Do you think that you an Emotional Eater?...The human body has an automatic mechanism that tells us when we are hungry and when we are full. Once a person has reached that point, they will stop eating and feel pleasantly full. In the case of an emotional eater, the ‘stop signal’ is completely ignored and they carry on eating for a psychological reason rather than a physiological one. They go way beyond the point where they should really stop and feel bloated, lethargic and guilty. Why would a person want to do that? An emotional eater cannot lose weight by dieting alone - psychological issues need to be fixed first.

Why Do People Overeat?...By overeating I mean overriding the body’s automatic processes. In my practice I frequently deal with plate clearers, fast eaters, chocoholics, comfort eaters, binge eaters etc. Why do they force themselves to eat food they really don’t want? Why do they overeat and make themselves uncomfortable? Why do they always have to clear their plate? The answers lie in issues from our childhood that still lurk in our subconscious minds.

We're all emotional eaters to some extent. We live in a food-orientated society - eating is an integral part of celebrations and  family life. But how much emotional eating is too much? Simply put, when it interferes with your health and happiness.

Traditional dieting and weight loss strategies don't work for emotional eaters, because the psychological aspects of weight control aren't fully addressed by most diet plans. Many programs don't deal with self-sabotage and the real reasons we throw ourselves off track. In his book Fattitudes, American psychiatrist Dr Jeffrey R Wilbert addresses the problem of diet sabotage and emotional overeating. He describes the need to discover the hidden emotional triggers that drive us to eat, and to understand the ‘food-feelings’ connection that makes balanced eating so difficult.