Written by Khara Bennet —
An often-overlooked area of mental health is the link between food and mood. Unless we notice someone with an eating disorder, we tend to disregard the connection between the two. Food and mood issues may extend to eating disorders, but are not limited to them. It is more about examining the relationship between a person, their food choices and the emotions he or she experiences while eating.
One way that we can look at this is by beginning to look at food as symbolism. In other words, what other needs does food satisfy? Within hours of birth, we begin to connect food with an emotion. In breastfeeding, the child is typically held and nurtured, giving a feeling of protection and safety in the feeding process. As kids, when we needed a shot at the doctor’s office we received a lollipop. This taught us that sugar or candy can make the pain go away; a form of positive reinforcement of food. If you grew up in a home where the “clean your plate club” was the way, you may develop anxiety or fear if you don’t eat everything on your plate. In this way food becomes more than just something you eat, it becomes an emotional event.
An example that I often use with my clients is that when I was sad as a child my mother always brought me dessert or gave me some chocolate to “feel better.” Over time I began to equate feeling better with eating.
This became a primary coping strategy to deal with whatever pain, hurt or difficult emotion I was experiencing.
We can begin to see how this can become a problem in times of distress. If a person begins to experience persistent loneliness or emptiness, they may begin to use food as a sort of companion or friend, letting food fill the empty space inside them. If a person is experiencing anxiety or depression, they may begin to use food as a calming mechanism, a way to relax.
When we become dependent on food as a means of self-medication and are unwilling to develop additional coping skills, then we are placing ourselves in a dangerous situation where we may get caught in a vicious cycle. Anyone caught in this cycle may start to identify any emotion as hunger as opposed to what the feeling actually is. The negative outcome from this is that we become unable to identify what is physical hunger versus emotional hunger.
So the questions we need to ask ourselves are, “What am I really hungry for?” Is it love, acceptance and understanding? Companionship and friendship? and “What am I finding in food that comforts me?” When we begin to ask ourselves these questions, we begin to develop insight into our own relationship with food and mood.
