Put the Kabosh on Emotional Eating?

Happened across an article by Marna Goldstein Thall titled Put the Kabosh on Emotional Eating with 3 P's at http://www.financenewsblog.com/put-the-kabosh-on-emotional-eating-with-the-3-p%E2%80%99s-strategy/

After the first paragraph I was excited to the prospects of some real direction and quickly sank to zero for the three p's are basically advice on how to handle habitual eating--not emotional eating. It's more recycled advice from the 80's when everyone treated overeating with fad diets, behavioral modification...

It seems that I have yet to find one expert or author that knows the difference between eating from habit and emotional eating. Can we put the kabosh on recycled advice?

Want some real direction for dealing with emotional eating? Click here.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

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Change Your Eating Habit--Life Awaits You

Happened across a great article. Click here to read it. The material sounds very familiar.

Want some real direction for dealing with emotional eating? Click here.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Online store for motivational thoughts:  Self Help, Self
Hypnosis, Stress Management Training, Subliminal tapes for self improvement

, Panic Attacks and Agoraphobia using Wakened Hypnosis. New technique resulted in documented 80% success rate

Lose Weight (Life Awaits You) Emotional Eating

Sure you have forever to get your act together and get serious about losing weight, correct? But you put it off day after day and week after week and month after month and year after year and before you know it you'll be in your 80's wondering what happened to your life.

But what actually works. I mean you've tried different diets and put your heart and soul into them and maybe you lost some weight but gained it all back plus some. It's sad that 95% of all those who lose weight gain it all back plus some.

The reason is that there are no real approaches to handle or focus on emotional eating which is the primary reason why weight is gained back.

After you've lost the weight and gained it back a few times it's easy to get thoroughly disgusted. Who really knows what they are talking about? Watch TV for a few hours and you'll see two-to-three ads for shakes, pills, and supplements to kill appetite.

But what really works? Even after you agree that you are an emotional eater where do you go for help. You read a few books on the subject and get more confused or find that there's really no direction.

I mean, where do these emotions that contribute to you eating come from? What do you do with them when you have them? How do they impact your life? Can you allow you to feel any emotion? Can you refocus to see what that excess food really means?

These are just a few questions and if whatever book or article you've read doesn't empower you to answer those questions but creates more stress, then it's most likely recycled advice.

What is recycled advice? Answer: the same old advice that's been given for the past four decades--it hasn't work for the masses then and it won't work any better now.

Want some real direction for dealing with emotional eating? Click here.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Online store for motivational thoughts:  Self Help, Self
Hypnosis, Stress Management Training, Subliminal tapes for self improvement

, Panic Attacks and Agoraphobia using Wakened Hypnosis. New technique resulted in documented 80% success rate

Is Emotional Eating a Mental Illness?

In my last post I referenced an article which claimed that emotional eating is a mental illness.
I'm an emotional eater and find it hard to believe that I have a mental illness. Perhaps if I were fifty pounds or more overweight. So I think there need to be a qualifier there as opposed to stating that emotional eaters are mentally ill.

And then there are many emotional eaters that never eat when they are frustrated, upset, depressed or angry--they eat to reward themselves and when they are happy. Of the books I've read, I have yet to find any of the emotional eaters experts handle happiness or explain it. I'm sure someone does, but most leave you to believe that there is a serious issue or emotional problem in the emotional eater's life that they use food to avoid.

By the way, if one can choose to make an issue serious, one can also choose to make the issue unserious. Make sense?

And how about self love? How does that fit in the scope eliminating emotional eating?

Take the emotional eater quiz? Click here.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Born American Video and Emotional Eating a Mental Illness?

A friend sent me this link--it has nothing to do with emotional eating, but I'm sure you'd like to see the video as it's well worth the view. Turn up your volume--especially if you like country and western. Click here for it. If you're not into country and western, this is an exception as you will still love it.

"Emotional eating is considered both an eating disorder and a mental illness" says R. Elizabeth C. Kitchen in her article Consequences of Emotional Eating.

The idea of it being a mental illness is new to me. She writes about it's impact on relationships with others and with self. It contributes to self hate and I've been writing about self love in a couple of the last posts. What are your thoughts--do you feel you suffer from a mental illness? Can you wrap your thinking around the concept of self love? On a scale of 1 to 10 how easy it is to apply self love--ten being hard and one being easy peasy? No I'm not selling Gyco Insurance.

Some who are only ten pounds overweight are emotional eaters and those who are 50 or more pounds overweight are also emotional eaters. Do you think the classification of mental illness might be connected to how much overweight a person is?

Take the emotional eater quiz? Click here.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Eat All You Want and Lose Weight?

Ok, I'm an emotional eating specialist--actually I consider myself an expert (toot my own horn) and I discovered this diet (similar to Atkins) that enables you to eat all you want and actually lose weight. This has nothing to do with emotional eating except to stay on the diet, it helps to manage your emotions.

Actually I'm not a diet type of guy and spend most of my time making fun of the various diets. Nevertheless every book you read about losing weight has a diet in it and I discovered this diet quite by accident. Fifteen years ago I encountered a skin parasite that nearly killed me. Of the half dozen doctors and specialists I consulted, none knew of a treatment. Eventually I discovered what foods the parasites like and what foods put them in remission and actually ate all I wanted on the diet and lost a lot of weight.

But what kind of foods are you stuck with? How about foods like shrimp scampi (using real butter) with rice or pasta, marinara with linguine, ice cream...? Unheard of but very real to have a diet that allows such tasty foods and at the same time lose weight.

In fact of the hundreds of people who have used the diet, the biggest reason that they come off the diet is that they lose too much weight. I stayed on it for nearly ten years during which time my body chemistry was perfect with respect to cholesterol and all other parameters.

Take the emotional eater quiz? Click here.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Emotional Eating "Do You Love You?"

Two posts ago I wrote about self love. No I'm not talking about the conceit type of love. Actually those who are conceited really don't love themselves either and have a terrible self worth issue.

But we're talking about loving the child within. A science that came to the forefront in the 70's (I believe) was transactional analysis. Yes, psychologists discovered something! They realized that within each of us there is a child and a parent and the possibility of an adult.

The child is frivolous, rebellious, non-caring, in search for adventure... Not all things about the child are bad in fact it's often a good idea to get in touch with the child within us. After all the child was not born rebellious. The child became rebellious and non-caring in response to the parent we developed which is controlling and into rights and wrongs.

It's not uncommon to have a grown adult in total conflict between his parent and child. When it comes to food, as the rebellious child wins the person becomes overweight. When the parent wins the battle, anorexia is the result.

Do you recognize the fight within you? I believe Geneen Roth's book Breaking Free From Emotional Eating is to let the child win to the point of exhaustion. And even though I think it could be done far better and differently, the ultimate goal is to negotiate a truce between the parent and child to bring the adult into being.

Can you recognize your internal battle? Am what I'm writing making sense?

Take the emotional eater quiz? Click here.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Country Fair Pig Out

Just got back from the Monmouth County fair where we watched pigs race, dogs race, a sheep dog herd sheep, and pigged out as we enjoyed a gyro, shared a sausage sandwich followed by a funnel cake and a small bag of kettle corn. Uhmm good! Certainly weren't hungry when we left and far from feeling stuffed--simply fulfilled.

It was worth skipping breakfast and lunch. Actually I've been about eight pounds over my goal weight and have dropped three of them in the last week as I enjoyed a root beer float every day--its the season you know.

Managing emotional eating in no way means that you have to stop eating the things you enjoy. You can truly eat what you really want and be amazed to find that what you really want to eat is far less in quantity and often far more nutritious than you dreamed possible.

Take the emotional eater quiz? Click here.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Flower Buds Curb Emotional Eating?

Happened across this article that claims flower buds curb emotional eating. Click here to read it. Denise Lamothe, Psy.D, H.H.D., author of The Taming of the Chew is reported as finding it beneficial with her patients. I actually don't know whether to make fun of it--like grab your Bach cherry plum to soothe your feelings--or laud it. Like I never know whether to make fun of the "meals on wheels" approach, or the shakes, or the pills, or the acai berry, or the whatever that claim to curb appetite. Do you know how many fads, shakes, pills, magic bullets I've seen since the 80's when I wrote the first edition of my book?

Of course a year of so after these magic bullets are widely used, many are pulled off the market by the FDA because of unexplained deaths or birth defects. The bottom line is after the pill, shake, or whatever the magic bullet one still has to deal with emotions. If the magic bullet makes it easier, then great but if you read The Taming of the Chew you'll wonder how flower buds or any magic bullet will solve the basic life rattling issues behind emotional eating. Sure it might be a tranquilizer that makes it easier to deal with the issues, but ultimately these issues and emotions that result from them must be embraced. Band aide, perhaps; cure, definitely not.
What do you think?

Take the emotional eater quiz? Click here.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Love the Fat Away

Consider this: The excess fat in your body is the three or four year old you crying for help. Does that make sense? The more important question is: How would you treat the three or four year old you?

Would you yell and scream at your three or four year old? Would you hate your three or four year old? Or would you nurture your three or four year old?

Your thoughts? What's this got to do with losing weight or dealing with emotional eating?

Taming of the Chew Book Review

It's been about three weeks since I read The Taming of the Chew (A Holistic Guide to Stopping Compulsive Eating) by Denise Lamothe, Psy.D H.H. D. Being a doctor of holistic health, she uses a holistic model to deal with the physical, emotional and spiritual.

There are probably dozens and dozens--maybe hundreds--of overweight people who have found her book very useful. While she strongly suggests that we "love our little girl" and she has a chapter on Healing the Emotional Self, she doesn't tell you what to do with basic emotions which I would think would be a strong part of healing the emotional self.

Without dealing with emotions it's rather impracticable to stop compulsive eating. But then again self love goes as long way as it's certainly an important part of my book.

Take the emotional eater quiz? Click here.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Breaking Free From Emotional Eating "Eating Crow?"

Ok, I was going to take a look at Taming of the Chew in this post, but in my last post I said some critical things of Renee Roth's book Breaking Free from Emotional Eating. I still agree with what I said, but then I ran across some book reviews of the previous edition of the book when it was called Breaking Free from Compulsive Eating at
http://behappydieting.com/diseases-conditions-and-treatments/compulsive-eating-diseases-conditions-and-treatments/breaking-free-from-compulsive-eating.html Sorry I can't link this--the url is too long. There are five posts which fit in very well as an add for the book from individuals who laud the book.

It's a good thing that I said in my previous post that the approach could work for some which these posts bear out. The problems I still have with the book are the change in title to go from Compulsive Eating to Emotional Eating and never really handle the subject of emotions and the "eat whenever you're hungry" thing. Obviously she got the point across that when eating is no longer a taboo, you then only eat when it's appropriate.

Take the emotional eater quiz? Click here.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Breaking Free From Emotional Eating Book Review

It's been about two weeks or so since I read Breaking Free From Emotional Eating by Geneen Roth. If you google "emotional eating" this book shows up on the first page of results. You would think that it would be a great source for dealing with emotional eating.

But all it is is a ridiculous approach void of any information on how to deal with emotions. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that her approach won't work--obviously it has for her and some of those who have worked with her.

What is her approach? Well, eat all you want any time you feel hungry. I find that interesting because sometimes I feel hungry and instead of going for instant gratification, I might let ten minutes pass by and holy cow, I forget about food and have no desire for food, but if I had eaten when I felt hungry then it might have triggered more desire for more and more food.

The irony is that I use a similar approach with the power of suggestion which is that, "I eat whatever and whenever I desire and am amazed how easy I fill up on flavor and taste and feel fulfilled within."

She misses the qualifier "amazed that I fill up on flavor and taste."

The bottom line though is that she simply jumped on the bandwagon of using the phrase "emotional eating," in her title. The book was previously published as Breaking Free from Compulsive Eating.

I find that there is no real direction in her book about how to deal with emotions--how to deal with the denial of emotions, how to embrace them, how to experience them, how to rereference yourself.

As a source for dealing with emotional eating I would not recommend it. As a book to read for shedding weight, I would not recommend it either.

Tomorrow I'll look at The Taming of the Chew

Take the emotional eater quiz? Click here.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Candy and Ice Cream are Screaming to You at the Boardwalk

Now I'm an emotional eater (no doubt about it). It's that Board Walk time of the year. What would I do if I were at the boardwalk and candy or ice cream were screaming my name?
Would I take a deep breadth? maybe but not for any particular reason.
Would I put on my tennis shoes and run on the boardwalk instead? Are you kidding?
Would I go to a bench on the boardwalk and mediate? Let's get real.
Would I call a friend and discuss options? Isn't amazing what you can do with cell phones? Answer: my friend would most likely be with me with her name being called by candy too.
Would I talk myself out of it? I doubt it unless I visited the boardwalk often.

It's amazing how many articles and books that I read giving the above options to eating--basically ridiculous advice. Sure it may work once or twice, but in the long run...

No, I'd eat it--I'd buy no more than a quarter pound though and I'd feel good about myself because most likely I would have planned on being at the boardwalk and skipped breakfast and lunch for the day if the additional candy or ice cream were unaffordable--I could write a chapter about this topic.

Now if going to the boardwalk were a spontaneous thing and I had not skipped breakfast or lunch, I'd still eat the candy or ice cream and skip a meal the next day--again if the candy or ice cream were unaffordable.

But isn't that recycled advice, Richard? And what does it have to do with dealing with emotional eating?

Answer: It's about my relationship with the candy and my ability to fill up on flavor and taste. The quarter pound would be for both my friend and me, but I must admit the ice cream even though small would be for me alone. And I'd know that it looks like candy or ice cream, tastes like candy or ice cream, but actually has nothing to do with candy, ice cream or eating. No guilt involved. I am choosing the candy or ice cream as opposed to the candy or ice cream choosing me. That's a big difference.

Emotionally I am choosing to dilute the feeling of happiness and when I can choose to dilute the emotion I can also choose to stop diluting it, but although it seems to have everything to do with food, it has nothing to do with food.

Not sure you're an emotional eater? Click here and take the quiz.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Emotional Eating "Be Fantastic"

Emotional eating is a challenge for everyone to understand and the experts--those trying to be experts keep recycling old advice that has been used for decades. OK, people have been in the fat business for a hundred years since the battle of the bulge was invented. Usually they are thin people who have never had a weight problem or they are x fatties who discovered their own particular solution to get rid of weight or they are nutritionists. None of these experts dealt with emotions--they either were exercise freaks or they were into behavior modification, dieting... A few years ago the idea of emotional eating surfaced and as it gained popularity, every weight management sufi has been applying his/her technique to emotional eating, but all it is is recycled advice. Just like the book I just reviewed Shrink Yourself by Roger Gould MD is full of advice. It reminds me of Ann Lander's advice.

The article Emotional Eating--Be Fantastic by Nutrition Coach Liz Copeland provides a new approach to dealing with thin weight loss trainers--slap them with a "wet fish."

Regarding dealing with emotional eating, she suggests specific steps and I must admit she gets further with them than most before she skips to recycled advice.

She suggests,

"1. Get in touch with what emotion you are actually feeling." This I agree with.

"2. Just rest in the ‘now’ acknowledging the emotion you feel." Ok, I agree,

"3. Tell yourself it is OK to have these negative emotions – even though they may not serve you well they are an accurate description of how you are feeling now. " She's on a roll, I agree. She's gotten further than most others who try to be emotional eating experts. And just suppose the emotion is happiness, then what?.

"4. Let the emotion go." Alright, maybe you can, maybe you can't. What do you do if you can't? I'd suggest a different approach.

"5. Take a deep breath and give yourself a hug. A hug may be physical or emotional, you will know what to do." Now we're getting into a stress management technique which is good to do in general, but has little to do with any specific emotion.

"6. Say “I am fantastic” and believe it. Associate this with something you can do that is fantastic... – I AM FANTASTIC!" Nothing wrong with this but it is basically more recycled advice non specific to emotional eating. Not that recycled advice doesn't work for some as I'm sure standing on your head will work for some too.

For an emotional eating quiz? Click here.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Emotional Eating "Shrink Yourself Book Review"

For safe eating practices, use condiments. I heard that today from my son's girlfriend, got a chuckle from it and thought I'd share it.

In the last several posts I've been reviewing three different books about solving emotional eating. The most recent book was Shrink Yourself by Roger Gould MD which I reviewed chapter by chapter. Now for the overall review. Doctors are experts at anatomy and he certainly understands the anatomy of obese individuals. But where does he go from there? Not far.

It's basically half of a book. Opps, doesn't look he'll ever endorse my book.

What's missing? There's no utilization of the art of suggestion--not even a list of affirmations. Ok, I use hypnosis which is the power of suggestion. I guess I take it for granted and don't realize its power until I read a book that is void of the art of suggestion. He doesn't discuss "self talk" in terms of the the suggestions you use to get rid of weight.

Since the book is about emotional eating, I would hope that there would be a section on how to embrace emotion--how to feel emotion--what to do with specific emotions like anger, confusion, frustration, happiness... But no, in the section about emotions he gives recycled advice as to how to deal with them like go jogging, mediatate (stress management stuff). Now there's nothing wrong with stress management stuff, but sitting down to mediate (unless you're a sufi) isn't the way to deal with anger.

Basically, the author recognizes that emotinal eating is a response to stress but his advice is limited to the standard everyday stress management techniques which are not going to help a binge. Can you imagine being at the boardwalk and feeling a bit gloomy as you walk by the candy apples or the chocolate store and then thinking to yourself, "Oh I feel a bit gloomy, I think I'll sit down and meditate, or put on my jogging shoes and go for a run rather than eat?" Yes, I think I remember taking a few deep breadths as one of the tips, but what are you going to say to yourself as you take a deep breadth to make a difference? And so if you do eat that candy apple, how do you handle it to make a difference in your life as opposed to loading on the guilts later on?

Overall I find the book a half a book and missing a lot of very important information--worth it's ten bucks on Amazon if you're interested in the anatomy of obesity.

Not sure you're an emotional eater? Click here and take the quiz.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Emotional Eating "Shrink Yourself Book Review"

I'm coming to the end of Shrink Yourself by Roger Gould M.D.
Usually doctors have their heads up their you know what, but I must admit this guy is on target as to why those who are overweight eat. Chapter 15 is about Creating Real Safety specifically about how some over eaters use food to avoid reality. He then gives the rational side of the power of reality.

Chapter 16 is about my favorite subject--Dealing With Anger. But it's a far cry from what I expected. He deals mainly with resentments from childhood--not a bad subject but I would have titled the chapter "The Price of Childhood Resentments."

Chapter 17 Fill Yourself Up is about dealing with the emptiness within you.

Throughout much of the book he uses how negative self thinking will lead one to disastrous negative conclusions about an event and then goes through the same event with looking at the event differently. It reminds me of a commercial on the radio several years ago where a fellow suffering from a physical ailment went to his local hospital and ended up with a life long condition and then the same scenario is replayed with him going to a special hospital where he ends up cured and happy.

Overall, I'm impressed with Roger Gould's understanding of the weight issue, yet very disappointed in the fact that he never dealt with ordinary everyday emotions (even anger).

Likewise his rational thinking mechanism could have been greatly simplified. I'm also disappointed that he didn't specifically deal with building self esteem, but for less than $10 on Amazon it's worth a read.

Not sure you're an emotional eater? Click here and take the quiz.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Emotional Eating "Shrink Yourself"

I'm coming to the near end of my review of Shrink Yourself by Roger Gould, MD. Chapters 14 and 15 are about dealing with self doubts and self defeatism. Like the two previous chapters I find them overwhelming. He's dealing with self put-downs and self doubts and provides examples of self communication to set things straight. I would hope that in his last chapters he goes into building self worth.

I'd suggest reading these two chapters for no other reason other than to see a comprehensive list of self put-downs and self doubts. Perhaps there's one that's been dictating your life that you're unaware of.


More to come

Not sure you're an emotional eater? Click here and take the quiz.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Emotional Eating "Shrink Yourself"

I'm reviewing the book Shrink Yourself by Roger Gould, MD and am in Part II Chapter 11 and 12. Both chapters are well worth reading however, I find them overwhelming and would imagine that one suffering from obesity would also. It's so much to do and remember that it can be stressful in itself. But then again, one tip may well be all you need as he provides many tips for overcoming the feeling phobia as well as getting out of your food trance. Although there's a lot of information, I feel it could be greatly simplified. I also notice that although he deals with the "feeling phobia" he doesn't really go into how to feel emotions. He doesn't tell the reader what to do with some powerful emotions such as anger, depression, confusion, uncertainty... other than to do one of many stress management activities. In a sense it's like telling your mother that you are angry with her and her response is to go jogging or maybe shopping. Maybe he handles how to feel emotions later in the book.

More to come

Not sure you're an emotional eater? Click here and take the quiz.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Emotional Eating "Shrink Yourself"

Continuing with Roger Gould's book, Shrink Yourself I'm at the beginning of Part II which is Chapters 9 and 10.

I got the distinct impression from reading chapter 9 that he was himming and hawing and it continued into chapter 10. It's like, "OK we're going to get you in control of your emotional eating, but I don't
1. either know where to start or
2. What to really tell you."

Chapter 10 did get rolling with a bunch of don'ts and things to avoid and ended with the only thing that really applies to emotional eating and that was to "observe."

More to come

Not sure you're an emotional eater? Click here and take the quiz.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Emotional Eating "Shrink Yourself"

Continuing our review of Shrink Yourself by Roger Gould, MD finishes part I of the book with chapters 6, 7, and 8.

Chapter 6 is mainly about how overweight people shy away from being thin because of all the mechanisms they've learned to use their weight to avoid being put in situations that would require them to "shine" (my word), to avoid sexual issues... It's about how people hide behind fat.

Chapter 7 is the various rebellion issues that overweight people use to get even with their parents and those who criticized them as youngsters.

Chapter 8 is about using food to fill emptiness in one's life.

Overall these chapters provide interesting and informative information well worth reading for as they say, "if the shoe fits, wear it."

I'm looking forward to reviewing Part II.

Not sure you're an emotional eater? Click here and take the quiz.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Emotional Eating "Shrink Yourself"

Book On to my next book to review--Shrink Yourself by Roger Gould MD. The introduction and first two chapters were more about emotional eating than the entire book by Geneen Roth was.
In the introduction Dr. Gould identifies the emotional eating problem as powerlessness. I must say that label pretty well fits all psychological problems. I mean those suffering from anxiety, panic attacks, lack of confidence, low self esteem... are all lacking power in their lives.

Nevertheless in Chapters 1 and 2 he provides an over abundance of case histories of those suffering from extreme stressful situations such as divorce relying on food and relates it to an alcoholic.

Chapter 3 is the Cost of Powerlessness in which he states that it's easier to be upset with yourself for pigging out than it is to deal with the emotional upset of something like anger or rejection. He goes on to say that overeaters have a feeling phobia--they're afraid of feeling emotions all of which I agree. There's also the challenge of maturing--throwing out the old childhood limiting programs and rewriting you own guidelines of life. The inability to deal with this conflict throws a lot of people into binging.

Chapter 4 is about how we let our low self esteem take a hit from other's criticisms, rejection... and that it's the low self esteem which contributes to binges and I agree with what he's saying.
Even self doubts (without anyone else's input) triggers binges. It's the critic within you--the self puts downs--that drive you to binging. He promises that in part II he'll give you a way of dealing with your critic.

Chapter 5 is somewhat about being hungry for what you lack or not knowing what you lack or not living up to your potential (dreams). Then there's the everyday pressures and stressors that contribute to overeating.

So far I'd say it's a one legged approach in that up to this point the book has been about eating in response to undesireable stress and fear--nothing about eating in response to happiness, celebration, achieving goals... Maybe that will come later in the book.

Not sure you're an emotional eater? Click here and take the quiz.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Emotional Eating "Breaking Free From. Emotional Eating Pt IV."

The last three chapters of Geneen Roth's book Breaking Free from Emotional Eating starts with chapter 13 and how fat people loath themselves and then it moves into about 15 different things to do to begin liking (loving) yourself. Forgive yourself and forgive others. Page 171 is the first serious attempt to discuss emotions and the emotion of choice is anger. She ties it in with forgiving those with whom you're angry and ends the chapter with what it would mean to be a powerful woman.

Chapter 14 is about pain, "Life is Hard, then You Die." She offers tips on dealing with pain.

Chapter 15 is about "Men Use Sex the Way Women Use Food." It's about women's fear of being thin and having to deal with the issues of being feminine.

Chapter 16 is titled "Compulsions." Maybe I read it too fast but I didn't get that it had much to do with compulsions.
'Whoops I goofed, there's a chapter 17 which is one page about affirming that there's an end to self flagellation and put-downs.

Maybe I read the book too fast and missed its genius as I found it to miss the mark. It's as though she picked topics at random and tried to weave it into her "breaking free" program. What do you think?

Not sure you're an emotional eater? Click here and take the quiz.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.

Emotional Eating "Breaking Free From. Emotional Eating Part III"

I think I understand why the subject of emotions and food is so poorly covered in Geneen Roth's Book which my last two posts were about. It's because the book was initially titled "Breaking Free From Compulsive Eating" and when it looked like emotional eating was becoming a buz phrase, she changed the title which means its what I call a recycled technique--true it stands alone but basically is a technique to ultimately create awareness as is generally used for habitual eating.

Chapter 6 is about learning our eating behaviors from our parents--how we were programed to eat from childhood. Chapter 7 is a about the program we received about eating in restaurants.

Chapter 8 is about exercise which is a standard discussion in most books. She warns about becoming an exercise freak and lists several things to watch for indicating you're an exercise freak. She has a section titled Scales are for Fish which I found amusing and am in agreement.

Chapter 9 is about what you want in terms of being thin.

Chapter 10 is looking at the image of the thin you and the fat you--a shift in self image.

Chapter 11 is about judgement and starts out with an interesting twist. For instance, in response to being told by one woman's lover that she's too heavy, she ate more and gained ten pounds rather than notice that her lover has a problem getting close.
Judging your eating behavior is the wrong thing to do as opposed to noticing your eating behavior free of judgement (much like I did in my posts a couple weeks ago when I was observing). The balance of the chapter is about tips on stopping judgement of yourself or handling them from others.

Chapter 12 is about trusting--trusting yourself that once you give yourself permission to eat everything in sight that you won't.

There's only three more chapters and I still haven't seen any real guidance re recognizing or handling emotions and what that would be all about.

Not sure you're an emotional eater? Click here and take the quiz.

Want to a cure for emotional binge eating and discover how to identify emotions, embrace them and feel them? You can purchase the, The Scale Conspiracy, (in e-book form) emotional eating now for only $14.95. It's a $39.00 value.