This is part 1 of a 6-part series on emotional eating: how I used to be a severe emotional eater, how I overcame my stress eating issues, and how you can stop stress eating, starting today.
- Part 1: How I Overcame Emotional Eating, Part 1: Food as a Symbol of Love
- Part 2: How I Overcame Emotional Eating, Part 2: Deep Entanglement
- Part 3: How I Overcame Emotional Eating, Part 3: Becoming at Peace with Food
- Part 4: 12 Signs of Emotional Eating (And Why It is Bad For You)
- Part 5: How To Stop Emotional Eating, Part 1: Tackling the Causes of Emotional Eating
- Part 6: How To Stop Emotional Eating, Part 2: Rebuilding a Healthy Relationship with Food
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How would you describe your relationship with food?
I would describe mine as a highly unhealthy one. For a very long time up until recently, I had the worst possible relationship one could ever have with food.
My Journey with Emotional Eating
For the longest time, I was very, very heavy emotional eater. I would eat based on my emotions (be it happy, sad, or boredom), not physical hunger. While not a definite consequence, it resulted in my tendency to overeat compulsively, also known as bingeing.
My emotional eating issues formed when I was a kid, as a result of societal conditioning, media conditioning, and the way food was used as a proxy for love in my family. I grew up, heavily tangled in a series of warped beliefs surrounding myself, food, eating, and last but not least, love.
In my teenage years, up till very recently, I would constantly eat out of self-hate, low self-worth, (misguided) self-love, and self-enforced pressure. I was engulfed in a deep, painful struggle with food and eating, to say the least. The past 10 years of my life has been one where I descended in a long, downward spiral of darkness and misery due to my emotional eating condition.
In the later years of the struggle, as I dipped into the darkest pits of emotional eating imaginable, I bore a quiet hope that I would one day be free from this entanglement with food. That I could just get food and eating out of my mind, and rebuild my diet and health on a clean slate. That I would have a completely healthy relationship with food, where I would only eat as and when I needed to.
Today, I’m glad to have resolve a big chunk of my emotional eating issues. I no longer go through the cycle of limiting my food intake, then binge, limiting my food intake, then binge. I no longer eat to feed emotions – instead, I eat to feed my body, as and when it needs me too. I no longer eat based on external cues, but rather, my eating is based on the hunger cues of my body. I no longer have maniacal, uncontrollable frenzies or cravings surrounding food – all of which, in retrospect, were the result of having a poor relationship with food. Today I look at food, and it’s something which I have a perfectly neutral, healthy relationship with.
This new 6-part series on emotional eating shares (1) my struggle with food and eating (2) how I worked through my emotional eating issues, one by one and (3) how you can gain salvation from it, as long as you set the intention to do so.
If you are an emotional eater, I want to let you know that no matter how bad things may seem, you *can* break out of this seemingly unresolvable mess. It *is* possible for you to bid goodbye to any twisted relationship you have with food today *and* attain a completely healthy relationship with it, if you want to. But you have to first acknowledge you *do* have an emotional eating issue, because until you do, you will keep going back-and-forth in a mental battle with food.
If you are not an emotional eater but you know someone who *might* be, please share this guide with him/her, because it may well be the missing link he/she needs to put an end to his/her problem.
This is my story with food, eating, and at the end of it all, myself.
Growing Up – Food as a Symbol of Love
The Beginnings
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For as long as I knew, I would eat to fill myself emotionally, rather than driven by physical need.
I believe it all started when I was a kid.
My parents doted on me (and my brother) immensely. They probably loved us more than they ever let on.
However, they never expressed that with words. With Asian families, love is rarely communicated verbally, but via actions, symbols, and mediums. In my series on improving your relationship with parents, I shared how verbal communication was a rarity in my family, partly due to language barriers, partly because it wasn’t the language of love.
In my family, it so happened food was that medium in which love was conveyed.
My parents would ensure my brother and I were well-fed, above all else. Eating was considered a joy. The more we ate, the better. While my parents extolled on thriftiness, they never held back when it came to spending on food. They, especially my dad, loved to buy/prepare/cook food for the family, because it made them feel they were fulfilling their duties as parents.
Scarcity of Food
Thinking back, their valuation of food was probably due to its scarcity during their time. My parents were born in the 1950s. It was the post war times, when the (Singapore) society was not as affluent as it is today. They often spoke of tough times they had growing up.
For example, my mom grew up in a household with 7 children. There were many mouths to feed and not enough food to go around. There would be times when she would go without food, because the needs of the males (her brothers) took precedence over the females. To be fed was a joy; To be overfed was a luxury.
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My parents also recognized that while we were living in a first world country (Singapore), there were hundred millions of people around the world stricken with poverty and famine. Hunger and starvation were real issues plaguing a large portion of the word population. Born in the wrong time, wrong place, it could well be us going without food or water.
A Family Culture of Food; Food as a Symbol of Love
Hence, raising me (and my brother), my parents’ main concern was always food. They would express their love by checking we were fed; ensuring our breakfast/lunch/dinner were taken care of; cooking for us; buying food; stocking up the household with food.
That, was their language of love.
Whenever they see me, they would ask: “Have you eaten? Are you hungry? Do you want to eat anything? Do you need me to buy food? Do you need me to cook anything? What do you want to eat?”
When it came to cooking, my parents, especially my mom, would prepare gratuitous amounts of food, much more than what was needed. For example, when cooking vermicelli, my mom had a habit of cooking a huge wok which was enough to feed 20-30 people, even though it was just the 4 of us eating. It was either we finish that or have the food go to waste. Usually we’d do the former.
During meal times, my dad would always check if I was eating fine. He would say, “Eat more” (regardless of how much I was eating). He would pile food on my plate, and refill when I was done.
If I was to ever reject their offer to buy food/cook or not eat the food they prepared, it would be as if I rejected their love. They never said that, but I would feel that way. Their face would grimace into a permanent frown, which would remain the whole day/night until I finally ate something. They would also remind me once every 10-15 minutes to eat until I ate. And when I did that, they would finally ease up, as if tension had left their body.
At night, my mom would ask us what we wanted to eat the next day, and occupy herself with breakfast, lunch and dinner plans for the family. It was the same thing the next day, every day.
During weekends mornings, my parents would go to the local market and buy a large assortment of food for breakfast. From carrot cake, to peanut pancakes, to rice cakes, to Chinese noodles, to fried dough sticks, to steamed buns, to roti prata (all popular local food), to McDonald’s, we could pick what we wanted and eat to our heart’s content, while enjoying quiet family time in the early mornings. These were the happy memories.
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On the weekend afternoons, my parents would bring us out to IMM (a mega mart) to stock up on food supplies. My parents would ask me to pick out any food I wanted in the aisles. I remembered being very enamored by the variety of food, always wanting to grab the flavors I had not tried before. There would also be this donut kiosk with mini-donuts fried on the spot. I always loved to see the “making of” process as my parents ordered some for us.
Occasionally, we would have KFC, Pizza Hut, local Chinese cuisine and more, as special treats. Sometimes, we would eat out as a routine family outing, which was always something to look forward to.
My parents would also keep a look out for what I liked to eat, and buy more of that. For example, growing up, they knew I liked steamed buns with red bean filling, chocolate, donuts, and curry puffs. (I don’t like any of them now. Now that I’m on a healthier diet, I find these food quite disgusting.) They would go out of the way to get my favorite food. I would then eat them in happiness and gratitude.
Throughout the week, my parents would stock the household with every food imaginable from biscuits, cookies, pastries, confectionery, bread, candy, chips, chocolate, ice cream, to instant noodles, because they didn’t want me nor my brother to go hungry. It was like every child’s dream house, like the one in Hansel and Gretel.
My parents would buy every food in bulk, because they had a habit of stocking up. If ever we ran out on 1 item, my parents would immediately get more the next day or the day itself. Hence, there would always be something to eat at home, regardless of the time of the day.
The above was what I was exposed to growing up, for every day in my life. I would eat every day, as much as I wanted, as freely as I desired.
As much as my parents had the purest, absolute best intentions from their heart, these childhood activities, along with societal and media conditioning, would embed me with some highly twisted beliefs surrounding food and eating.
I would grow up with these distorted beliefs, which would layer on one another every time I undergo an experienced that affirmed them. This created a huge web of twisted, erroneous beliefs surrounding food and eating in my mind. These would later lead me to experience a large amount of pain and suffering in my early adulthood, where food and eating were concerned.
Continue on to Part 2: Deep Entanglement, where I share my deep entanglement with food as a result of my conditioning since young.
This is part 1 of a 6-part series on emotional eating: how I used to be a severe emotional eater, how I overcame my stress eating issues, and how you can stop stress eating, starting today.
- Part 1: How I Overcame Emotional Eating, Part 1: Food as a Symbol of Love
- Part 2: How I Overcame Emotional Eating, Part 2: Deep Entanglement
- Part 3: How I Overcame Emotional Eating, Part 3: Becoming at Peace with Food
- Part 4: 12 Signs of Emotional Eating (And Why It is Bad For You)
- Part 5: How To Stop Emotional Eating, Part 1: Tackling the Causes of Emotional Eating
- Part 6: How To Stop Emotional Eating, Part 2: Rebuilding a Healthy Relationship with Food
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Celes,
Thank you so much for writing about this. Ever since your visit I have been introspective and writing about my desire to be healthy and how my relationship with food affects that. I look forward to the rest of this series! :)
Meredith
Thanks so much, Meredith. :D I appreciate your comment. Our relationship with food has such an intricate role to play in living healthily. I’m only happy that I can share this with the rest and hopefully help others gain insight in how they perceive food.
I can relate to this well, so can my husband – especially my husband! He’s Italian and to this day his mother shows love through food. Poor guy was overfed all his life and he remembers moments of eating food he shouldn’t be eating (sugar galore) when he was at a very young age, while his mother laughed at him and proclaimed that he was ‘so cute’.
She will cook a 7 course meal for what is supposed to be a simple supper. I don’t think I’ve ever gone there without pasta or some other food cooking on the stove. And she makes him, and me, feel guilty if we don’t want to eat her food. Fortunately we’ve learned to deal with the guilt and just say NO!
She also stocks up on our favorite foods. She knows I like chocolate so she wil have chocolate sitting there for me when I walk in the house, and she will even offer me chocoate before she says hello :!:
For her life is about feeding people. I wish she would learn to sit and visit with us rather than cook and obsess about us not eating. I don’t think I’ve ever had a conversation with her because food is always her focus when it comes to us. But fortunately we’ve learned to say no and move past the pressure. My husband has gone from overweight and struggling with food to making healthier choices and the ability to stop when he’s full. Me?
Hey Kari, thank you so much for sharing. I’m happy for both you and your husband for making conscious food choices. :D Learning to say no to food is incredibly important – many people overeat because we do not know how to say no, both to others and food. In fact, it’s one of the steps I cover in the guide to overcome emotional eating (later in part 5 of the series).
I can relate to this. My dad’s family (who I don’t see anymore) used to eat a lot of very unhealthy foods like cheesy bacon potato casseroles and fried ham and things like that, in very large quantities. If I was eating around them, such as on a holiday, me or my cousins would get teased if we didn’t eat huge amounts of food too. It was no wonder that the whole family was overweight and had diabetes and heart problems. Anyway, I don’t spend a lot of time around them anymore, or is I do, I won’t eat with them.
Hey Laurel, thanks for sharing. Interesting that you pointed that out – I believe a lot of overweight people are overweight because of how they were conditioned with food when they were young. Your story basically affirmed that. Good for you that you broke away and took ownership of your eating habits!
In the US, I think both the Jewish and Italian cultures food is pushed on the children and food is a sign of love. Some people think the origin of this attitude is that at one time food was short.
I am from the Jewish culture but I find Italians are very similar in this respect. At family events there will always be a lot of good and feeding people is an act of love.
Many Jews are starting to change as they realize this is causing children to be overweight and being overweight is bad for one’s health.
Hi Celia, I would agree. I’ve met a couple of Italians and it seems that food is quite an integral part of their culture. In Asia, food is quite an important part of the culture as well. Being overweight is often linked with wealth and prosperity (a reference point would be the laughing Buddha) and celebrations such as Chinese New Year are never seen as complete without an abundance of food. It’s also seen as good luck to stock up the kitchen and fridge with a lot of food.
Lovely timing Celes, I have reached a crescendo of hating myself in regards to being overweight, inactive and feeling trapped and helpless. I look forward to your insight. It will be a good continuation journal exercise today to explore my childhood relationship with food. As always – thanks for your insightful posts.
Thank you for your kind comment Chloe. :hug: I hope you will find this series useful in uncovering your relationship with food. A lot of food issues are formulated since young, so it’s a great idea to start with your childhood.
I’m so happy that you’re busy with all those challenges, but still manage to find time for the blog!
I have to admit I have not read the text yet (it’s past midnight and I have to be up by 6am), but I am looking forward to the series.
I had quite the battle with emotional eating and I’m finally starting to get a grip on it these past two-three months. I believe your advices will be helpful as always :dance:
Thank you Ivona – I appreciate your kind words. :D I hope you will find the series useful in addressing your emotional eating issues. It will be the most comprehensive guide on PE yet, as it’s a condition very close to my heart. I hope to help as many people who are battling emotional eating today as possible through this series.
thank you for this article! i too feel even now, as a young adult, how my father is worrying on the inside if i don’t eat what or when he wants and that makes me extremely angry. i really need help, i am so tired of fighting. i am 22 years old, but i know that for dad i will always be a kid. how can i develop better habits with food when i grew up with such a bad example (my dad eats very much and is overweight)
i still blame him for all the suffer i experienced from food. there were periods when i would eat very healthy (fruits and vegetables) and he would complain to everyone that i wasn’t eating. i don’t know what to do. i wish he could stay out of my way.
Hi Raluca, I hear you. Your dad sounds like my parents, both of whom would be frustrated if they didn’t see me eating or eating enough (even to this day).
While it may be challenging, the important thing here though is not to put blame, but to take ownership of the situation and work it out. A part of me would blame my parents when I was young, but then I realized this was the way things were, and they really only brought me up this way because that was the best way they knew, based on their upbringing. Ultimately our parents have the best intentions. In the later part of the series, I’ll share a guide on how to overcome emotional eating, for those who are in the same situation.
Hi Celes
thank you for sharing this with us. I’ve been an emotional eater since high school and have only been my ideal weight for the first 10 years of marriage when I just absolutely could not afford snacks. Now, with being able to afford it, AND THE STRESS OF THE JOB, i’ve put on 10 kgs and I can FEEL it in a big way. I’m uncomfortable and have always known that a diet is not the way to go.
I’m also not sure exactly how to deal with the underlying issues and therefore really value your insights on this.
Bless you
Hi Aletta, thanks so much for sharing. :hug: I’m sorry to hear about your situation – emotional eating can be very tricky to address, especially if it has been deeply embedded since young. I’ll be writing a guide on how to address emotional eating later in the series, so be sure to stay tuned for that.
Hi Celes,
Thanks for your post – thanks for all your posts, actually, I’ve been following your blog for some time now, but it’s the first time I leave a comment… I do now, because this post touched me particularly. I am definitely an emotional eater. I’m not sure if the origin were my parents (although I do see some similarities in my mum’s behaviour toward food), but at the end of the day it all comes to the same: food to replace love and self-esteem. When my days are full I don’t even remember food (only when I’m truly hungry), but when I feel lonely or somehow disappointed with something in my life, it seems food is the only way to fill that gap. And then, of course, I overeat and I feel terrible! I exercise a lot (and like it), I am sure if it was not for my eating problem, I would have a perfectly healthy weight (I’m slightly overweight now, nothing dramatic but enough to make me loose confidence in myself). I can see I’m not alone, it is really important that some people can openly share their stories to bring some hope to people like me. Thank you so much, can’t wait for the next part! :)
Thanks for your kind comment, Mary. :hug: I’m sorry to hear about your emotional eating, but at the same time it seems you’re very conscious of the situation, which is a great start to overcoming the problem. It’s good that you already exercise a lot – with the right steps, I’m sure you’ll eventually address your emotional eating and restore your desired weight. I’ll be sharing an extensive guide on how to overcome emotional eating in the second half of the series, so stay tuned.
I am italian and I have lots of things to say on this subject.
But I don’t have the time and will to do now. Also a comment on a blog post is not enough space to express all I want to say.
In one sentence I can say there is nothing wrong in emotional eating. Food is one of the biggest joy of life. I eat with emotions mostly of my meals.
Many people who experiences food disorders turn out to be excessively attentive to eating “healthy”. and demonizing some kind of food, that is not a balanced lifestyle.
Many became vegetarians or opt for more extreme lifestyle on wrong assumptions. Like former alcoholics who then become complete teetotaller.
Old latins use to say “in medio stat virtus” . Everyone has his different level of tolerance, but a glass of wine at dinner is usually healthy for your spirit and even for your body, a bottle is usually too much. No wine at all in your life..you are missing something. Wine is divine.
So there is nothing wrong if once in a while you want to treat yourself with french fries or sashimi or an argentinian steak or a big cup of ice cream or whatever.
If possible I’d like to recommend the most accurate and objective book and website I have read about food an health.
It is Food & healing by Anne Marie Colbin
http://www.foodandhealing.com/
Hi cloudio, I’m not sure what you take away from the term “emotional eating” – Emotional eating to eat in response to emotions, whereas your statement “I eat with emotions mostly of my meals.”) sounds like you’re referring to the act of appreciating food. (?) I could be wrong though and you may be referring to the same thing as I am.
Regardless, I strongly disagree with your statement that “there is nothing wrong with emotional eating”. It’s a very serious issue and more detrimental than the sufferer would imagine. Emotional eating is no different from using food as an escape outlet. It takes us away on our path of conscious living. At the end of the day, food can’t fill that which it was never designed to fill in the first place (i.e. emotions). An emotional eater will keep eating and eating to try to fill that emotion, but he/she will keep wanting more because the original trigger point for eating never gets addressed through eating.
While not always the case, these very same people are often the ones who experience internal struggles with their diet, food intake, weight and body image in other times of the day, when they are not eating. (By diet, I’m not referring to weight loss diet, but just an overall term to refer to one’s food choices).
It’s perfectly fine too if there are emotional eaters out there who enjoy eating in response to emotions, having their lives revolve around food and living in mercy of their feelings for the rest of their life. I’m not here to place judgment. I’m only here to share my experience with emotional eating, the truths/horrors behind it, and how others can learn to break away from it.
I’ll be covering more about the downsides of emotional eating in part-4.
So my personal definition of emotional eating, is not the one you were referring, that obviously is a just an obsessive/compulsive relationship to food and I guess this is the one generally people relate to, since you master English language much better than I do.
What I am trying to say it is that we don’t eat just to fill a need. This is one of the thing the differentiate us from other animals. So it is not wrong if SOMETIMES we eat to balance an emotion.
I just had few cookies because I like sweeties and I felt I needed a break from writing and reading, and fresh energy for my body. Usually my snacks are almonds or nuts that are much healthier choice. Sometimes, when I need a break, I just walk, or grab fresh air, or stretch or practicse yoga or sit on the floor and meditate few minutes.
This time I felt I wanted cookies, junk food. I was aware while eating I didn’t need it physically, so this was not the healthiest choice on a pure mechanical point of view of our body and spirit, but being obsessed with health is not healthy at all. Forgive me for the word play.
Maybe the reason I am in very good physical shape in spite of plenty of un-healthy behaviours is that like in the zen story “The burden”, I don’t live these with a sense of culprit.
This is what I meant with “there is nothing wrong with emotional eating”. I didn’t mean to disrespect people with serious disorders.
Anyway I am looking forward for the next parts so we can have more facts to exchange our opinions.
Amazing!!! Your Article is so honest,clear and interesting! Congrats! :D
I was an emotional eater too about a year ago, but I’ve been a vegetarian since three months now…
I’ve had much resistance from my parents for my transition, eating meat is “sacred” to them, it represents wealth and pleasure. Little do they know… I think they’ll be surprised when I transition to veganism soon, thank God they don’t read my blog (:
Can’t wait for part 2 :D
Thanks Celes for the post. Can’t wait for part 2. I don’t think I’m an emotional eater and sometimes even skip meals because I’m not hungry…
And my house has like, no snacks to eat. :D But I don’t really mind since I don’t eat often. Only for the 3 meals (I skip breakfast sometimes though)
Hey Amanda, that’s good that you’re not an emotional eater. Sounds like you’ve been inculcated with a normalized view on food, which is important at a young age. These views pretty much set the foundation for our worldview in the future, because usually we’re going to end up having our existing beliefs reinforced through affirming events.
This is by far the best emotional eating insight that I’ve had! At 54 years of age, I never thought about the way I was conditioned to eat as a child. I was taught to enjoy all food…healthy and unhealthy. My parents loved to cook..it was their hobby and my brother, sister and I were the recipients of some very lavash meals.
I turned to food for everything and by the time my parents noticed I “had a problem with food” I was sneaking and hiding food because I was embarrassed that I couldn’t control my desires for it. So, after living many years being taught that food equalled love, my parents now were taking it away from me. Until reading your post, I never considered the effect that had on me as a 10 year old little girl. Because my parents expressed their love thru food and now food was being taken away from me I guess that little girl probably felt unworthy and unloved! WOW, what an insight!
I can’t begin to tell you how much I appreciate you telling your story. It has already allowed me to see things from a totally different perspective!
Thank you, thank you, thank you!
“Because my parents expressed their love thru food and now food was being taken away from me I guess that little girl probably felt unworthy and unloved!”
That’s an amazing insight, Kim! I’m very happy for your revelation. :D Separately, funny how little actions we are exposed to since young can have such a big impact on our lives, huh? It would seem the hangups that parents have usually get passed on to their kids. It goes to show that as kids, we are very impressionable, and it’s important that we share the right beliefs and values to our kids so they are brought up the right way (with no attachments or hangups, ideally).
I have been an emotional eater for a long time, owing perhaps to my early relationship with food. The sweetness of chocolate can hint at love, as can a fully belly. I have on most occasions eaten chocolate until I feel sick, using that as a satiety indicator. Tis not satisfying though!
Emotional eating is something that has been mentioned in varioius self-help books but never really delved into… your series on this matter I’m sure will help a lot of people.
My latest phase of emotional eating coincided with finding out my mum has lung cancer in June this year. Since then I have gone up two jeans sizes and have felt out of control. It is only when I am feeling positive that I don’t have to eat, then eat more…
Love and light to you for tackling this and sharing your journey… Thank you :angel: :heart:
Thank you for sharing, Hanna. :angel: I’m sorry to hear about your emotional eating; at the same time I’m very sure you can easily lose those 2 jean sizes and overcome your emotional eating by taking the right steps. Acknowledgement of the issue is already one huge step forward, if you ask me. Most emotional eaters remain in emotional eating hell because they refuse to acknowledge what they are going through. I hope you will find the remainder of the series helpful. :hug:
Thanks Celes for your encouragement. ;)
I wish that we all arrive at a normal healthy relationship with food. :angel:
In congolese culture it’s exactly the same thing. Eating a lot is a luxury cause people back home usually don’t have that oppurtunity. From the time I was a little kid, my mom would fill up my plate and make me eat the whole thing and if I didn’t she didn’t say anything, but you could tell that it saddened her, so I would. I come from a family of 9 kids, so naturally she would cook a lot of food, but growing up she lived in a house of 4 generations with so many kids so for her cooking a lot is the way it’s supposed to be. I felt like we could could feed an army with all the food she cooked. :lol:
Another thing is that in my culture when you go see someone there’s always food cooking, no matter if its an aunt, uncle, cousin they’re always offering you food and if you reject it they get really offended, it’s like an endless tunnel. :(
Hope that I’ll learn how to deal with them through this series. :)
Hey Melissa, that’s unfortunate that they would get offended when people reject their food offers. The important thing is not to make yourself responsible for their emotions though, because in the end that’s out of your control. The best thing is to explain yourself and let them know that you appreciate their intentions; however they want to take the reply is their choice. I cover this as part of the guide to overcome emotional eating later in the series, so hopefully you’ll find it helpful.
it is very useful,,infact most of my diet is without a life and there is a great chance i’m having to change it… :rolleyes:
hi, i just found this site. I registered; I hope I can find it again. I need to read all your installments. I know I MUST take action. I hope that I can find a good guide and support here. I’m sure I’m older than the typical follower, I’m 67. I’ve been lucky so far. Yes, I’ve had some serious illness related to my weight, but I think more to my emotions. Angina eventually leading to having a cardiac stent. The narrowing wasn’t as serious as some, but serious enough to warrant the go ahead when they did the cardiac cath. Sleep apnea, deconditioning, poor endurance. When I was younger I used to gain five pounds premenstually all because of emotional eating, and I wouldn’t lose it. I don’t know when my emotional eating began. I was a skinny kid and a healthy weight teenager. So I guess it was during my first marriage….wow, well I never pin-pointed it before, this in itself is going to be helpful to my making some effective change. Looking forward to reading part 1
Hmm, let me think if I had this in my childhood. I guess my parent were fine with it and never made me it what I wanted. But the culture of Soviet Union, wich heavily infuence the 90s in Ukraine presupposed cooking lots of diverse dishes for holidays and stuffing yourself that day until you can take no more. This is a scheme that when there is a holiday – you should overeat for showing that you love and please yourself.
Secondly, my dear grandmother always asked me to eat this and that and couldn’t tolerate my refusal. Fortunately, we didn’t visit them often.
I remember getting my favourite foods (chips) as a revard for good greades at school and also being given candies on holidays. All so commonplace, but not good anyway.
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