Cake over Keto: Episode 16 - What does Anxiety have to do with food issues?

Using food to cope with difficult emotions, including anxiety is called being human. If you’ve ever opened up a tub of ice cream, a sharing bag of crisps you have no intention of sharing or sitting on the sofa with a whole cheesecake and one spoon, you are human.

Food has the ability to soothe, comfort and numb. It can nourish mind, body and soul and it can heal, which I think is rather marvellous. To be honest, there are many worse things we could do other than eat. Although our culture will do it’s very best to shame folk for comfort eating and binge eating. The idea of eating ‘unnecessarily’ is called greedy, overindulgent, out of control and weak. Which means many folk experience anxiety with just the idea of eating, especially if it’s been labelled a ‘bad’ food [there is no bad food by the way, this is diet culture language and it’s harmful].

There is so much pressure to conform to the so-called thin ‘ideal’ thanks to cultural, medical and peer coercion. There is no consideration of genetics, environment or trauma. There is no consideration of neurodiversity. There is no consideration of mental health and needs must.

Mel is here to help release some of the shame around food being a coping tool and she’ll explain why food is a common crutch for so many . Mel will also help you understand what food issues can look like when the anxiety comes before the eating and after the eating.

And make sure you listen to the pick n mix at the end as Mel has 3 helpful free nuggets to help you break the cycle of constant worry, boost your coping strategy options and restore a sense of calm.

Oh and she’s got a lovely helpful gift for you that you can open it right now: Journaling prompts to promote healing and recovery. Free download here: https://tinyurl.com/5dmyf8n3