Emotional hunger is using food to satisfy needs that are not being fulfilled in other ways. Emotional hunger is believing that food makes us feel better. It is longing for food whenever there is any imbalance in our emotional state. It is being more attuned with how food will make us feel than with our emotions. It is wanting to satisfy loneliness, boredom, shame, the blues, or any other emotions with food. It is feeling truly comfortable, truly at home when we are alone eating and finally we can be ourselves, we can enjoy the one thing that always makes us feel better.

Once we want something emotionally, no amount of reason will talk us out of those wants. Even when one becomes aware of these destructive behaviors does the behavior change. Neither intellectualization, nor information, nor desperation seem to mitigate the emotional hunger. It only gets worse when we understand because “You know better” and “You know you should not eat so many calories so late at night.” In comparison to the passion of our emotion the intellect is weak. Learning how stress triggers our hunger and being with our emotions, exclusively, stops emotional eating.



Food: Coping with life’s ups and downs.

Food provides entertainment when we are bored, relieves anxiety when we are stressed, sooth us when we are lonely, comfort us when we are disappointed, stabilizes us when we lose control, calms us down when we lose our cool, give us a boost when we get the blues, and recharges us when we are fatigued. For many of us once we get into a state of extreme anxiety food is what calms us down, the only way we are forced to physically slow down so we can get back to a normal level.

Click here to being the process of healing the emotional hunger.