EMOTIONAL EATING – HOW TO BREAK THE HABIT LOOP

Many of us have turned to food or an extra glass or two of wine to help us cope with the past 18 months. So it’s

not surprising that emotional eating – as opposed to eating from genuine

hunger – has been identified as one of the main reasons for recent weight gain, along with inactivity.

Emotional eating results in extra weight gain not just because you tend to eat more food – it also makes you more prone to reach for highcalorie or sugary snacks because these provide an instant ‘feel good’ hit. As anyone who’s ever snacked through stress or boredom will know, however, eating doesn’t make the uncomfortable feelings go away.

‘If anything, it makes things worse because you feel guilty afterwards, setting you up to reach for another biscuit or slice of cake to make you feel better,’ says Julia Westgarth, Head of Programme at WW. ‘But emotional eating is a learned behaviour and it can be unlearned.’

Luckily, the WW programme includes advice from specialists in behaviour change – and techniques that have been clinically proven to work. The next time hunger strikes

between meals, for whatever reason, the first step is to evaluate whether you really feel hungry. Drink a large glass of water and focus on something else entirely for five minutes.

Once you’re away from the situation, you can evaluate your response. The chances are you aren’t hungry at all. ‘Using techniques like this can help you to identify your own behaviour patterns and start to change them,’ says Julia. ‘This is why the mindset package is such a key part of the WW programme – it helps you to better understand your own behaviour, and work out how to change unhealthy patterns for good.’