There are a number of factors that influence our health. For example: obesity is as much a result of how and when we eat as it is of what we eat. Overeating, eating late at night or eating too many different foods at a meal may weaken digestive functions and make it much easier to gain weight.
Some people eat to live, others live to eat, while some eat when they are happy or sad or lonely. It’s not unusual for us to eat for emotional reasons.
So how do you know if you are an emotional eater?
The answers to these questions will give you a good idea if you are an emotional eater. Once you know, you can make a conscious decision to change the way you view food, choose it and eat it.
How to score this Quiz: For every answer that is frequently give yourself 2 points. For every answer that is occasionally give yourself 1 point and for every answer that is never give yourself 0 points. Frequently could be every day or several times a day. Occasionally is likely 1 or 2 times a week.
- I munch when I get bored
- I like to eat with my friends even if I am not hungry
- I eat so the cook will not be offended
- I eat when I get depressed
- I eat when I am lonely
- I eat when I get anxious about something
- There are times when my eating is out of control
- I like to nurture other people with food
- I will eat my way through a difficult time (divorce, job loss, illness, broken dream)
- I eat when I feel my energy go down
- I crave some foods
- I just like to have something in my mouth
- I eat even if I am not hungry
- I like to celebrate with food
- I think about food a good deal of the time
- I have a tendency to binge
- I eat to be polite
- I am embarrassed sometimes by how much I eat
- I eat to relax myself and relieve stress
- I get upset if I overeat
- I eat because I get angry
- I am displeased with my weight, but I overeat anyway
- I eat everything that is placed in front of me and always clean my plate, so as not to waste food
- I need high levels of sugar in my system
- Eating is my main enjoyment in life
Add up all your points. This is your emotional eating score.
If you scored more than 35 points, it’s likely that you have serious trouble with emotional eating and regardless of what else is working, you would benefit from getting your emotions under control.
If you scored between 15 and 35, you struggle with emotional eating at times and have room for improvement.
If you scored less than 15, you rarely eat for emotional reasons but beware of those emotional situations that can derail your good intentions.
How did you do? Are you an emotional eater? Are you happy with your score?
If we want to maintain a more healthy diet and a more balance life we need to deal with our emotional states in ways other than with food’s moods.
Using hunger as a guide, create a basic diet. If overweight meals may need to contain less food and calories. If underweight more calories may be needed. We can learn to deal with stress and sadness and all of the other emotions creatively and not let them take hold of us and run our lives.
Good health is a choice……protect your most precious possession.