Emotional eating: this is how we get out of the food trap

What does the terms emotional eating or emotional eating mean?

Emotional eating occurs when we eat out of emotion, even though we are not physically hungry. For example, if we develop a eating behavior through education, habits, trained behavior or through taught beliefs, in which we have placed an emotion behind it.

What would such a belief be?

For example, such a belief would be: "If you don't finish, it will rain tomorrow." or "Chocolate makes you happy." So whenever we do not eat out of a feeling of hunger, there is very often an emotion behind it, for example eating out of grief, out of boredom, to calm down and of course the classic stressful food that each of us knows.

What are the consequences?

Often we have dealt a lot with weight and figure in life and there is usually a certain ideal for us that we personally pursue – even if it's only the two or three kilos that we would like to lose. But there is a discrepancy between our personal ideal of beauty, which we believe we have to live up to, and the desire to eat accordingly. That means: I realize that pizza may not be as healthy as a salad, but making the right decision at this moment is often the problem in implementation due to our emotions. If you look at a lot of diets, it's mostly just about calorie deficits or bans. But the more we forbid ourselves from emotional eating, the more we actually want it. Precisely because we are so strongly controlled by our emotions, that makes it really difficult to adhere to many diet rules if they do not suit me or my needs. Ravenous hunger attacks are pre-programmed because we think so often about what we are not allowed to have that our brain really interprets this as a desire and a great wish. Not giving in to this inner urge is difficult.

What do you recommend instead if you want to or even have to shed a few pounds?

I neither allow myself to be dieted nor counted calories and do not try to work with prohibitions, but rather to find out what inner need is behind the food? Each of us has certain character traits that must also be used in a positive sense for our eating behavior. So if, for example, I have someone in front of me who doesn't like to move but is more of the comfortable type, it doesn't make sense to pick them up and say, "If you feel like eating, you can compensate for that with exercise." because he or she then thinks: "Why? I don't like any sport at all." It is then more important to look at the needs and to turn the right screws to resolve certain patterns. Of course, I can always limit myself and do without, but does that make me happy in the long run?

When does emotional eating become problematic?

It's not bad to eat emotionally per se. It's always about the amount, too. If I've been busy managing emotions with food all day, it actually gets difficult at some point, and not just with weight. Insulin resistance or problems with female hormones can develop, so that it becomes really stressful for the psyche. Namely when I accuse myself of being a diet failure afterwards. That costs me a lot of strength and at some point comes the phase where you think: Now I don't care either, now I just keep eating.

Then what do you advise?

For me it is important to explain: you are just who you are and that is a good thing. You don't have to improve what you can't, but use what you already have in a positive way. And think about it beforehand: Do I want to eat because I'm hungry or is it just appetite? Can I still feel hunger and satiety? And then I think about whether I really want that now, because in the end I am only punishing myself by eating anyway, even though I really don't want to.

How do I recognize my own patterns?

That's why I developed the diary to first find out: What is my everyday life like and when do I eat? Am I actually the type who is just hungry or do I eat many small meals in between without even realizing it? So the first step is to find out: why do I eat, when and how much. Especially when, for example, I am currently sitting in the home office due to Corona, still have to take care of my children's homework and have no time to cook something healthy for me and then try to recover the energy that I have lost through the stress between the Refill meetings with physical calories by having a quick bite to eat in between. The more I become aware of this and document it, the clearer the structure according to which I eat becomes. And that creates an awareness of different things that you would otherwise not even notice.

But how does it work then? Do I have to weigh everything I eat?

No, please no more dietary rules or more supervision. It's really much more about writing down what I ate and approximately when – i.e. 12 o'clock, a portion of spaghetti Bolognese, for example. And I note: Did I eat because I was hungry or because it was 11:30 a.m. and the canteen had started moving. So it's not about weighing or counting something, but simply about: How did I feel when I went out to eat? Was it automated or was I actually hungry?

What do you think of our trained meals? Three meals a day with a little fruit and vegetables in between?

Whenever I go to my parents' house, I notice again and again that I now have completely different eating habits. They are things that we were trained in childhood and especially here in Germany we also eat a lot of bread. I grew up with bread in the morning, bread in the evening, then at school the lunch break and in between there was cake again. And even today I still notice the conditioning. That is, we adopt eating habits and the frequency of meals because we don't know it any other way. The problem with this, however, is usually that we no longer even notice when really hungry occurs. You can then experiment a little and investigate after how much time your stomach growls and question yourself.

But do we still have a real feeling of hunger? Often we just eat out of appetite, don't we? Can we relearn how we feel hungry?

Yes and no. It is very complex physically. There are two main hormones in the body that are responsible for satiety and hunger, and they are leptin and ghrelin, which in turn are dependent on body fat. It has been found that the feeling of satiety is reduced from a BMI over 30. So the more body fat I have, the less satiety I feel. Of course, this also has something to do with the degree of stomach stretching, because physiologically I can then eat a lot more than I can perceive. It is therefore particularly important for us women to know that we are not only dependent on hormones, but that physiological causes can also be responsible for suppressing a certain feeling of hunger or satiety. Women who are bulimic or anorectic, for example, no longer feel hungry when they are stressed and only notice this when they feel dizzy or nauseous, but still do not feel hungry. Of course, it works the other way too. I eat until I feel sick because I don't even notice that I'm full. So the perception is sometimes extremely disturbed. But what happens much more often is a desensitization of the pancreas through constant eating and our snack culture. At some point she doesn't even know: How much blood sugar do I have in my blood now? What should I pour out now?

What happens then?

The pancreas eventually becomes resistant and produces insulin all the time, and when insulin can't be broken down in the body, it ends up in fat. Insulin is a fat store that is then expressed as a small roll over the waistband _ and unfortunately that doesn't go away that quickly. Which in turn is due to the fact that I no longer give my body a break.

But how do I actually notice that I'm really hungry?

Would be hungry if I noticed: Oh, energy is running out, maybe I'm a little hypoglycemic and my stomach is rumbling – that's no longer just an appetite, where I think I could eat a piece of candy now.

As children, many of us heard: "Whatever is on the plate is eaten." and often eat past fullness. How do you avoid the typical "eating coma"?

There are different tricks. If you really don't want to weigh anything, you can do an experiment and see: How much do I really need to be full? The top priority is still what we were prayed to as children: eat slowly and put the cutlery aside for a moment. Because the feeling of hunger takes 15 minutes before it even sets in. These portion sizes can then be measured well with household items. For example, a small cup of rice is enough for me. Another option is to pre-cook and portion the meals. Then it stays with the one plate. Because if you’re honest, after a plate of spaghetti bolognese I’m definitely physically full. It's just the desire that makes me want to eat another plate.

Now the pre-Christmas season is full of temptations that we can treat ourselves only once a year. How do we manage not to escalate completely every time and resist speculoos, gingerbread and co. Or divide up the delicacies healthily.

It actually has something to do with the fact that we also associated Christmas with certain memories and feelings and suddenly there are things on the supermarket shelves that we couldn't have all year round. Then there is the fact that at least in the years without Corona, cookies were brought into the office that you naturally wanted to try at least once. That, of course, means that most of us put on a little weight over Christmas. That's just the way it is. It's just like everything else here: the crowd makes it. Of course I can buy the speculoos, but instead of eating the biscuits at random, I can portion them the evening before and they have to be enough for the day. Sometimes you have to look from the emotional to the factual level. For most of them, it is not a question of whether it is a children's bar or ten, but rather the taste and the plot itself. So we have to learn again not to serve pleasure through a certain amount, but to experience it again through all the senses. Then I eat more consciously again and can treat myself to something during the Christmas season, after all, mulled wine and the roast with dumplings on Christmas Eve are simply part of it for many. I just have to make sure that it runs normally. If my eating habits are 80% right, the 20% when things don't go that well don't make it that bad either. You should just ask yourself beforehand: "How well can I deal with it emotionally afterwards?"

Due to Corona, many of us are in the home office. We hardly move any more, and if only to the candy cupboard. But right now, when a lot of leisure activities and contacts are missing, we have an imbalance of needs. Do you have any tips on how we can do something good for each other without constantly eating?

It is always important to ask yourself: What good can I do for myself? How can I charge my batteries? The first step is then to consciously plan free spaces for me and not wait to see what's left at the end of the day. Because when we close our PC in the evening, totally tired and stressed, we usually don't feel like going for another walk or doing yoga. And when I'm not the activity type, I take time to read an audio book or talk to a friend on the phone, for example. The important thing is to create a balance that relaxes me. Because the more relaxed I am, the less I have to grab something to eat. When I am stressed, my body releases cortisol, i.e. the stress hormone and exactly what insulin does, namely shifting itself to fat, that is what cortisol does too. The best way to get rid of corona kilos is to try to do something good for myself and relax. The less cortisol, the less I store in fat. For this reason, we also look in my diary at the stress level throughout the day. Because that's the most common thing we do: stress eating. And then you can look at your patterns and set goals that don't put me under pressure and create even more stress. One step at a time.

Finally, do you have your three golden rules of nutrition for us, which we can all easily integrate into our everyday lives?

Yes of course:

1. It is healthiest when 80 percent of our food is plant-based. That doesn't mean we all have to become vegetarians or vegans. But the vitamins and plant substances that support our body in regeneration or inhibit inflammation come from plants.

2. Eat unprocessed foods whenever possible. My credo is always: If the list of ingredients is longer than the washing instructions in my sweater, that's not good.

3. Pay attention to the sugar intake. The German Nutrition Society recommends no more than 40 g of sugar a day. Watch how much sugar you actually eat because it is really important for the pancreas and thus for insulin resistance not to fall into sugar addiction.

Dr. Kathrin Vergin is an oncological chemist and has researched the nutritional behavior of women with breast cancer for many years. At the same time she has been working as a nutrition coach for more than 10 years and trains private individuals and companies. In her free time, Kathrin Vergin is a triathlete and trains for the Ironman. She has developed a food diary that focuses on "emotional eating" and in which not only the food is noted, but also routines, stress levels and feelings. All of this is reflected on daily for 12 weeks. This allows you to understand your own eating behavior and initiate sustainable change without any prohibitions.

The food diary was published by Rowohlt Verlag for € 25.