How could getting a little creepy when you’re feeling pretty weepy help you stop emotional eating? Keep listening!

Welcome to The Done Bingeing Podcast. This is the place to hear about how you can pair the emerging brain science about why you binge with powerful life coaching to help you stop. If you want to explore a non-clinical approach to end binge eating, you’re in the right place. It’s time to free yourself. You have more power than you know. And now, your host, Life and Weight-Loss Coach Martha Ayim.

Welcome to Episode 45 of The Done Bingeing Podcast and to part 11 of this special series, 12 Keys to End Binge Eating. This episode continues our discussion about the seventh key: Reduce the Desire to Overeat.

In the last episode, we talked about one of the key factors behind the desire to overeat: emotional eating—that is, the act of eating to make difficult feelings go away.

We explored what it would take to actually feel the emotion you’re inclined to run from. What’s the upside to letting a challenging emotion unfold? Well, first, you get better at feeling these feelings; they become less scary over time and you stand more and more in your power. Second, you get a chance to figure out what might be behind the emotion and to address what needs to be addressed. Third, you don’t make the emotion worse by resenting it for being there—by adding on suffering on top of the pain that’s already there.

And that’s what we’re turning to in this episode. We want to consider, how you might be contributing to it—or even creating it—with your thinking. Okay, I can hear you already: “Say what?” Let me finish before you get hoppin’ mad at me for even suggesting that possibility.

You might believe that your feelings are involuntary—that they just happen based on whatever’s happening in your life. For example, your partner didn’t seem so thrilled to see you on FaceTime tonight. And it was that not-so-thrilled look on her face that made you feel sad.

But before we draw that conclusion and get stuck in that sadness, I want us to take some time to figure out what’s going on in your brain. Maybe what’s going on goes something like this: “She didn’t look happy to see me. She doesn’t need me anymore, I can tell. Maybe she doesn’t even love me anymore. Maybe she’s going to leave again. She said she could see that I was looking lovingly at her. She must hate that. I can’t show her too much of that or I might overwhelm her. I’m so used to her pushing me away or getting cranky when I get close. I don’t know how to be around her any more. She said she loved me but maybe she doesn’t know that for sure. Maybe she doesn’t even know what love is. Or maybe she does, but she only loves me in the hard times. But tonight, she’s seems okay—nothing seemed to be that hard. Now what? She says she trusts me. But she might change her mind. And maybe trusting me isn’t enough. After five years, I don’t even know how to be with her. And I’m 46—you’d think I’d have learned a thing or two by now. I suck at relationships. I had to end to call so she wouldn’t pick up on my weirdness too much. I said a quick good night and ended the call five minutes in.”

Wow! Okay, there’s a mind full of thoughts for you! No wonder you feel sad.

But hang on a sec. What do we really know about what’s going on for your partner? Nothing. She might be content. She might also be tired, she might distracted. And these emotions could be coming from any number of thoughts she might be thinking. And now, you’re in her business and not in your own. You’re also not in your power because you have zero control over what she’s thinking or feeling.

So, let’s get you back in your power and figure out what’s going on for you.

How do we do that? We start by separating your thoughts about the FaceTime call from the facts about the FaceTime call. We already know your thoughts—those are the sentences in your mind that we just listed out a moment ago. So, what are the facts?

The facts have to be things that anyone who witnessed this call one would agree on. Suppose everyone who listens to this podcast was watching your FaceTime—that’s a few thousand of us. I know, it’s a little creepy, but just imagine it for the sake of argument.

Would we all agree that your partner doesn’t need you anymore? No, for sure there would be varying opinions about that.

Would we all agree that she said she could see you were looking lovingly at her? Yes, because that’s a direct quotation from her, and if we all were watching we would have heard her say those words.

Okay so that’s a fact. What else is a fact? What else would we all agree on?

Well, there was a FaceTime call between you and her. On that call, she said that she loved you and that she trusts you. You ended the call after five minutes.

That’s about all we have that’s factual.

Do you notice the difference between the facts and what you think about the facts?

The facts aren’t the problem. There is no problem until you start thinking thoughts that create a problem for you.

So, let’s pick one of those thoughts and look at it more closely. It doesn’t have to be the “deepest” thought, it doesn’t have to be the “worst” thought. Studying any thought will help you to discern the impact it’s having on your life. So, how about the thought: “I don’t know how to be with her.” We know that that’s a thought that leaves you feeling sad.

And what do you do when you feel sad? You ruminate, as you did for the entire duration of the call. You end the call after five minutes. You second-guess both her and you. Then, after the call, you down about five bowls of cereal.

What are the results of these actions? You’re not able to be really present during the call so that you can genuinely interact with your partner. You undermine an opportunity to be with her in a way that helps you learn to navigate your relationship. Then your cereal binge leaves you feeling bloated, gassy, and groggy. You don’t sleep well and wake up with swollen eyes and a headache. You’ve also reinforced the pattern of eating when you’re sad.

I don’t think that this is what you really want to be the result of your FaceTime call. But what is it that you do really want?

Even if, right at this very moment, you don’t believe it’s possible, try to articulate what result you would want if you could have it. And if we have to go to Fairy Tale Land, let’s go.

I’m going to guess you’d rather have results more along these lines: a more authentic connection between you and your partner.

What would you need to create this result? Maybe you’d need to check in with her by asking something like, “Hey, you usually look so thrilled on our calls, but I’m picking up something different. Not that you look upset or anything, just different. I’d love to know what’s happening for you.” Maybe you’d need to be willing to experience some discomfort, a kind of not-knowing, as you explore the dynamic that’s unfolding in the call.

What emotion would you need to feel to take these actions? Maybe acceptance would work. If not, think of another emotion that would work for you.

If acceptance seems right, what would you need to believe to create that sense of acceptance? Well, maybe that your partner has grown through her connection with you and doesn’t need to push you away when she gets scared about being close to you. In the past, she’s shared with you that that’s what her experience has been. Maybe you’d need to believe that your consistent loving has helped her come to trust you. Maybe that it’s a good think if she no longer seeks to be with you from a place of neediness, but rather from a place of true choice. Maybe that it might be an adjustment for you to let go of her neediness, and that’s okay. Maybe that partners don’t always need to be ecstatic to see one another. Maybe that you are learning how to live more genuinely in your relationship with her and that it makes sense that it would take time to get there.

Now, we did this work to create a different result for you: a more authentic connection. But I’m going to throw in another result from doing this work: your increased ability to manage your mind so that you don’t create unnecessary sadness for yourself.

Now you’re back in your power. You’re not creating sadness that isn’t required. You might not feel jubilant, but that wasn’t the goal. The goal was to have a truer connection, and you got there by feeling accepting.

Your thinking can create sadness in the first place or make it worse when it comes.

And that, my friend, is very good news. Why? Because you get to choose your thought—it’s the privilege of being human.

You have privilege.

And you have power.

And, with those two things, you can turn emotional eating around.

That’s it for Episode 45. Thank you for listening! For a limited time, my e-book, 12 Surprising Steps to End Binge Eating, Starting with Your Very Next Urge, will continue to be available for free. There’s a link in the show notes to download your copy!

Thanks for listening to The Done Bingeing Podcast. Martha is a certified life and weight loss coach who’s available to help you stop bingeing. Book a free session with her at www.holdingthespace.co/book. And stay tuned for next week’s episode on freeing yourself from binge eating and creating the life you want.