How I Overcame Emotional Eating and Found Food Freedom

I used to be terrible at dealing with my stress, and constantly turned to food to cover my emotions and find temporary relief. As time went on, I became more and more frustrated. My underlying problems weren’t going away, I hated feeling out of control with food and felt stuck in a cycle of numbing my feelings with food. I had big goals for my life that overwhelmed me – I wanted to go away to college and become a Registered Dietitian, but I had a lot of barriers in the way like affording it and felt alone in my pursuit of achieving this education and a career where I could help other women improve their relationship with food (a touchy subject in my family as many women in it have struggled here).

As time progressed and I became closer to hopefully going away to college, I realized I was stuck by covering my problems with food. And if I kept up my emotional eating and ignoring my problems, I wouldn’t achieve my dream and life goal of becoming a Registered Dietitian and helping women live their best like my finding food freedom. My journey to food freedom was long, tough and lonely, which is a HUGE reason why I offer my Food Freedom Group Coaching Program – to provide women with the support and guidance they need to achieve food freedom faster. Like I said, my journey to food freedom and ending emotional eating took time, but the end result was well worth it. If I hadn’t overcome my emotional eating, I would not be where I am today, helping women like you improve their relationship with food and becoming the best version of themselves.

Below are the exact three steps I used to overcome my emotional eating, and achieve the life I dreamt of:

1. I sat with my emotions

This is TOUGH but so necessary. Be prepared for a good cry when you start this step, and understand that’s 100% okay. When you find yourself turning to food when stressed, or to cover up a problem, stop yourself and go to a non-food designated room (somewhere you do NOT eat in your house), and give yourself at least 10 minutes to sit with your emotions. Ask yourself what you are feeling and why you are feeling this way. It’s okay to be vulnerable with yourself. Soak in your emotions and accept them; no one can tell you they are wrong. Grab a journal and jot down exactly what you are feeling –  it could be hopeless, lonely, nervous, scared, happy, startled, etc. There are so many emotions you could be feeling, but it’s important to gain awareness of and acknowledge them.

2. I formulated a plan to overcome my stressors

After sitting with your emotions and acknowledging them, it’s time to create a plan to overcome the underlying issue and what is truly bothering you. For example, for me when it came to my college career I had two options: Keep covering up my fear of making my college dreams a reality and attend a local college in my hometown that did not have a dietetics major, OR develop a plan that would have me attending a college where I could live out my dreams of becoming a Registered Dietitian faster, and able to help women improve their relationship with food sooner. Now I’m a gal who likes to live life with no regrets, so I chose option #2 and created a game plan of what I needed to do to get me to the college of my dreams (4.5 hours from home) and able to become a Registered Dietitian. I applied for MANY scholarships, and was the recipient of only one that I applied to. But that scholarship, in addition to financial aid, was enough for me to go away to school and live out my dreams. I’m not going to lie to you and tell you this was easy. It wasn’t. But, it was SO worth it, and I believe that you too can stop covering up your problems and emotions with food, so you can better your life and achieve what you are capable of.

3. I gave myself grace

Like I said, my journey to food freedom and overcoming emotional eating wasn’t easy. I did it alone, I fell back into old behaviors intermittently and found myself turning to food for several YEARS after making a commitment to myself to overcome my emotional eating. But with each binge and emotional eating session I gave myself more and more grace. No one is perfect and it’s important that you understand that too in your journey to food freedom. If you find yourself turning to food, and feel out of control with it, that’s okay. After each binge, ask yourself what could of happened to make you turn to food and use it as a learning experience. Grab your journal and jot down what YOU learned from this binge. Make changes in the future so you don’t have to turn to food when feeling stressed; you can make a game plan to distract yourself by calling a friend, journaling, going for a walk or cuddling with a furry pet friend. There are many options! But, the most important thing you can do is to not be too hard on yourself and understand that you will have bumps and hurdles along the way to food freedom and overcoming emotional eating.

Apply to my Food Freedom Group Coaching Program for additional guidance and support that will speed up your journey to food freedom and living your best life, free of emotional eating quicker.