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Posts Tagged ‘emotional eating’
Thursday, October 20th, 2011
 Q: Dear Tanja, I am 40 years old, 5’8″ tall and I weigh 143 lbs. For the last 20 years I have been fighting with my weight.
My first problem is I cannot do cardio training anymore as I have extreme pain in my knees and hips. The doctors told me I should quit or take it easy, but I cannot afford that. Secondly, I cannot train in the evenings because than I stay awake all night. I am bipolar and maybe because of that when I overtrain my body I cannot sleep.
What I do now is one hour of fat burning yoga every morning, but that is not enough. I am thinking of plastic surgery, but I know even if I do liposuction, I will still need some effective sport in order to maintain the weight and my body shape. Do you have any idea what can I do? Thank you! –Irina
A: Hi Irina, I react the same way when I train in the evenings, so I always try to schedule my workouts before 5 pm if possible! It’s not clear what is going on with your hips and knees, but there are a few things I can recommend for someone in your situation. Yoga, pilates, and swimming are things that are in combination highly effective and keep you fit and healthy, when you do them on a regular basis. Swimming is great because it takes the pressure off joints and since you have so much help from the water, which keeps you buoyant, you can move in different ways and not only have to swim. I’m confident that this can be a great option for you!
The other part of maintaining weight is diet. Your diet needs to be tailored to your needs, and there is no space for emotional eating, which can be a problem if you have a bipolar diagnosis. The quality of the food is highly important here, too, as it really affects your overall experience of health, and all functions in your brain and body! There might be some tips for you in my book Your Life Force about eating and how to find a good balance.
Lastly, I want to say that liposuction brings a whole other set of problems or risks with it, but if that is your last resort, and you have really tried everything, you would definitely want to spend time researching and interviewing several doctors to find a GREAT one.
Tanja
Do you have a question? Don’t be shy – ask it here!
Tags: emotional eating, swimming, weight loss
Posted in Ask Tanja, Fitness | No Comments »
Tuesday, September 27th, 2011
Q: Hi, Tanja. I am a 44-year old single mother of two children who loves to train. I weight train and run on the treadmill 3 times a week, 4.5 miles each time. I also swim if time permits. I weigh 112 pounds and am 5’1″ tall. My problem is that I stress eat every time I get restless. I wonder if you have any advice for me! — Nikita
A: Hello, Nikita! In my book Your Life Force there is a whole chapter with tips and tricks on how to stop emotional eating. It requires focus and a real resolve, as stress is so common and we need to eat every day. But there is hope if you really want to stop!
My advice is to work with the different methods in the book, and if it still feels like you are not getting anywhere, you have to call in the Army! There are support groups for overeating, and there are cognitive psychologists who can help you change your behavior around food. Do not give up and do everything wholeheartedly!
Tanja
Do you have a question? Don’t be shy – ask it here!
Tags: emotional eating
Posted in Ask Tanja, Body-Mind Health, Nutrition | No Comments »
Tuesday, May 3rd, 2011
Are you an emotional eater? One way to keep emotional eating in check is to eat wholesome food every three hours. This gives you the opportunity to stand strong when emotionally driven hunger pangs arise.
Eat a variety of food every three hours and nothing in between. The portions should be moderate and the feeling of being full – just like great hunger – should be avoided.
The body will slowly get used to this new eating cycle and you will begin to see food as a well-balanced fuel instead of as a way to reward yourself or release mental stress. When you’ve come this far, you are on the right path toward a more wholesome way of dealing with food.
Image: pixelnaiad
Tags: emotional eating
Posted in Nutrition | No Comments »
Thursday, December 23rd, 2010
Situations that trigger our desire to eat can be divided into several categories.
Social eating involves eating when one meets other people, perhaps to fit in with the group or to take part in a discussion.
Situational eating occurs when the opportunity presents itself, for example when one passes a restaurant or a food stand.
Emotional eating is the most dangerous because it involves a reaction to how we feel, whether that is sadness, stress, tension, or anger.
Are you an emotional eater?
One way to answer this question is to carry a food diary. When hunger pangs set in, note how you feel. Are you stressed, have you argued with the kids or your partner, is there too much to do at work? Analyze whether your hunger is real or if it was aroused by an emotional feeling. If the answer is that the hunger is emotionally aroused, there are ways to distract the feeling and avoid putting anything in your mouth.
An effective guide for learning how to handle emotional eating is the Four Step Model described by Dr. Herbert Benson and Eileen M. Stuart. In addition to using this model to reduce general stress, it can also be used to overcome emotional eating.
- Stop
This step breaks the cycle of automatic eating when a certain feeling arises, and it must happen before eating begins.
- Breathe
This step helps you slow down, find some calm, and get a chance to reflect for a bit.
- Reflect
This step is known as “Think before you eat.” The best question to ask yourself when the body signals hunger is, “Why do I want to eat right now?” The answer may be that it involves an emotional need and not that the body needs fuel.
- Choose
There are various ways to reduce the negative health effects even if you do choose to eat.
Learn more about each of these steps, emotional eating, and creating body-mind balance in the new e-book, Your Life Force: Training for Strength & Harmony.
Tags: emotional eating, Your Life Force
Posted in Body-Mind Health, Nutrition | No Comments »
Tuesday, September 7th, 2010
 All too often, we eat for reasons other than satisfying hunger. Food becomes a “remedy” that we turn to when we feel depressed, bored, angry, anxious, lonely, stressed, tired, or powerless.
This is emotional eating, and it often leads to weight-related illness. It is a problem for many of us. Generally speaking, all of the people I train who have serious weight issues have difficulty managing food on account of stress and anxiety. Rarely do their weight problems have to do with a lack of awareness about which foods are good or bad; that knowledge is widespread.
Are you an emotional eater? One way to answer this question is to carry a food diary. When hunger pangs set in, note how you feel. Are you stressed, have you argued with the kids or your partner, is there too much to do at work? Analyze whether your hunger is real, or if it was aroused by an emotional feeling.
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One way to treat emotional eating is through cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT), which helps you identify and change unhealthy thought patterns. For more information on CBT, visit the Mayo Clinic and Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies sites. I will also have some exercises for overcoming emotional eating my upcoming book, Your Life Force.
Image: ginnerobot
Tags: anxiety, body weight, cognitive-behavioral therapy, depression, emotional eating, food diary, hunger, life force, stress
Posted in Body-Mind Health, Nutrition | No Comments »
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