Weight Loss and Emotional Eating: Lose Weight by Discovering Yourself

Weight loss doesn’t have to be an emotional affair. Discovering your emotional eating habits before you begin to lose weight can go a long way in helping you lose weight, and keep the weight off.

Weight loss experts report you’ll gain confidence after you lose weight. Although true, science is proving that it’s more important for the success of your weight loss program that you gain confidence before dieting, or even during dieting, to be able to successfully reach your weight loss goals. Emotional eating often leads to binge eating, particularly if you’ve been denying yourself your favorite foods to lose weight. Weight loss gets significantly more challenging when you turn to food for boredom, loneliness, comfort, depression, insecurity, celebration or anger. Losing weight to gain confidence means you have to gain confidence in your ability to lose weight first.

Emotional eating is common, and some studies estimate that 75% of the population participates in “emotional eating.” Short bursts of emotional eating certainly isn’t harmful to healthy diets, but more often than not, our emotional eating doesn’t result in bingeing on bowls full of celery sticks. If you’re thinking about participating in a weight loss program to lose weight, or you’re currently trying to lose weight with your own diet plan, keep of journal of when you feel the need for “emotional eating” and what foods you typically eat under the circumstances. Being aware of yourself and your habits is the first step when trying to lose weight with any weight loss plan.

Stress can lead to overeating. This could be ingrained. Studies from Emory University showed that subordinate monkeys ate more often, and ate more foods high in fat than the dominant females. Another factor is whether your emotional eating is “external” or “internal.” External emotional eating occurs if you eat more socially at parties, or overeat because you are with someone who is overeating. Internal emotional eating occurs when you plop down on the couch with a bag of munchies and say, “I’m bored” or “I’m depressed.” A study by the Miriam Hospital's Weight Control and Diabetes Research Center found that “external emotional eaters” were better at retaining their weight loss goals than the “internal emotional eaters.” Internal emotional eaters end up regaining weight, and go on and off endless weight loss programs to continue losing weight. Recognizing your internal emotional eating habits gives you the knowledge to fight emotional eating when your emotions try to override your motivation to lose weight.

You may see yourself as a self-confident person, however, after examining your diet patterns, you might find that you lack self-efficacy; which believes you have the ability to reach a specific goal. Self-efficacy was a contributing factor in a Queensland University weight loss study. In this study, the women with higher rates of self-efficacy were able to meet their dieting goals because they believed they could, and they sought the education to do so. Gaining education, believing in you, and getting encouragement from others are recommended to increase self-efficacy levels that would have a positive affect on a dieter’s weight loss program.

Weight loss plans must consider the emotional aspect of losing weight. If emotional behaviors, weight loss education and dieting confidence are gained at the beginning of the weight loss plan, the weight loss is more likely to stay lost. Science is proving that if you believe you can lose weight, and then you’ll be able to do it. Start your journal and get a grip on your emotional eating, especially while you’re trying to lose weight. Gain a few pounds of self-confidence, and lose a few pounds of weight. If you need help, try a weight loss program like the Atkins Diet Weight Loss Program that has a strong support group. You can control the food instead of letting it control you. Just learn and believe.

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