Judging your food choices is keeping you stuck.
A common thing I hear when working with people to help heal their relationship with food, is this:
“I ate x food which was bad”
or
“I shouldn’t have eaten x because it’s naughty”
It’s usually closely followed by:
“then I felt guilty and ashamed of myself”
“I don’t know why I keep doing it”
It’s natural to feel frustrated when you repeat a pattern that’s not serving you, but the reality is: the self-judgement and shame is a large part of the problem.
This starts with the way we identify with food. When we label food as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ we subconsciously take on these morals. For example, I ate ‘good’ foods today so I was good. Or I ate a ‘bad’ food so I am bad and I feel guilty. These are not usually conscious thoughts that we are having, but it’s important to realise that our language is powerful.
When we judge ourselves for our food choices we don’t see anything other than the ‘bad behaviour’ we engaged in. We miss the valuable opportunity to reflect on what led us to these food choices in the first place. When we take the time to understand our patterns, this gives us an opportunity to change them.
So how do you change this?
If you’re stuck in the cycle of emotional eating and then feeling bad about it, the first thing I would do is work on releasing the shame, blame and guilt around your food choices. Try to approach it from a place of neutrality, and move one step towards curiosity. Get curious about what led you to emotionally eat or overindulge. I often describe it as "imagine you were talking to your best friend about her food choices.” This helps take the emotional charge out of the situation so you can see it for what it is.
The first step is approaching these situations with self awareness, curiosity and self compassion.
Ask yourself:
How was I feeling beforehand?
What emotional need was I using food to soothe or suppress?
Emotional eating is not about the food itself - it’s about the unmet emotional need that you’ve learnt to address with food.
The good news is, with the right awareness and support, we can change these patterns. This is something I work on with clients regularly, and it's one of the most rewarding shifts to witness.
If this resonates and you'd like some support navigating your relationship with food, I offer a free discovery call where we can chat about what's going on for you and whether 1:1 nutrition support might be a good fit.