Emotional Eating

(Hi new Blogger. You're lucky I like Googledocs or I might be more annoyed.

Re-post of a comment I made over at Katja's latest post The Feeding Doctor. There were a lot of things wrong with the website she critiques, and a lot of people rightly tore it apart, but i went on a tangent so I figure I'll throw it here. A couple of  quoted comments from the site were clear on their stance against Emotional Eating - "TIP: If you’re not hungry, PUT DOWN THE FOOD.” 


You know what I used to do when I was a kid on a diet and food outside of mealtimes/one allotted sweet snack was prohibited? I binged. I waited till I was alone in the house and ate everything I wanted, long past the point that I actually wanted to eat it.

You know what stopped my binging? Giving myself permission to have a few chocolates or cookies whenever I had a craving for them.

You know what helps me eat more protein, vegetables, and complex carbs, and less dessert-y food? I never eat dessert when I’m hungry. I’ve found that if I do, I eat too fast, don’t enjoy it and end up eating more, because I’m trying to fill up and it’s harder to do on pure sugar. If dessert is purely an “emotional” experience, I have less of it and take so much more joy.

You know what else I struggle with? Depression and self-injury(TW ahead). I’d love one of these people to look me in the eye and tell me that eating a bowl of ice cream when I’m upset is more unhealthy than biting and scratching my own skin. And the thing that really pisses me off is that I know plenty of them actually would.

Food is more than nutrition. Communal, celebratory, self-soothing, self-medicating and yes, Emotional eating is part of the good things in life. So yes, it can be an issue if you find yourself constantly eating without paying attention. But a blanket stance against ever eating for any reason other than hunger isn't the answer.