Emotional Hunger: The Favorite Disguise Of Fear

We all know what hunger feels like. If you have an empty stomach and you have to put something in your mouth, you are hungry. Sure, you know how to identify situations where you’re really hungry after you haven’t eaten for a while. But do you also know how to distinguish these situations from emotional hunger?

Experts do not recommend going hungry. They also recommend not eating for more than four hours, even if you’re only eating a snack. But you don’t always eat because you are really hungry. Sometimes you eat to hide your emotions. Stress, sadness, fear… You try to hide them under unhealthy food which will only make you feel worse in the long run.

You eat to feel better and then you feel guilty for eating. Do you want to stop this vicious circle? I encourage you to learn how to tell the difference between emotional hunger and hunger due to a lack of energy in the body. Take the bull by the horns and learn to recognize the signs of emotional hunger. Then you can take charge of your life and your eating habits.

Let’s take a closer look at some of the characteristics of emotional hunger.

1. Binge Eating

Emotional hunger will never ask you to eat a plate of vegetables or a salad. No, it’s low-calorie, low-nutrient foods that this type of hunger makes you crave. You crave sweets or foods high in saturated fat. In other words, junk food.

2. It is insatiable

If you find yourself hungry, you usually know how much food you need to eat to satisfy your hunger. However, emotional hunger allows you to eat until you are overfull. Emotional hunger inhibits feelings of fullness. As a result, we don’t really feel full until after we are this long.

3. It tries to fill a void

This void is not in the stomach. No, it’s a response to some sort of emotional imbalance. Instead of figuring out what the problem is, it gets buried under all the food we eat in an effort to make ourselves feel better. The relief is temporary and will last as long as it takes to digest the food. Once it’s over, the relief will probably give way to an even worse feeling than we already had.

4. It forces you to eat alone

People almost never binge eat with others around. It’s a kind of ritual that you do alone. Often loneliness itself causes the binge eating. However, you can do it at events like weddings or birthdays to hide your feelings.

5. You feel guilty

You know you don’t need that bag of chips. It will raise your cholesterol, it’s full of saturated fat and to top it all off, you won’t even feel hungry. You know all this, but you cannot resist the desire. When we eat this type of food, we feel guilty. We feel the need to punish ourselves for not being able to control ourselves.

6. It’s impulsive

If you eat to satisfy emotional hunger, you do it without thinking too much. It’s impulsive. You walk into the store and buy everything you feel like that day.

7. You use it to avoid responsibilities

You have to work, you promised yourself to go to the gym, or to study… But you don’t feel like it and you stay at home. Deep down you know you didn’t do what you said you would do. It won’t be long before the fearful feelings knock on your door to keep you company. That’s when you visit the fridge. You are looking for what you crave, something to calm you down.

Once you finish the unhealthy food, you realize you feel worse. Now you feel guilty about two things: you have not fulfilled your obligations and you have given in to your desire. In addition, you realize that while you were eating, you didn’t feel anxious. So you go back to the fridge for more… and you repeat the process until you’re very, very full.

Ideas to satisfy your emotional hunger without raiding the fridge

All of these characteristics are associated with emotional hunger. They are habits that you must learn to recognize in order to identify the problem. Then it’s time to fight the problem. Here are some ideas to help you.

1. Try to eat something healthy

If you want to eat, but you think it’s because of emotional hunger, test it with something healthy. If you are not physically hungry, you will either not eat or become full quickly. Your body will tell you it’s not what you want. Then you know for sure that the feeling of hunger is not real.

2. Think about the cause of the problem

If you feel a binge coming on and aren’t really hungry, think about what could be causing the problem. Are you concerned about work? Do you have relationship problems? Have you been running like crazy all day without stopping?

3. Exercise

Exercise helps in two ways. First, it is a way to release negative emotions. Exercise produces endorphins that improve your mood. Endorphins also help fight anxiety. Second, after exercise, your body needs energy and will look forward to healthy food.

4. Make a meal plan

This will help you avoid eating impulsively. If you keep track of when and how you eat, you’ll have a better idea of ​​when to actually recharge. This makes it harder for your body to deceive you. Plus, you’ve already decided what you’re going to eat, so your choice will likely be healthier.

5. Allow yourself to binge every now and then

Even though emotional hunger usually responds to junk food, it’s good to give in to your binge eating every now and then. Just make sure it doesn’t become a habit.

6. Eat with other people

When you eat with other people, you eat more slowly. You will also probably be too distracted to focus on your problems alone. Another advantage is that you divide the pleasure between the company you are in and the food you eat. So it is not necessary to keep eating to feel better.

7. Don’t use food as a reward

Sometimes, when you’ve had a bad day, you try to make yourself feel better by eating junk. “I deserved it,” you tell yourself. If you get used to making up for a bad day with junk food, you won’t be able to focus on developing healthier eating habits.

8. Seek help for the underlying emotional problem

Whether it’s a friend, family member, partner or an expert, find someone to help you. Your attempts to hide the problem and deal with it alone have not worked.

9. Think Before You Buy Junk Food

Why am I buying this? Do I really need it?

10. Bring a shopping list of what you really need

And don’t buy more than what’s on the list. The things we eat during a binge are usually not the things we would write on our list. They are often the result of an impulsive act.

The best technique is definitely to be aware of your body’s true needs and to know if they match your physical or emotional body. It is important to proactively deal with difficult emotional situations. You need to find out the cause and then decide how you will deal with it. Instead of eating away your feelings, work on a physically and mentally healthy life.