If you’re one of those persons who have eaten a delicious cake or a whole box of chocolates in one sitting, and your immediate thought is: “I shouldn’t have eaten that!”, then this blog is for you.
The Dangers of Feeling Guilt After Eating
Most of our problems with food, either overeating, having very little food, or even stop eating, are related with our emotions and the way in which they can harm us. According to Leticia García, from the Mexican Psychoanalytical Society, feeling guilty indicates that we’re harming ourselves in some way, whether harming our body, health, or emotions.
When we overeat, we’re using food to deal with our emotions. The problem of “drowning” our feelings in food is that we may feel better for short time (immediate pleasure), but this cozy feeling is quickly replaced by guilt and shame. These feelings make us overeat – again- and fall into a vicious circle.
Furthermore, eating with guilt makes us feel anxious. When our body notices this anxiety, the hypothalamus (an almond-size gland located in the middle of our brain) sends a signal to produce adrenocorticotropin (ACTH). This substance stimulates the suprarenal gland to produce a hormone called cortisol, also known as the “stress hormone”. When we produce too much cortisol, our body begins accumulating fat, mostly around our belly.
Make Peace with Food
Food is neither bad nor good by itself; those are just labels we put on them. The problem arises when we feel guilty after eating food we consider as “bad”, and which we even didn’t enjoy! That’s why we shall reconsider our relationship with food and look for the nice side of it.
Below you’ll find some tips that can help you make peace with food:
- Don’t criticize yourself over and over. Silence that voice in your head which constantly disapproves of you. Begin by telling yourself that you care about yourself out of love.
- Enjoy food. Remember that the food you eat gives you the energy to go around every day, and it doesn’t have to be tasteless.
- It’s not about “being on a diet”, you shall follow a regime that helps you achieve a healthy weight, as well as a happy and fulfilling life. You can find many delicious recipes in our website.
- Stop eating when you feel full. Your body is wiser than you and send you a satiety signal when you’ve got enough food. Listen to it.
- Only eat when hungry. If out of nowhere you have an irresistible desire of eating a very specific something, it’s a craving. If you feel full, but cannot stop eating, it’s anxiety. “True” hunger gives you an “empty-stomach feeling”, it even hurts.
We should learn to be more flexible with ourselves and with our food. In such way we will enjoy our food more, without guilt, and it will even be easier to follow a more balanced diet that includes all kinds of food. What are you waiting for? #DecideItNow.