stop stress eating

This has not been a good couple of weeks for control of this compulsion. The irony is that the stress has not been mine directly, but the stress of others that I have taken on myself (one problem with my empathic personality type). I need to create my own emotional space, guard my own well-being. I also need to establish healthy alternatives to my current behavior, and internalize those alternatives so that they become as automatic as the unhealthy one. An exercise compulsion, for example, would be a nice change, and might undo a bit of the damage! ;) Obviously, though, the real problem is not the behavior at all, but the compulsive nature of it.

Sigh. Today was NOT a good day for this goal!

Lack of sleep and a hectic morning started things off badly. When my daughter was sent home ill from camp, and I left work midday to care for her, tomorrow’s deadlines looming large, no time for lunch or breathing, I knew I was sunk. It pretty much went downhill from there, our female tensions running high, the heat not helping things, and me eating everything in sight, so that by dinnertime I had a stomach ache to match my ten-year-old’s, and a guilt complex the size of an extra large pizza, with a grande depression on the side … super size me!

Here’s the thing, I should have seen it coming, could have, in fact. I know myself. This kind of behavior should not surprise me after all these years. I am well-versed in nutrition, can plan healthy meals, create them, enjoy them. I am actually a healthfood nut by nature, love my foods fresh and whole and healthy. But at times of stress I seem to lose all sense of what I am doing, move into an almost trancelike state, some horribly dysfunctional autopilot. After the fact, if one were to ask me what I ate, I would have no recollection.

OK, so here’s the post-whining resolution:
To quote Scarlett O’Hara, “Tomorrow is another day” (fast approaching, in fact, as I post this). With a little more sleep, a good breakfast, some dark, fresh coffee, a happier child, and a better outlook, I WILL have a functional, productive, and healthy day.