When I ask clients how often they think about food, they answer “all the time”.
I know how exhausting that is. Years ago, my first thought in the morning was “how can i be good (with food) today?”. I’d design my whole day around the goal of eating the right foods and avoiding the wrong ones. I put so much effort into doing everything I could to not eat too much.
Inevitably, when I put my head on the pillow at night, I’d think, “how can tomorrow be different?”.
I’d wake up the next morning with the same goals, the same thoughts and the same food obsessions.
If you can relate, you likely believe that thinking about food all of the time is a sacrifice you need to make. This is the mentality we all have when we’re working toward our goals. When you wanted to do well on an exam, you knew you needed to study. When you signed up for that road race, you knew you needed to train for weeks and months before. To get certain results, you need to put the effort in.
As you consider the time you’re spending thinking about food, are you getting the results you’ve been hoping for?
In my experience and those of my clients, obsessing about food just left us feeling like a failure. And feeling like we’re on a gerbil wheel that we can never get off of.
This is why I want to share with you a few reasons why you’ve been obsessing about food so you can understand what is really happening.
1. You're not eating enough.
One of the ways our bodies are brilliant at sharing hunger signals with us is to partner with our brains. Some early signals can be when we start to think about food, ideas like… “do i still have leftovers from last night?” “Do we have eggs in the fridge?” When you're not eating enough, your brain is going to let you know that you need more food. This is your body’s way of ensuring you’re getting enough calories to be well nourished and in balance.
When you’re not eating enough during the day, it’s common to overeat in the afternoon and evening. This is your body’s way of catching up to get enough nourishment during the day.
2. You’re trying to avoid certain foods.
What happens when you tell someone they can’t have something? They want it even more. This is the natural human response when our brain is triggered by scarcity. If you’ve been trying to avoid sugar or carbs, for example, you’re essentially activating the part of your brain to desire those foods and seek them out. Which in turn means you’re spending even more time thinking about that food.
3. You're feeling guilty about what and how much you're eating.
Guilt has a way of staying with you long after you’ve eaten the “wrong” food. You may notice thoughts like “why did I eat that?”, “I shouldn’t have done that, I know better”. Guilt is uncomfortable and takes a lot of headspace.
You may even notice that when you feel guilty about what you’ve eaten, you then spend even more time thinking about how you can “fix” the mistake you made with your food choice. The guilt just fuels the cycle of restriction and preoccupation with food.
4. You keep trying to find the right diet.
Diet culture tells us there is a weight loss solution if we work it hard enough. So, it’s not surprising that
you believe the right diet is out there and you just haven’t found it.
It’s like you have an antennae up, ears piqued, eyes searching for that one “thing” that could finally work for you when it comes to weight loss. You may be spending time scrolling your social feed, browsing magazines in the grocery store line, or asking those folks who share their weight loss publicly- “what did you do?”.
5. You believe you need to lose weight.
It’s not your fault you believe this. Diet culture glorifies thin bodies and tells us that only thin bodies are attractive.
When you’re judging your body, you find a lot of ways to criticize it. If your clothes aren’t fitting, this discomfort may take your attention like a pebble in your shoe would. You may be comparing your body to other people’s bodies. You may be so fearful of other people judging your body that you put a lot of time and energy trying to hide your body.
These are a few reasons food is always on your mind. Now that you know, you have options. Dieting and food restriction will not lead you to feeling peaceful. It’s not worth the sacrifice of your precious headspace.