dessertS = Stressed

I have seen and lived through the Yo-Yo effect of diets where I would lose the weight only to gain it back over time.  I found this happening over and over again through the years. 

Why? Because regardless of the best conscious eating plan, if you have emotional baggage still attached to food, chances are you will always go back to where you started.

I myself have lost track of the amount of times I have made it so close to my ideal weight, only to emotionally sabotage myself. Many times I would not only revert back to my starting weight, I would gain more.

So why does this vicious cycle occur over and over again?
I can almost guarantee during the time frame our diets and healthy plan fail, is due to an emotional connection.

We have heard over and over again eat a balanced diet and you will be healthy.
However, the information that is being over looked is the emotional states we go through on this journey to a healthy lifestyle.

Whether we realize it or not, our “overeating” has an emotional attachment. How many times have we stood in front of the refrigerator looking for an answer? It maybe boredom, anger, stress, or to gain some kind of control. Regardless of the reason, we choose to use food as a coping mechanism.

I can tell you from experience that;
Unbalanced emotions, leads to unbalanced food choices!
So many times when we attempt a diet or a scheduled type of eating, we set our mind frame into a spiral of panic questions such as; “When do I get to eat? Can I have that? How can I stick to my diet and go out and eat?

These questions may not even be due to hunger;
 The real question is:
When do I get to feel good again?

When we are dieting we are actually setting our minds into thinking we need to deprive ourselves of something that always brings us pleasure. So when we are told we can’t have it, we have to look at what are the consequences not only physically, but emotionally.

For example if cake is the “go to“ food when you are stressed, you are using that item as the coping mechanism for that certain emotion. If this has been going on for a long time, than we have created a neurological path in our brain that says “Hey, I feel bad, so I will eat to feel good” When the reality is after eating that cake we are only left to feel bad. Hence the vicious cycle we need to learn how to break.  

 Recognizing the emotion “stress “ is the connection to cake, than we now can find another avenue to deal with stress instead of the food as the coping mechanism as a temporary fix.

​If you are finding Diets and Exercise only working at a temporary level, than chances are you need to drop the emotional weight. Recognizing the emotions will put you on a stronger path for a long term healthy lifestyle.

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