Stress snacking usually sneaks up on us, and before we know it, we’re licking our fingers clean, and looking for another packet or two…
But when things around us are changing and life feels like it’s almost stopped, yet our minds are going at a million miles an hour, it’s natural to want to distract ourselves.
So what can we do when our stress turns into insatiable snacking?
1. Take away temptation
First up, if you want to stop stress snacking, you’ve gotta keep super tempting foods (Red Rock sea salt chips for me) out of your house. If you do buy your favourite snacks, buy a small pack, and then give yourself permission to enjoy the heck out of it. Stop buying the family pack for when guests come over, because we all know what happens when the snack attack comes on.
It’s also good to have healthy snacks, prepared and ready to go. You don’t need to spend hours in the kitchen; really simple and super healthy carrot and cucumber sticks are great here.
And if you’re not hungry enough to eat carrot and cucumber sticks, then you probably aren’t even physically hungry, are you? 😉
2. Tame your stressÂ
Sometimes, you eat for the sake of eating, and you just never quite get full, no matter how much you eat, right? That’s because you aren’t able to satisfy emotional needs with food. Although, we’ve all tried our hardest at some point.
There’s a big difference between physical hunger and emotional hunger. The first step is to notice it, the second is to learn what triggers the stress snacking for you. Try to remove the triggers, reduce your stress, and then make sure you have some tools to help you when something is pushing you over the edge.
3. Use your body
When you feel that urgent stress snacking urge coming on, and you don’t have some actions mapped out and ready to go, you’ll probably end up pigging out and feeling a whole lot worse. Most strong emotional reactions (such as hunger, anger, excitement) only last around 2 minutes. This means that if you distract yourself for just 2 minutes, your hunger may just disappear… Your heart and waistline can thank me later.
Here are a few activities you can do anytime you feel the snack attack coming on.
Set a timer for 2-3 minutes and enjoy some;
- Stretching! Strength out your neck, shoulders, and back – ooh yeah!
- Shake your body, skip on the spot, bounce around or do star jumps
- Pop a song on and get your groove on. (For bonus points, look up RefitRev on YouTube and learn one of their dance routines – so much fun!).
- Anything else you that you can do, and enjoy doing, for just 2mins!
If you’re still feeling hungry after moving your body, maybe avoid the stress snacking, and have a meal instead, ’cause maybe you’re actually hungry…
Now it’s your turn to think. Ask yourself, ‘How do I deal with stress eating?’
Leave me a comment below.
I’d love to know, has this helped?
Big love,
Deanna x