How do you deal with your emotions?

HOW TO HANDLE YOUR EMOTIONS

All of us experience a wide range of emotions in our lives. Usually, that’s a good thing. But sometimes we have difficulty controlling our emotions, even to the point of letting our emotions control our behavior. Usually, that’s not such a good thing. Here are some helpful suggestions for handling your emotions.

• Be honest with yourself.

• Talk to somebody about your feelings.

• Don’t ignore your emotions, they are telling you something.

• If you are having an unpleasant feeling, think of something you can do that will help, and then do it.

• Find positive ways to express anger that are not hurtful to others.

• Remember, whatever you are feeling, you’re not alone.

• Try not to get overwhelmed, things usually improve.

• If you do get overwhelmed—ask for help.

Sometimes it helps to get your feelings down on paper. Here are some ideas for writing that may help you deal with your emotions so you don’t turn to emotional overeating:

1. Write about a time when you felt like you had to hide your emotions. Have you ever tried to hide them even from yourself?

2. Describe one or two times when you had big emotional mood swings.

3. Describe a time when you felt like you were mad at the world. Were you really mad at the whole world, or just one or two things? Did you figure it out?

4. Who do you talk to when you are feeling down? What does this person do that helps? Do you ever do the same for others?

5. Have you ever felt like you are totally alone and no one else could possibly understand what you’re feeling?
Do you think other people sometimes feel that way too?

6. Watch a television program and write about one of the characters. What were the major emotions that motivated that character’s behavior? How did the character deal with those emotions? Did this character handle his/her emotions in a positive or negative (helpful or harmful) way? Can you think of a better way?

7. Imagine that some day you will have a child. Write a letter of advice for that child to read when he or she reaches the age you are right now. Tell the child about the moods and emotions you experienced at this age, and how you hope he/she will deal with his/her own moods and emotions at this age.

Hypnosis…What is it???

Hypnosis

Are you familiar with Hypnosis?

Some of us think of hypnosis and we imagine stage shows where an individual is standing on a chair acting silly or quacking like a duck. We may say to ourselves, “Oh, my goodness, I would never want someone to have control over my mind like that.”Actually, all hypnosis is self-hypnosis, which means that the client has complete control over their experience.

Remember, those at stage shows are there for entertainment purposes and when given the suggestion to “quack like a duck,” would probably do so in their own living room as well. No one can ever make us say or do anything out side of our value or belief system when we are in hypnosis.

So what exactly is Hypnosis?

Hypnosis is an “awake” state, where the physical body is relaxed, yet the mind is mentally alert. When the conscious mind is relaxed or at bay, the subconscious mind becomes open to suggestion. Hypnosis is similar to guided visualization, and allows us to become greatly absorbed in the experience and sensations of our ideas and imagination. If we can perceive it, we can achieve it.

For help with emotional overeating, contact us at The Hungry Heart.

Avoid Overeating during the Holiday…

Emotional eating, overeating and holiday stress—is this a combination you know well? Feeling stressed and overwhelmed by holiday demands and hectic schedules and giving in to the temptation of too many Fourth of July goodies is something many of us struggle with during a busy time when it can be hard to make our self care and needs a priority. If you are struggling with emotional overeating, especially this time of summer, contact us at

You might be an Emotional Overeater if…

More of us are emotional overeaters than we might think...

Is your best friend Haagen Daz or Sara Lee? Do you snuggle up at night with potato chips and M&Ms? Have you eagerly awaited the end of an evening event so you could go home and eat? Do you welcome solitude so that you can have an uninterrupted food spree?

If you see yourself in any of these situations, you are an emotional overeater — a person who eats in response to his or her feelings — a person whose overeating has nothing do with hunger.

You will know it’s emotional overeating because the food is consumed in large quantities, is usually fast foods or snack foods, tends to be eaten very quickly (often barely tasted), and is usually consumed in secrecy Hunger will have nothing to do with it. And you will feel terrible about yourself afterwards…

When the most comforting though in your head is the candy bar stashed in your desk drawer, you know that you have a problem. Food, like tobacco or alcohol, can be addictive and the drug of choice. In particular, quick and easy high fat, high sugar foods are addictive because they numb out feelings. When life gets too stressful, boring or tense, food can be the emotional anesthetic that makes it better. for many people, food is an emotionally addictive anesthetic.

Emotional overeating protects people from tension and worries. As strange as it may seem, emotional overeating can be calming; it “works”, at least in the short run. And that is why it is a difficult cycle to break. The emotional facts are that it is often easier and less upsetting to be angry at yourself then it is to be tense upset or angry at an important person in your life. Perhaps you are afraid of the feelings of disruption, aloneness or abandonment that can come with being angry at a significant other…

Often, an upset feeling can be transferred into emotional overeating. Through the distraction of food, repetitive chewing and swallowing, and obsessive food thoughts, intense feelings are redirected into overeating behavior. These behaviors tend to be psychologically safer than confrontations with a loved one which might cause conflict, arguments, disharmony or withdrawal.

The first step in breaking the emotional overeating cycle is to find out what feelings you are avoiding. Often, this is not easy to do. You have to be a bit of a detective and look for clue~ anytime you find yourself overeating or wanting to overeat.

If food has been your anesthetic, then to cure emotional overeating you will need to bear some discomfort–the discomfort of saying what you are really feeling, the discomfort of an argument, or the discomfort of someone “disconnecting” with you. The alternative — superficial harmony — is only attained through your silence and the act of swallowing your true feelings along with a large dose of food.

We all want warm loving accepting relationships. But real life is more complicated. Relationships between grown adults have differences, angers and tensions. Relationships are prickly not smooth The price tag on a smooth relationship is that one person (sometimes both) obliterate their opinions, values, thoughts or feelings.

So — the cure for emotional overeating is speaking up and spitting out — having the courage to express yourself to the persons meaningful in your life.

Yo-yo Dieting. The Hungry Heart has a solution.

yo-yo dieting?

Yo-yo dieting, also known as weight cycling, is a repeated loss and gain of body weight due to excessive dieting. The term “yo-yo dieting” was coined by Kelly D. Brownell, Ph.D., at Yale University, in reference to the cyclical up-down motion of a yo-yo. In this process, the dieter is initially successful in the pursuit of weight loss but is unsuccessful in maintaining the loss long-term and begins to gain the weight back. The dieter then seeks to lose the regained weight, and the cycle begins again.

The reasons for yo-yo dieting are varied but often include embarking upon a diet that was initially too extreme. At first the dieter may experience elation at the thought of loss and pride of their rejection of food. Over time, however, the limits imposed by such extreme diets cause effects such as depression or fatigue that make the diet impossible to sustain. The dieter reverts to their old eating habits, and with the added emotional effects begins to rapidly regain weight.

This kind of diet is associated with extreme food deprivation as a substitute for good diet and exercise techniques. As a result, the dieter may experience loss of both muscle and body fat during the initial weight-loss phase (weight-bearing exercise is required to maintain muscle). After completing the diet, the dieter is likely to experience the body’s famine response, leading to rapid weight gain of only fat. This is a dangerous fat-cycle that changes the body’s fat to muscle ratio, one of the more important factors in health. One study in rats showed those made to yo-yo diet were more efficient at gaining weight.
The Hungry Heart helps you identify your eating triggers, gain control over food and your life and help you lose weight naturally!
Visit us at The Hungry Heart to learn more.

5 Minute Lunches!

5 minute Lunches
1.) If you are in a work place or environment where it is hard to stop for lunch, make sure you bring lunch with you. Stop on your way in or plan on Sunday for the week to bring the food with you for the week. Leave jarred or canned foods in the office so they are available when you need them, as well as bread, fruit, and vegetables. If you need early, bagel stores are usually open early. Instead of a bagel and cream cheese that has little nutrients or fiber. Get a tuna, chicken salad, turkey, etc on bagel with tomato and sprouts, if possible. Eat 1/2 at breakfast and 1/2 at midmorning or 1/2 at lunch and 1/2 at 3pm You can pick up 2 sandwiches if you are desperate to  carry you through the whole day. Also grab a piece or two of fruit  and coleslaw to help carry you through the day.
2.) Homemade tunafish (water based)  with Spectrum  mayonaise and  raisins, apple, almonds, walnuts, or celery. Its quick and easy. Have with good high fiber bread and a salad, soup, or fruit. You can eat the other 1/2 a sandwich at 3pm
3.) Good Bread with peanut butter, banana slivers, and drizzled honey with a glass of milk or soymilk. You will not be looking for anything sweet after this treat.
4.) Boca Burger or Garden Burger. Heat in toaster oven add tomato and precut up spinach. Bruchetta spread from Trader Joes or other store. Good bread and Spectrum Mayonaise and mustard.
5.) Soup and Sandwich or Salad and Sandwich. Eat 1/2 the sandwich and soup or salad. Save the other 1/2 a sandwich to eat at 3pm with some fruit.
6.) Left over fish from last nights dinner.  Toast a Fish Taco with Spectrum mayonaise and a little mustard.
7.) Stir fry from last nights diinner. Heat up rice or pasta noodles an add egg, vegetable protein mix, and frozen vegetables or left over vegetables. Add Braggs Amino Acid, taste like soy sauce, or tomato sauce.
8.) Left over chicken make chicken salad. Add raisins, grapes, or apple pieces with spectrum mayonaise and crackers or on healthy bread and fruit.
9.) You can buy frozen chicken or fish patties. Put in the toaster over and have with a premade salad and healthy chips.
10.) Eggless eggsalad or hummus and tabouli. You can buy premade add to good bread with some carrots, tomatoes, cucumber, sprouts. Buy precut vegetables and dip. 
11.) Split pea soup or chicken noodle soup and good high fiber bread.
12,) Prepare a large quantity of food over the weekend so you have it ready during the week. For example soup or lasagne and then you can have it as a snack or meal through out the day.
13.) Buy soy meatballs heat and cook 2 minutes of angel hair pasta, stir in some frozen vegetables.Soy Yves sandwich meat as an alternative, to ham or turkey.
14.) Take leftovers from the night before and freeze in a lunch portion for the next day.
15.) Health Valley chilli with corn bread or other good quality bread. Health Valley makes a turkey and vegetarian canned chilli. Quick and taste good.
16.) If you are eating out, get comfortable ordering it without creams, cheeses, oils, etc. It is expensive to eat out so we might as well have food prepared the way you like. Plan for your 3pm snack time. Plan to take left overs with you for your afternoon snack. Order an extra soup or fruit, so you can save some of your main meal for 3pm.

What is Stress-Related Eating?

Stress Eating?

In this modern age, almost all people face daily stress from sources such as a job, school, 
living conditions, or relationships as a matter of course. Health problems resulting from stress 
usually reside not with the actual cause of stress itself, but with the person`s 
answer to the stress. Unfortunately, many people choose to automatically respond 
to daily stress factors with food. Interestingly enough, a study in Finland that examined stress 
related eating discovered that the most common stressors for men were 
being single, unemployed, or having a low educational level, while for women, the most significant stressor 
was possessing a lack of emotional support.

Foods can change moods, 
as they trigger both chemical and emotional reactions in the body. These reactions can 
help to temporarily cause a feeling of calmness, but this positive feeling doesn`t last for 
long. The problems caused by stress related eating, such as unwanted weight gain and guilty emotions, can 
quickly eclipse these good feelings. The negative thoughts from these results of 
stress related eating can turn into a vicious cycle, causing you to eat more food, which then 
leads to more guilt, and so on.

 Good news, though! This cycle can be 
stopped with an effective program called The Hungry Heart-emotional eating 
help that curtails 
the need to feed emotional, rather than physical hunger.

Stress depletes the body`s neurotransmitters which 
help to stabilize emotions, but many options to food can 
boost these feel good triggers. Exercise is an exceptional 
choice, as it not only releases endorphins, but it also burns calories and increases health. An effective 
exercise program doesn`t need to be expensive or elaborate; anything that gets you in motion 
is a positive step. 

In any successful stress related eating program, it is also 
critical to understand the unique purpose that food is serving in your 
situation. Keeping a food diary can be beneficial; for a week, write down 
information on what, where, and when you eat, as well as your feelings before, while, and after eating. This 
diary can be helpful in identifying trigger situations that lead to stress 
related eating behaviors, which can be the first step to resolving the situation. Pay 
close scrutiny to the feelings identified in your food diary. Examine the 
feelings associated with stress related eating for patterns that point to past loss or trauma, 
which can be reactivated by a trigger event in the present. These past 
occurrences can be varied, such as an unstable childhood, abuse, or a serious injury or 
illness, but all these occurrences have the common trait of being 
potential triggers for present day stress related eating problems. Working with a Professional 
Counselor may be an effective solution to resolving the persistent feelings associated 
with past events.

 Mending stress related eating problems is a difficult 
procedure, but the more you find about yourself and care for your body and emotional 
health, the less likely you will abuse food to deal with stress.