The Mystery Revealed - What It Really Takes To STOP BINGE-EATING

SPEAKER_00: Hi, this is Shelley Treacher from the Binge and Overeating Recovery Podcast. This podcast is all about helping you to recognize, to understand, to manage and to overcome emotional eating. So today I thought it'd be a good time to brush up on exactly what I'm trying to get at here. I'm going to explain again what emotional eating is and what it really takes to stop. First, I'm going to answer a question that people ask me all of the time. They ask, does it have to be emotional? And they're asking whether there really is an emotional thing behind comfort eating. I find that generally people become wary of me when I start talking about the emotional side of binge eating or of anything in actual fact. They often immediately assume a posture or an attitude of defense. And it's quite clear that they want me to stop this line of inquiry or talking about things in an emotional way. Some people even get quite aggressive about it. We all overeat or eat junk food to a lesser or greater degree. So is it actually emotional for all of us? I honestly think the answer is actually yes. Even if it is just an association or a habit, we are emotional creatures, whether we like it or not, and we have complex psychologies. I don't think there can be much that we do that doesn't actually involve emotion. Even if it is just that it feels nice to eat that particular thing at that particular time, this is still an emotional response. It's just that for many of us it's gone out of control. And understandably, like any addiction, tolerance levels creep up for the substance that we consume and habit increases quickly. We don't like the idea that we're losing control. It's hard to admit that. But clearly, overeating is a big problem in our culture. Collectively, this has gone out of control for all of us. But especially now. We still live in a society that prizes action and toughness. Not wanting to admit emotion or vulnerability belies a survival fear of failure and rejection, and an aversion to difficulty. This is often what I see in the eyes of the person who wants me to stop talking about emotion. We love a quick fix as humans. We are averse to pain and discomfort by nature. We are pleasure seeking. So we instinctively go for the thing that we think will feel good immediately. Some people are more attracted to this than others. What determines whether we are more pleasure seeking or quick fix oriented than others? Probably partly how we've developed and what we've learnt as we grew up. But could it also be the level of discomfort? It may not be immediately recognizable what emotions lie underneath comfort eating, but somewhere there may be a discomfort of some kind, demanding to be soothed or dissolved. In my experience, it's often the most sensitive of people who struggle with addictions. That's not to knock the sensitive, in fact, in my book, they or I should say we are the most interesting of all the creatures on the planet, because we are the warm and caring ones who are creative and connective. The planet needs us. It's just that some people have lost their way, in the pursuit of toughness and productivity so prized in our cultures. You've heard it said that a large part of what we do is unconscious. Something I know as a therapist is that it can be a difficult job getting to know the unconscious. What we really feel can be buried very deeply, particularly if we've used a substance that numbs repeatedly. But once there, it's the only way I know how to heal, psychologically, because the one way to change the unconscious is through the unconscious. So a question to determine whether your eating is comfort eating or not could be what would you be left with if you didn't do it? Something I also hear people say a lot is that it's hard to be addicted to something that we have to use every day to survive. And it's true. Ideally we would be able to enjoy some comfort foods without having to devour the whole packet, the entire cupboard, or without thinking obsessively about eating. But my thoughts around this are that it takes a huge mindset shift to stop emotional eating, the same as it would for any addiction. And that the actual substance you're addicted to is not really the point. More that it's about squashing emotion. So this is the thing that needs to change in order to stop. So now I'm going to give you a recap of what I really think it takes to give up comfort eating and binge eating. In my work, giving up comfort eating is something that happens naturally when you uncover what's going on in your psyche and then take steps to learn to treat yourself better. It does take an active decision, but only once you understand what you're doing. I could have chosen so many different steps, but these are the ones that it boils down to. Number one, you need to identify why it is that you want to stop. This has to be real and motivating. One of my clients said recently that she wanted to be able to play with her granddaughter. I was really touched by that, and I believed her. I can imagine that when she's trying not to comfort eat, she might think of the times when she wants to get up and play with her granddaughter. It must be so frustrating not to be able to do this thing that connects you with love and happiness. So it needs to be emotion. You need to have emotion attached to the thing, the reason that's going to motivate you to stop. And that's just a start. A really good start. Number two. Identify and challenge your habits around food. Be honest with yourself about what you eat and when. Notice any habits that you're entrenched in, and attempt to do something slightly different or largely different. I encourage you to be experimental here. I recently started eating my main meal around lunchtime because that's when I'm actually hungry. What I'd been doing previously was trying to starve myself to save myself up for the evening, knowing that I was likely to snack in the evening after dinner. Somehow, through eating a big lunch and allowing myself to plan in the snacking as food later in that evening, I'm more satisfied and less likely to go out of control at any time. I've done another podcast on eating in the evening, so you might want to check that one out. But this is just an example of a little habit that you can switch just to try something different so you don't have that association anymore, and the more you practice that, the more uncoupled the association will become. Start to observe, to study, and be curious about how you respond to life and what's going on in your psyche. This is about starting to get to know yourself on a psychological level. What gets you riled up? What do you enjoy? When someone asks you to do something, do you always say yes? If you're tired, do you s give yourself a rest? What are the thoughts in your head just before you binge eat? My first podcast was about identifying emotional eating. This is also a great one for starting to learn about yourself. Number four. It's important, prolific, and pivotal in steps to recovery because it's the critic that makes you want to eat. Mostly. So identifying what thoughts you were having just before you ate, and in particular looking out for ways you put yourself down is going to be a huge step for you. This can be really hard to identify when you're in such a habit of it, so start by identifying the thoughts, just the thoughts, and then ask yourself whether you would say what you've identified to a child or to your best friend. If you wouldn't, it's usually a self-criticism. And you are more likely to have an emotional response to it, one of upset or frustration, i.e. feeling crappy, and this will make you want to eat. My second podcast was on self-criticism, so you might want to go and have a look at that one again, but I'm also going to talk more in depth about it next week. Step five. This step leads on from the last one. Identify and be kind to yourself or attend to your inner child or your feelings. Learning to identify the part of you that has that emotional response or feels crappy is what I'm talking about here. I'm calling it your inner child because it's an instinctive and primitive feeling. But it is also something that may feel very young, and you may have had that feeling first when you were a child. So your next mindset shift is to learn to be compassionate to that part of you. This again is a massive step, and it's going to make all the difference. Step six. The last part of this little equation is reversing the criticism with a more reasonable thought. So for example, if I think, oh you idiot, you shouldn't have done it that way. I might feel ashamed or stupid or hurt. That's the part I'm calling the inner child. My adult would come in and say don't talk to my child like that. She was only doing her best and deserves love always. You did it that way because you're human. Now let's try a different way. There's always time to try again. I'm hoping that you can see the difference there. Step seven. In order to be able to maximize on all of these techniques that I've mentioned so far and to really grow into someone who chooses not to comfort eat naturally, something that has to be learned is to manage feelings in a different way. Once you've identified what feelings you have underneath eating, you need to learn A that emotions are not to be avoided, B that they are helpful in understanding who you are, what you want and what you need, and C that there are other ways to manage them in a different, more empowering way. My last five podcasts at least have been about this, and I will be continuing to talk about it. The final step, step eight, expand your resourcefulness and self soothing. This is kind of an extension of the last step of step seven, but it is something that can be practiced on its own, and it's so rewarding. I also did a podcast on this You're looking for the eight ways to self regulate two podcasts ago. So much of this is about healing from your past and addressing the developmental reasons why you started eating in the first place to comfort yourself. Addressing the beliefs that you've built up about who you are and what you're allowed to do in life. What I'm suggesting is expanding these possibilities to include kindness to yourself. This way you will naturally make better choices for yourself all round through your developing self-confidence. It is a big deal. It's not an easy job, but it is achievable. And you might need some support. So I know that that was a lot. We're packed a lot into a few minutes there, and you might be wondering where you can start. So I would suggest starting by identifying the emotion that causes your eating and your self-critic. Get up and do something different to what you normally do, and start learning about how to treat yourself well. We've come to the end of the podcast for today. Thank you very much for listening. I would love to answer your questions, so if you have any, please be in touch. As usual, anything you tell me is completely confidential, and I guarantee that there's many people out there that would be benefited from your question. Next week I'll be talking about your self-critic, how you can identify how you put yourself down, where that comes from, what it's like for you, what it does to you, and what huge part it plays in comfort eating and binge eating. Next week will help you understand. But if you want further help, my support group is coming out really soon, so please be in touch. Thank you so much for being with me. I'll see you next Wednesday.