5 Signs That You Might Be Emotional Eating (and What To Do About It)
Nobody likes to admit or come to terms that they might be an emotional eater, likely because of the shame we’ve attached to emotional eating experiences in the past. But emotional eating is nothing to be ashamed of.
Emotional Eating is simply a coping mechanism and the most socially acceptable, fastest acting way we’ve been taught to cope with uncomfortable emotions and situations from a young age. Knowing that, it’s fair to say that almost everyone has engaged with emotional eating to some degree in their lifetime.
Of course, it can be frustrating to endure emotional eating event after event. What I’m going to be sharing with you today are 5 signs that you might be emotional eating so you can label these common habits if you happen to engage in them, and then work on getting to the root of what’s driving them.
If you would rather watch a short video that summarizes everything I talk about in this post, you can watch the video on my IGTV.
5 Signs That You Might Be Emotional Eating (and What To Do About it)
You eat when you’re not hungry
Let me clarify, if you happen to eat when you’re not hungry, it’s okay. It’s still okay to have popcorn during a movie or dessert after dinner even if you aren’t hungry. That’s “normal eating”. What we want to get curious about is when this becomes an on-going habit. Knowing that emotional eating is a coping mechanism, if you are always turning to food when you’re not hungry, it’s likely that you’re looking for relief from an uncomfortable emotion or situation using food.
2. After finishing a meal, you always think “what’s next?”
I love food, so it’s not unlike me to be dreaming of what I’m going to make at dinner at 10am. I would consider this to be normal behaviour. But when you want to get curious about your habits is when you’re constantly finishing a meal (or maybe you’re not even done the meal in front of you yet) and you’re thinking, “what’s next?”. If that’s the case, it’s likely that you’re using food as a crutch; as an escape so you don’t have to feel the emotion you might be struggling to sit with.
That’s what food does when we eat for more emotional purposes – it provides us with a quick hit of feel-good dopamine and serotonin to give us a brief (but fleeting) vacation from the uncomfortable emotion we’re feeling.
But the key word here is “fleeting”. The relief you experience when you use food as a coping mechanism is temporary and until you get to the root of what’s driving that behaviour, you will likely see your emotional eating patterns persist.
3. You always feel super full after eating
Believe it or not, overeating is actually considered to be “normal eating behaviour”. I mean, really all it takes is reaching for an extra helping of mashed potatoes or even salad to push you a bit over edge. It happens. It doesn’t make you a bad person. It doesn’t mean you “messed up”. Of course, it’s uncomfortable and sitting in that discomfort can be tough mentally and physically (and for that, I recommend reading this post where I share some of my tips to feel better if you happen to overeat or binge) .
But if it’s normal for you to always feel super full after eating, it could be because when you were looking to satisfy physical hunger, you may have also been looking to satisfy emotional hunger, which would naturally put you over edge.
4. You immediately think of food after an emotional event
If your first inclination is to turn to food after an emotional event, whether it was a disagreement with a friend or loved one or even experiencing the sensation of boredom or procrastination, you might be engaging in emotional eating. It makes perfect sense if we remember what emotional eating is, which is a coping mechanism to mask the intensity of an uncomfortable emotion. It also makes sense if, from a young age, we were consoled and soothed through food (which many of us were).
If you aren’t taught how to sit with your emotions, then it’s likely that you will turn to a coping mechanism like food to flee from that feeling. If this is something you want to learn how to start doing to keep you from always turning to food, grab a copy of my FREE Emotional Eating Secret Sauce handbook over here that will tell you more about why exactly you might be emotionally eating.
5. You feel guilty after eating
Aside from those that actively or have struggled with an eating disorder, typically if you were to satisfy physical hunger, you wouldn’t really feel guilty. I mean, think of the last time you were suuuuuper hungry and then went on to satisfy that physical hunger. You probably didn’t think, “Oh no, I shouldn’t have had that”. You probably (well, hopefully) thought “Oh my goodness, I feel SO much better. I so needed that!”. But of course, if you are eating for emotional purposes, you may experience some guilt because it wasn’t exactly “necessary” and if you have a fear of gaining weight or struggle with your body, then you may be fearful that your emotional eating habits will only worsen what you’re feeling.
If you were nodding along while reading this and have come to discover that you are, in fact, an emotional eater, I want you to know that you aren’t alone. In fact, you’ve just joined a force of millions of people around the world who also struggle with emotional eating.
The first step is becoming aware of your habits, because up until now, you may not have been able to label or understand your behaviours. When something becomes your “norm”, it can be difficult to see that there is another possibility, which is a life where you aren’t turning to food to find the answers to your problems. But I say that with a lot of compassion because emotional eating, in some ways, can actually be a good thing if we think of it as a harm reduction tool and a way to understand a deeper rooted issue going on.
If you are interested in learning more about how to get your emotional eating under control and get to the root of what’s driving your emotional eating habits, I share more about this in my Emotional Eating Secret Sauce Handbook, which you can download here or by clicking the image below.
In the meantime, if you are looking for more support for emotional eating, you can read up these blogs posts on or listen to the episodes below where I talk more about it:
Episode 30 Joyous Health Podcast: Understanding Emotional Eating with Rachel Molenda
Supplements To Alleviate Stress and Provide Support For Emotional Eating
If you have any questions about anything I covered in this post, I’d love for you to leave them in the comments below!