- They warn that these patients try to fill a mental void with food or alleviate the stress of complex situations, sadness, loneliness or boredom
- They recommend a care program, guided by a health professional, and based on mindful eating, such as Minds, the online psychological therapy of the health group
"Food should not be used as an emotional calmer." This is the conclusion of the Mental Health specialists of the hospitals of the Ribera healthcare group, which warn of the increase in what has been called “emotional hunger”among patients who turn to food to hide problems and fears or to fictitiously fill a mental void.
"Emotional hunger is understood as disordered eating that appears in situations that are stressful, sad, lonely, anxious or bored," explains Marisa Escribano, psychologist at the Mental Health Unit of the Vinalopó University Hospital, which gives a very graphic example: "Packages of biscuits that go to the mouth, without real feeling of hunger."
For Javier Carreño, psychiatrist at the Ribera Povisa hospital (Vigo), emotional hunger "is a new term that responds to old symptoms, such as anxiety and the biological correlate of the affect of anguish, capable of generating a large part of mental health problems." Dr. Carreño adds that "this situation between panic and uncertainty, which is anguish, leads us to seek solutions, and one of them is to eat to fill that void." And not to do it in a calm way, responding to a physiological instinct, but rather "the patient eats fast and a lot, because his goal is to satiate himself to achieve appeasement that is usually brief," he explains.
Nuria Lázaro, specialist in Mental Health and coordinator of the ACT Program of the Torrejón University Hospital, considers that the education received has a “very close” relationship with the desire to “regulate oneself emotionally with food”. "On many occasions it is used as a punishment or reward and in our culture, food is constantly present along with emotions: we celebrate with food and we accompany situations of sadness or loss with food," he adds. Lucía Fernández, a health psychologist at Ribera Polusa, and one of the professionals of Minds, the online psychological therapy of the Ribera health group. “Food plays an important role in our culture, because it is part of many social relationships and pleasant moments. That is why we also use it as an element to appease bad moments or emotional discomfort ”, he explains.
Both Nuria Lázaro and Lucía Fernández clarify: "This type of situation does not necessarily have to be something negative, only when the main emotional regulation becomes solely food." "When emotional hunger has become pathological and leads to dysfunctional behaviors, such as anxiety about eating, eating compulsively or binge eating, it is time to consider how to remedy the situation," adds the therapist at the Torrejón Hospital.
All specialists agree on the basis of the most appropriate therapies to curb that emotional hunger. Dr. Carreño, a psychiatrist from Ribera Povisa, assures that "the cure for this type of anxiety usually comes from debriding the causes that have generated this anguish and, consequently, that failed remedy that is eating badly, urgently and frightened".
For Nuria Lázaro, a specialist at the Hospital de Torrejón, "the first step is to understand that food is not the focus of the problem, but rather the cover." “We must pay attention to bodily sensations, to differentiate physical from emotional hunger, and for this it is key to practice conscious eating or mindful eating"He says.
Lucía Fernández, a psychologist from Ribera Polusa and a member of the Minds team, the group's online psychological therapy, explains that this program "includes a special itinerary to help curb emotional hunger." “The tool helps the therapist to estimate the degree to which our emotions influence eating behavior and also includes logs in which each patient can assess the degree of influence of their emotions on emotional food intake,” she explains. And it doesn't just help in diagnosis. “It also allows patients to learn tools to manage this problem and among them stands out the mindful eating", he adds.
The psychologist from the Hospital del Vinalopó agrees when pointing out the mindful eating as one of the solutions to deal with this problem. "It is important to carry out a conscious diet, because in this way we will learn to nourish ourselves through full attention, listening to our emotions," he assures, while recalling that "this way of eating is considered one of the healthiest, because it allows us to listen to our body and our sensations”.
