Friends! Friends. Wow. When I think about all the BS we women have to deal with to be functioning members of society, it sometimes makes me mad⌠like itchy, rashy mad.
But having experts to break down some of the challenges we inevitably face as we go from adulthood to motherhood and beyond always makes it a little easier.
And thatâs why Iâm so, so thrilled to feature some words of wisdom from yesterdayâs amazing guest who talked about how to conquer emotional eating for goodâcoach and nutritionist, Andrea Montoya.
Audio more your thing? The podcast episode is below!
While I count myself lucky to have never had an eating disorder or other textbook definition of any psychological eating issue, I do count myself among the majority of women who experience major downs when it comes to accepting my body. Itâs not pretty to say, but I have to be honest.
After going through the amazing experience of pregnancy, childbirth and postpartum, I have seen my body change wildly from year to year. I gained 40, 40 and 50 pounds, respectively, with each of my pregnancies. And things just donât end up in the same place they started after three kids. I know other moms know what I mean.
It can be easy to fall into the trap of measuring our self worth by a scaleâand I talk candidly about how I started to experience that issue after having our third babyâbut we have to fight back against that negative pull that tells us weâre not enough.
Emotional eating is so difficult to get over because, as weâve been discussing all week, our physical health and habits are so inextricably tied to our emotional and mental state. And thatâs where Andrea comes in.
Iâve broken down three amazing takeaways from our discussion yesterday, but please, listen to the whole podcast! I promise youâll walk away feeling more inspired to be kind to yourself, and maybe even learn how to ditch emotional eating for good.
Andrea said that the most important step she focuses on with her clients is getting to a place of self-loveâsomething that is easier said than done, but she says is the true foundation to eliminating emotional eating.
âI get to the root cause of why weâre eating in the first placeâmost of the time itâs feelings weâre told to not feel. ⌠Weâve been taught not to feel for so long that we numb all of those emotions.â
While she approaches each client in a different way, depending on her circumstances, she says the first step is always presenceâactually feeling where they are in the moment without outside distraction.
âWe cannot heal something we are not aware of. ⌠What is actually going on? What triggered the episode of binge eating? Where is that stemming from?â
I also asked if emotional eating typically stems from one instance of trauma, or a lifetime of societal conditioning where women, in particular, are told we âhave toâ look a certain way.
While Andrea says this is also unique to the client, she did say one thing she notices is present in almost every one of her clientsâa desire to fulfill a need instilled in us in childhood to seek some sort of love or acceptance:
âThere is one thing I see across everyone ⌠perfectionism. All or nothing mindset. Maybe when we were little, most of us ⌠I love to ask my clients, âWhose love did you seek the most when you were little?â Most of us ⌠it was a love that was a little hard to get. ⌠The way we got love was through achievements, and we thought maybe we have to look a certain way. The ways we got love when we got little are the ways we are still looking for love as adults.â
âItâs more about ⌠healing stuff from when we were little. I actually do not talk about food [that much in my programs]. Food is just what we use to numb. Itâs just ⌠like a drugâthe most socially-acceptable and readily-available drug on the market.â
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“The ways we got love when we got little are the ways we are still looking for love as adults.”
Okay, I was so surprised to hear Andreaâs response to an Instagram question we got, which went something like this: âWhat are feasible alternatives to food when we need that quick dopamine hit?â
And instead of the answer I expected, which was to swap out another activity for eating, she said instead she tells her clients to sit with the pain. Sit in the feelings. Sit in the root cause of what it is thatâs driving the emotion behind eating, and start there.
âWhatâs the intention behind the needing to eat? If we just swap it out, yeah maybe youâll have a little less calories, but you wonât have dealt with whatâs going on. ⌠I could say to go for a walk, but still youâre gonna be walking and not processing whatâs going on.
So the ideal is to not willpower and change the thing, but feel to heal whatâs actually going on. Itâs not the sexy thing people want to hear; people want quick fixes. But ify ouâre able to sit with the pain for longer ⌠and just take a deep breath and feel into, What am I actually needing right now? ⌠If youâve eaten and youâre not hungry ⌠it might be comfort, it might be love, it might be validation. ⌠Itâs taking a look at what Iâm needing, and how can I give that to myself?â
One final takeaway from this amazing chat with Andrea was talking about how the process of conquering emotional eating actually worksâas in, how long it takes, and what type of commitment those going through her program should expect to give. And the short answer isânothing good comes quickly.
While that may be disheartening to someone who wants to âfixâ her issues quickly, the truth is, long-term fixes require long-term work, and thatâs how Andrea breaks down her time with her clientsâone step at a time.
âI always say, itâs about the smaller commitments that we know we can follow through on. ⌠[When we donât follow through], it builds on the belief weâre not good enough. ⌠So sometimes setting really high goals ends up being really detrimental, because it leans into that negative self-image. So sometimes I say itâs better not to set those big goals, [but rather] micro goals that start to build that self-trust.â
That being said, Andrea works with her clients by setting a six-month goal, and then breaking it down to smaller tasks.
â[This includes] a higher-self activation exercise where they create the self-image they want ⌠the goals they want ⌠and we put it into an audio soundtrack. ⌠And they listen to their mantra every morning as a way to re-program their subconscious.
âAnd when we donât follow through, the compassion thing is huge ⌠Looking at it with curiosity rather than judgment.â
Again, I canât recommend enough listening to our whole conversation; itâs filled with Andreaâs wisdom and tips! Click below to watch on YouTube, or listen to the podcast here!
If youâre into Andreaâs vibe as much as I am and want to know more about how to work together, you can check out her website here, where she offers not only shorter courses, but also longer-term programs to conquer emotional eating. And follow her on Instagram here; sheâs great about responding to DMâs!
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