"Why do we Eat" and "How did we Gain Weight"?

Next week we are teaching a class on Emotional Eating at our local hospital. To prepare, I have tried to think globally about why we have ended up being a nation where 2/3 of our people are either overweight or obese! I am going to attempt to explain to you why I believe this is so. You will also be able to see why dieting has a long term success rate of 2%.

First question: Why do we eat?

Easy Answer: We are Hungry, right? Sort of right! Most of us eat only 20% of the time because we are actually hungry. The other 80% of the time, we eat for other reasons!

Now you know why diets fail. A diet usually says it is all about food. Change everything you know and love about food and do it this way and you will lose. Well, you box up your "80% reasons" for a time and lose the weight and then when the diet is over, you breath a sigh of relief and go back to your old ways. Voila!
Weight gain again, sometimes to a greater amount than you started at. Diets look at the "What". What are you eating wrong? Count your calories better and you should be successful. Do this by getting rid of carbs, or going low fat or whatever the lastest, greatest diet figures out to redo the calories. Not going to probably work!

Now for the rest of the story! This is your "How" or your "Personal History with Food". Have you ever started a diet and been asked to fill our your food history? I would highly doubt that. It would be like going to the doctor and leaving out your history. You would not get very far. I believe that diets do not work but each person must look at their personal history to find their answers. Most of us gain back the same weight with the same foods on the same days of the week at the same times over and over again! Enough!

What are some of the other 80% reasons that we eat?

Thoughts

All of Nothing Thinking (Perfection or Forget it)

Sabotaging Thoughts (Negative thinking)

Triggers (anything that triggers you to eat)

Biological-hunger, thirst, hormonally influenced cravings

Environmental-seeing or smelling food, food shows or ads

Mental-thinking about food, imagining food and the good and bad memories

Emotional-tension, anxiety, sadness, loneliness, boredom, happiness, excitement,.........

Social-offered food or being around others who are eating

Food-a particular food or type of food is your downfall

Situation

Time

Behavioral pattern

Habits

Mindless Eating

No Planning

Poor Nutrition

Your personal habits add here

Are you overwhelmed yet? Please do not be!

It is all about developing a unique set of great strategies that look at your particular food history and implementing them. Most of us are not doing that many things wrong. Most of us have not woken up today overweight, but have gained it slowly. We are not doing that much wrong. If you overeat by 100 calories per day you will gain 10 pounds this year. Let that go for 10 years and you would be 100 pounds overweight. By identifying your problem areas and cleaning them up, most of us can lose weight and feel better!