of ice cream

but i've also devoured a full bag of

popcorn

half a package of cookies and 26

hershey's kisses

i feel completely sick

disgusted i sweep up the remains and i

throw them in the trash vowing never to

eat that kind of crap again

i collapse on the couch

after a few hours

the cookies in the trash call to me

trisha

and i answer

in a trance i stumble over the trash can

find the cookies

and polish them off

once again

my insatiable hunger

drives me

to new depths of shame

what's wrong with me

why can't i stop

i'm such a loser

at age 20 i was 50 pounds overweight

i hated my fat i had a roll of fat on my

tummy that i would scrunch up in my

hands and imagine cutting it off like

you cut fat off the side of a steak

i sometimes wished i'd contract a

disease where i'd automatically lose

weight without having to diet

i even considered joining the army so

i'd be forced to exercise at boot camp

i hated to exercise

i was a yo-yo dieter up 30 down 20 up 10

and as a result i had several sizes of

pants in my closet because i never knew

what size i'd be

my skinny jeans collected a lot of dust

as i wild away years

looking for the the hidden solution to

overcoming my weight loss problems

i found that solution

i found that key

and it wasn't through a magic diet

in fact dozens of studies show

that diets generally have a dismal

success rate

a recent study in the british medical

journal

follows 22

000

adults on one of 14 popular diets

they found

that within one year

participants regained all the weight

they had lost

yet if you do a search on amazon right

now for diet books you'll get roughly 50

000 results

this was my experience

no matter what diet i tried

of course i'd start out strong i'm doing

it

looking good feeling good pants getting

looser

but then after a couple weeks

things started to get hard

i mean really hard

and at some point the tension in my gut

would become so unbearable that i would

just break down and binge

and i always put the weight back on

again

and then some

so the million dollar question is

why did it get so hard

my experience

is that when i would diet

all the feelings i had stuffed with

excess food would come to the surface

and i didn't have the tools i needed to

deal with them

that's what kept me stuck in a cycle of

self-sabotage

eating was how i coped with life

if i wanted to lose weight and keep it

off i had to develop healthier means of

coping

this changed everything for me

when i adopted healthy ways of

addressing my emotions and stress

my weight stabilized and my relationship

with food became so much more peaceful

i'm excited to share

three of these key ways with you

the first key was a change in my

perspective instead of focusing on what

unhealthy foods were doing to me i

started to address instead what they

were doing for me

pep is an acronym

p-e-p the first p stands for painkiller

my painkiller of choice

praline pecan ice cream of course

so after indulging in any form of sugar

fat and starch my favorite three food

groups i'd feel

nothing

i was unconsciously using food to

anesthetize

uncomfortable emotions

but my eating ultimately brought on more

pain

the e stands for escape

because when life got a little bit too

intense either from

family stress financial fear or just

overall feelings of anxiety curling up

with my favorite foods in front of the

tv always took me to a far away place

at least momentarily

and the third p in pep

punishment which seems counterintuitive

i know because yummy foods

seemed to be a reward

but i was hardly rewarding myself when

i'd overeat and end up feeling sick

yet i did this over and over again

you see i was not only an overeater but

i was also an over feeler

i felt guilty about everything

and i was also super hard on myself when

i'd make a mistake

so when cookies start calling my name i

ask myself what's really going on am i

trying to

perhaps numb painful emotions

am i looking to escape from something

that's overwhelming

or perhaps am i trying to punish myself

for something i've said or done that i

feel bad about

this is an easy way to begin making the

connection between my eating and my

emotions

the second key to finding balance

is

reducing stress

so in my experience both personally and

professionally

overeaters tend to be overdoers i was

always on the go

always putting everyone else's needs

first never slowing down long enough to

catch my breath or eat a healthy meal

stress plays a role in elevated cortisol

levels and cortisol increases appetite

and causes our bodies to store fat

instead of burn it

so for me an important and crucial piece

of the weight loss puzzle was self-care

when i began to integrate self-care

practices into my life i had more

emotional balance

and i had more energy and i no longer

craved

coffee and chocolate for stamina so some

of the traits that works best for me

that i do every day are meditation and

journaling

but you may be thinking hey lady i don't

have time for self-care i'm a busy

professional with a job three kids and a

neurotic dog

think again when we take time for

ourselves we actually increase our

capacity to give to others

and we're also better equipped to handle

life's challenges without turning to

food

so another key element of self-care

was changing ingrained habits that

caused my stress

so in my work i've observed several

traits of emotional eaters that tend to

be most common and i refer to these

traits as the anatomy of the emotional

eater

the achilles heel for most including

myself

is people pleasing

so i lacked self-esteem and i chased the

atta girls that made me feel worthwhile

and as a people pleaser i said yes to

everything

sure i'll chair the committee happy to

host the party and of course i'll do

your job and mine and jerry's job

no problem

i don't know about your experience but

any time that i really knocked myself

out to try to please somebody

they were never as pleased as i planned

on them being

so i was not only burned out but i was

also kind of resentful

and this was the perfect storm for

justifying yet another

i deserve it binge

changing this habit

by learning how to say no when there's

too much on my plate

so to speak

really helped reduce my stress and my

feelings of hunger

now the last key

in overcoming my emotional eating

super important

get support from a community of other

emotional eaters

research shows that group support

increases weight loss results and it

makes sense right i mean temptations to

eat unhealthy foods are everywhere think

tv commercials checkout lines at the

supermarket

and parties

so

overindulging is a socially acceptable

past time that's difficult to curb

without support

plus

i gotta tell you

there's nothing more comforting

than connecting with those

that really know the shame and

humiliation

of behaviors like digging binge foods

out of the garbage

so

you might be thinking

isn't it silly to need help with

something as basic and seemingly easy to

control is what i put in my mouth

not so fast

the truth is emotional eating is one of

the hardest

of the addictive habits to break

why because we have to eat

what we're up against is a really akin

to taking a

growling tiger out of the cage

trying to

pass the nice kitty

and then somehow get it back inside the

cage without getting mauled

not so easy unless you have the right

kind of support

sarah is a mom

wife and award-winning producer

who is tired of her dependence on sugar

turns out she was numbing her feelings

with more than just

food things like nicorax gum or evening

glass of wine and overworking

sarah would often work straight through

breakfast and lunch and pay for it with

a late night binge

she never gave herself time to just

chill

sarah was at the end of her rope when

she reached out for help

so within weeks of learning new ways of

processing her emotions and addressing

her feelings

and her stress

sarah was not only off all the

stimulants that had kept her propped up

but she was also feeling so much less

anxious

sarah was coming home to herself

her daughters noticed a difference and

even asked how they could adopt these

same practices for themselves

you can develop the same sense of peace

start by taking the pep test

and really ask yourself what's going on

when you find yourself taking yet

another trip to the kitchen

is it for

perhaps a painkiller an escape

or are you feeling bad about something

and is it a form of punishment

next

manage your stress by implementing

self-care habits that can help you feel

more centered

and also take a look at things like

people pleasing that may be causing you

more stress

and finally nourish your soul through

connection and community with other

emotional eaters that can help you stay

accountable and stay on track with your

goals

these simple steps while having nothing

to do with food can make a real impact

on your food choices and your ability to

reach a weight that works best for you

i'll leave you with this

i believe we can all enjoy a

relationship with food and with

ourselves that is both peaceful and

self-caring

it starts

with looking beyond the food for answers

thank you

[Applause]

[Music]