Addicted to Food….

I am an emotional eater…

I have been pretty much all my life…

I also have an unfortunate habit of rewarding myself with food as well…

So you can imagine my absolute struggle with this situation. My fallback when I’m sad, lonely, unhappy, hurt, angry etc is to find “comfort” in food…

The stupid thing is that I KNOW this will not make me feel any better for more than about 5 minutes… I KNOW that eating unhealthily does not serve me well in the long run (or even the short term)… So why do I blatantly ignore myself and go ahead with such destructive behaviour?

I think it has to do with my self worth at the time… I seem to sway between quite high and low self esteem which depends on what is going on in my life at the time… I have recently been through a period of quite low self esteem due to feelings of isolation and loneliness… I had enough of feeling like this so I’m working on loving myself again.

Man, it is hard work!! Looking at myself in the mirror and telling myself that I am allowed to be valued and I am worthwhile has been quite confronting for me… To be honest it just makes me want to reach for a family block of chocolate!!

Working through my issues has been so much harder because eating is something we have to do to survive. I have had to differentiate between “wholesome” (and ok to eat) food and “black hole, red alert, emotional vortex” food. I have had to try and identify my triggers and come up with a plan to avoid feeling vulnerable. Funnily enough, it can be really odd things that set me off. Not heartbreaking, soul destroying things but everyday slights… Now THAT is something that blindsides me – eating my way through a small almost insignificant matter – why do I let the little things affects me so much??

Throw my little habit of rewarding myself with food into the mix and I have yet another set of feelings to identify… Ooohhh I’ve worked out time for a “treat”. Yay me I’ve been fantastic must be OK to celebrate with sugar/ carbs or whipped cream!

So it seems that I have a sub conscious reason to eat badly ALL THE TIME..

Hopefully by acknowledging my issues I can be aware of them and keep them in check. It’s not going to be easy. And PLEASE don’t ever call me out on it (seriously it would be like taking a bone from a dog – dangerous and not at all good for your health!!)

I know that I am a work in progress (aren’t we all really??) and with any luck I can reduce my “emotional eating/rewarding myself with food” tendencies to something that is insignificant or at the very least manageable.