Feeding My Emotions

Emotional eating is one of many things that can complicate a weight loss or maintenance journey. There are a whole range of emotions from happiness to sadness, boredom to stress, and celebration to mourning. It is easy to drown out those emotion with food. Sure, the relief is only temporary but at that particular time eating just makes us feel good.

I fell victim to feeding my emotions.

On Thursday last week I started to feel some pain in my lower back. It felt like pinched nerve on my right side above my hip. My exercise/weight lifting class didn't help so I took Friday off of activity to rest. I was still feeling pretty lousy on Saturday so I cancelled my weekly hike to Table Rock. I was in a lot of pain and very uncomfortable. I also had not been sleeping well since my back/hip is painful. I was also a bit stressed over not being able to exercise. I had a great loss last week and brought my weight back into goal range so not being able to exercise made me a bit worried on how this week's WI would go.

I am also feeling pre-PMS symptoms and while I never thought it affected me before I sure do feel it. I am bloated and craving salt! Saturday night I had no desire to stand by the stove and cook so I met Kenyon for dinner at On The Border. I ate my emotions, and close to my weight, in chips and salsa and boy was it tasty! The eating didn't stop there. I finished off some left over frozen yogurt with Reeses peanut butter cup that was in the freezer. My damage for just that meal was 26 PPVs.

Sunday was a planned event with my friends and parents at St. Chapelle Winery for a local concert. I had packed my picnic and planned to enjoy some good wine and good company. While my back was starting to feel slightly better, apparently my give-a-damn was still busted and15 PPVs of wine was consumed. Between my picnic lunch, wine, and a planned birthday party we attend later in the day I had used all of my remaining 14 WPPAs and was now in the hole -12 PPVs.

Yesterday I got out for an easy two mile walk in the morning. It was nice to get in some activity after all the emotional eating, and drinking, I had engaged in. I still went over my PPVs. My back is still not 100% better but it is slowly feeling less painful.

I can't dwell on my sloppy eating this last weekend. I am human and I still struggle from time to time. It is upsetting that I will most likely have a gain on Tuesday. I will get on the scale and claim my responsibility. I will also work to make my new WW week a successful one as I get back to healthy eating and hopefully normal activity.