Health and Wellness from Kim Hynes

 If you suspect emotional eating is sabotaging your health, making your cholesterol or blood sugar rise or affects your mood, keep reading.  This one secret will help in all areas, even with some menopausal symptoms. 

Explore how incorporating this one thing into your day can be a game changer.  It not only helps reduce the emotional eating that sabotages your health, but it also reduces overall stress. 

I was doing “all the things”.  I was running, lifting weights, eating a whole food diet, but I still wasn’t feeling healthy, energized or myself.  I still wasn’t loving my body and just kept adding more to my regimen.  Instead of looking inward, I kept picking another external vice to cling onto in the hopes I would look and feel like the work I was putting in. 

I didn’t realize I had it all backward. 

Yes, I know it sounds cliche, but let’s explore why self-love really is the key to making life-long health changes.

It's that time of year again.

Get your summer body!

Get in shape for summer!

Lose 20 pounds before summer!

Do you go through this “summer body” challenge every year?  Or maybe you want to lose weight quickly for a wedding or party?  

Taking care of your body is a crucial aspect of leading a healthy and fulfilling life. However, it's so important to understand that managing your body goes beyond just food and working out.

Your physical overall health is intricately connected to your mental and emotional wellbeing. 

   I had a menopausal client who was not moving forward in her goals.  She felt defeated and I took it personally.  I thought I wasn’t a good coach or maybe I didn’t know enough about menopause and losing weight in midlife.  One day, it all broke open!

My divorced client made a comment about not wanting to lose weight because then men might ask her out. 

Silence. 

We both just sat with that for a minute.

What an incredible breakthrough!  

  Have you ever noticed that sometimes you lose weight when you are vacation?  We totally expect the opposite, but sometimes we come home and the scale is the same or lower.   Think about it.  You are away from daily stressors, you’re eating whatever feels good, you are walking in your vacation environment and trying new activities, you are sleeping more and you are having fun. 

Read more about how stress affects your weight loss and some tips to break through the stress.

Do toxic thoughts lead you straight to the pantry or fridge? If you find yourself escaping in the cookies, chocolate or chips, you are not alone.  It is an automatic response.  Your thoughts of being unheard, misunderstood, taken advantage of or mistreated can lead you to want an escape and food is the easiest way to drown out those thoughts.

Learn tips to check in with your feelings so you don't check out with food.

If you feel like you are climbing up a mountain in your health or weight loss journey, check out these surprising non-food and non-exercise things that may be hindering your progress.  

Emotional eating and negative self talk go hand in hand.  Do you find yourself saying things in your head like:  

"Don't be so stupid" 

 "You will just fail again so why try"  

 “You ate so much, you are disgusting”  

“How could anyone love me with this body?”  

“Why eat well when I can’t do it all the time?”  

When you struggle with emotional and binge eating, negative self-talk will only further the shame, guilt and self sabotage.  

The mind and body hear every word you say, but you can learn how to change those negative thoughts into positive thoughts.

Emotional eating and negative self talk go hand in hand.  Do you find yourself saying things in your head like:  

"Don't be so stupid" 

 "You will just fail again so why try"  

 “You ate so much, you are disgusting”  

“How could anyone love me with this body?”  

“Why eat well when I can’t do it all the time?”  

When you struggle with emotional and binge eating, negative self-talk will only further the shame, guilt and self sabotage.  

The mind and body hear every word you say, but you can learn how to change those negative thoughts into positive thoughts.

It’s 10pm and you are going back and forth between the chocolate and the chips.  The sweet to salty and back again cycle that you keep falling into is making you feel guilty, sad and full of shame.  How did this happen?  

Things started off so well today.  You had nourishing food, added in the vegetables, drank water and even exercised.  You felt like you were doing all the right things.  Then BAM!  You are just going for a little treat after dinner and end up binging.  

Why are you so vulnerable to emotional eating at night?

At some point in your younger life, you may have been sent a message that your body wasn’t good enough.  We also are sent messages through social media, TV and movies of what is considered beautiful. 

We judge ourselves and feel worthy or unworthy based on those external images, some of which are photoshopped and filtered.  

How can we reconnect with our bodies?

  I love fall soups!  I eat them all year round.   This easy soup is packed with nutrients and a variety of vegetables so you will help your gut health, feel satisfied, but also have leftovers for more lunches and dinners. 

 Want to to know a secret? I used to be a secret eater. Many of my clients report that the secret eating is for comfort and has very little to do with the food itself. They often use words when describing their feelings as angry, sad, stressed, overwhelmed, empty or deserve a reward 

Do you find yourself running to the pantry or fridge when you are feeling really uncomfortable or anxious?

Those feelings and anxiety can spike your cortisol, put you into fight or flight mode, and cause you to reach for food to quickly come back to a calmer, safer state.

Emotional eating does just that.  It changes your state from uncomfortable to soothed.  We know it’s a short term fix, though.  It becomes a cycle.  Discomfort - eating - soothed - shame and/or guilt - repeat

If you are a pumpkin fan, this easy soup will warm you from the inside out.  Fall weather is perfect for this warming and grounding meal.  You can use an Instant Pot, crockpot or cook it on the stove and it’s simple and fast!

Are you sitting in the waiting room feeling like your health is out of control?  In a time when you may feel you have little control over your mind or body, there is one thing you can control with depression and anxiety.  That is your daily food.  With therapy and medication, food can be a part of your overall treatment plan to help you feel better.

I love date night when I can relax with Mike and have someone else cook. I also really enjoy some nights when we go out as a family and I don’t have to feed 3-4 teens. Most of the time, we have a plan so we rarely go out spontaneously. That’s because we do take cooking at home seriously and we are both working on our nutrition and working out. But...those nights when we do go out, we still try to eat the same way we would at home. That can be a challenge.

Health and Fitness Expert, Shawn Stevenson, has a great analogy. Our health is like a three legged stool. The three legs are Nutrition, Exercise and Sleep. If we take any one of those legs away, the stool falls.

Stressed out? Me too! Let’s talk about stress and specifically how we react to it with food. Whether it’s the hurricane coming to our area, a job situation, busy family or any chronic stress, our bodies are under attack.  Sadly, many people report a high level of stress on a daily basis over very long periods of time. 

Did everyone else grow up on cereal? I did!  I even ate it for dinner many times in college. I didn’t love granola until I was older. I liked the typical sugar filled cereals like Froot Loops and Frosted Flakes.  Of course, Cap’n Crunch beat them all out because I am a peanut butter freak.

I admit it! I attempted so many fat loss diets and even used some very unhealthy ways to lose weight fast.  I was on the only potato diet, the grapefruit and hard boiled egg diet, the low fat diet, the juicing diet and even the don’t eat anything diet.  That one backfired into me eating more.

It’s 10pm and you are going back and forth between the chocolate and the chips.  The sweet to salty and back again cycle that you keep falling into is making you feel guilty, sad and full of shame.  How did this happen?  

Things started off so well today.  You had nourishing food, added in the vegetables, drank water and even exercised.  You felt like you were doing all the right things.  Then BAM!  You are just going for a little treat after dinner and end up binging.  

Why are you so vulnerable to emotional eating at night?