Hello love,
Today I wanted to share a client’s journey from binging and emotional eating to ease, peace and confidence around food, their body and life.
I personally love watching process videos. It gives more insight into what a person is navigating and you get to see the little nuances and things they did to move through their journey.
I thought this would be helpful for you to see yourself, your journey and where you may need more support.
I find these processes help me see what hurdles, resistance and obstacles clients had to overcome. Of course each person is different but there are themes for sure.
My client Kelly came into the program and she had tried many things to help her emotional eating. She had tried diets for many years and was in and out of therapy for years (3+) and as a last ditch resort before she joined the program her family was pressuring her to try ozempic.
She knew she needed more than a bandaid because in the past she reached “her goal” only to spiral. She knew there was something deeper going on.
I want to add that she was bingeing daily for about a year and a half while also being in therapy. When she came into the program she needed to stop the daily binges. Luckily a therapist recommended my program to her.
As a quick overview the program has 3 main phases True Nourishment, Body Acceptance, and Emotional Wellness. There is a step by step approach through these phases but they are interconnected as well. There is a structure to flow from.
Changes within the first few weeks:
Kelly started to step by step to change her morning routine and added in the recommended supplements to help her digestion and stress levels.
Within the first few weeks her digestion shifted dramatically because of optimizing her nourishment and my resolving a trauma through one of the somatic meditation mini sessions on one of our program calls.
She had struggled with IBS for years and her BM’s literally changed over night. This can happen with a powerful shift in the nervous system around a specific trauma.
Her moods also started to shift as digestion and stress directly impact this.
Her bingeing also stopped from being daily to not having anymore episodes.
These results were due to her incorporating specific strategies in the program; optimizing digestion, taking specific supplements and working on direct triggers with her emotional eating.
She was tracking her patterns using a food + mood journal so that we could pin point her triggers; the physical ones and emotional ones and discerning them.
For Kelly we cleaned up the physical triggers and found that her emotional triggers were in the evening like clockwork.
Even tough her binges stopped she was still using food to comfort herself, by excessively ordering take out, drinking almost daily and engaging with others that triggered her.
Working with TRIGGERS
We look at triggers as 2 main categories. Physical and emotional . We work to reduce the physical ones and then use the somatic meditations sessions to work with the root of emotional ones.
These somatic sessions are what created a big shift in Kelly’s BM’s as we released and reworked a trauma that was unresolved in her body. Working in the body is so powerful.
IBS is connected to our nervous system and can be the result of trauma. This is why digestive issues are common with emotional eaters.
Another trigger that was coming up was around body shame. It was the holidays and she feared judgement from her family as they would regularly comment on her body. We worked to get to the deeper root about her lack of acceptance that she internalized from a young age.
We worked on the root by meeting her true needs in the body and shifting limiting beliefs so that she had tangible steps around the holidays. This also created an authentic core desire to move her body from care vs. punishment.
This was profound as in the past Kelly did reach “the body” but it was fleeting. She still felt shame and badly about herself. She didn’t feel she deserved to take care of herself.
Once these triggers and blocks were resolved by meeting her true needs internally that opened her up to her authentic desire to care for herself. We had removed the blockage to this.
Some Additional Insights for Kelly
1. Kelly realized that she was not sabotaging herself that she was protecting herself from these deeper emotions in the only way she could. Once we were able to work with the root she was able to align fully and implement tangible steps to caring for herself.
2. Kelly was also able to release the shame and badness she felt and was able to she how this was intergenerational trauma. How as a young child she internalized she was bad because she wasn’t treated in a kind and loving way.
3. Kelly also began to release her need for alcohol. At the time of this recording she had gone 2 weeks without using alcohol and one event out with friends where she chose to drink. She felt sovereign vs. compulsive. Alcohol is used in the same way as emotional eating so as she did the deeper work on her triggers she not longer needed these bandaids to numb out.
4. BONUS not mentioned in the video: Kelly started to feel more empowered and confident at work. Speaking up for herself and exerting boundaries when in the past she would people please, stay quiet and feel she wasn’t respected.
Kelly has the tools to continue this journey beyond food and has grown so much in the last 12 weeks. I love it!
Invitation
It is always inspiring to ride along with my clients on their transformational journey. I am always re-inspired and see how possible transformation is. Going from bingeing daily to ease, peace and confidence is no small feat but it can happen if you are willing to commit to yourself.
So if this has inspired you and you are ready to resolve your emotional eating from the root then I invite you to find out more about The Emotional Eating Evolution Program here.
To transformation,
~Michelle
Certified Holistic Nutritionist Specializing in Emotional Eating
