Last week, I wrote a blog post about some environmental triggers that had been getting in the way of me staying on track. Someone commented on it saying that they wish they knew why triggers got in the way of weight loss success. I thought it was a really interesting comment, so I wanted to explore it a little bit.
As I stated before, I am a therapist working in the alcohol and drug treatment area. I work every day with people who are battling their addiction and their triggers are at the core of that addiction. Without understanding what their triggers are, my clients are unable to understand their own addiction. Triggers can be people, places, emotions, activities, situations, anything you can think of. Triggers can also be memories that come into your head out of seemingly nowhere and then stick with you until you learn how to cope. Coping skills can be healthy or unhealthy. However we cope (whether it's by working out or eating McDonalds...or in my clients' cases, going to a meeting or shooting up) is how we handle these triggers.
We are all here for one reason: we have an unhealthy relationship with food. Yes, losing weight is the goal for most of us, but the true reason that we are here is to learn how to see food in a way that is healthy and natural. From the very beginning of our journey, we are hounded with triggers. Every day we all pass by food that is tempting and reminiscent of our old lives. We watch commercials that try to trick us into making unhealthy choices and we see the people around us eat things carelessly and without regret. Our sense of smell can also hurt us by allowing us to be reminded of how great unhealthy food smells. So how do you cope?
A couple of weeks ago, one of my clients told me that she had recently had an epiphany. She talked about how I would always ask her about any "cravings" she was having and she would dismiss them and think nothing of them. But what she realized is what all addicts (whether the addiction is drugs, alcohol, TV, food, internet, anything) have to learn before they can manage their addiction. She said, "I realized that the craving you were talking about isn't a physical craving. I don't physically crave pills, but I crave the way they make me feel." That's what it's all about. Learning that your cravings are not about a physical need. Your triggers will make you crave a way you felt, not an actual thing. So when I find myself thinking about going on a late night ice cream run, I have to ask myself what it is I actually want from that ice cream. The answer isn't the taste or the texture or anything like that. The answer is the way I feel when I'm eating that ice cream. The joy I feel from having that in my system. That's why we eat unhealthy foods when we're depressed. That's why we eat unhealthy foods when we're stressed. And that's what that trigger is really all about.
So then the question is, what do you do? You stop yourself and ask if that food I'm being triggered to eat is really what I want. Maybe I just need to go watch a chick flick and have a good cry. Or maybe I need to go for a walk and get some endorphins in my body. But more often than not, what I need is not the thing I'm triggered to do.
My amazing WW group leader always gives great advice and wonderful things for us to try through the week. One thing she said that stuck with me was, "Whenever I walk into the kitchen looking for something to eat, I say out loud, 'I feel....' and if the answer isn't 'hungry,' I walk back out."
Be aware of your triggers and always ask yourself what it is you really need before you give yourself into those triggers.
