Observation:
1. an act or instance of noticing or perceiving.
2. an act or instance of regarding attentively or watching.
3. the faculty or habit of observing or noticing.

I’ve completed week 3 of my 12-week emotional eating experiment with the Shrink Yourself program and it sure has been a good one! By the way, if this is your first time reading about my emotional eating experiment, you can read my introductory post to get caught up on just what this is all about.

This was a week filled with more observation, with the additional step of beginning to take new actions instead of eating in response to my hunger switch. Remember, a hunger switch is a trigger for your emotional eating, which you discover through guided sessions one and two. What is different in week three is that you start to learn that you do have other options besides eating for comfort.

What I really like about the online Shrink Yourself program is that it easily walks you through the sessions step by step, and it’s interactive. You answer a lot of questions that get you thinking about your emotional eating habits, and based on those questions you come up with your own answers of how to cope with your emotions instead of using food.

I also like how the Shrink Yourself program builds upon itself. I totally understand why it’s 12 weeks long because after all, if you’ve had the habit of emotional eating since you were a kid or teen (like I have), it’s not realistic to think that you could just switch off that behavior in a couple of days or weeks. This is a program designed to help you come to your own awarenesses, let that awareness sink in, and come to the realization that you can choose other actions.

As far as my progress goes, I’ve been holding strong without weight gain or loss until this week - I dropped a pound, which brings me to a 13.5 pound loss. In a way I feel like I “should” be doing better, but I’m measuring that “better” by the scale, which is how I think most people judge success when it comes to the topic of food and eating, however like I’ve mentioned in my previous updates, my focus for the moment is on making the inner changes which will result in the outer changes.

It’s also a huge accomplishment that I’m not binging and stuffing myself with food or indulging in guilt over my eating schedule because that only makes things worse. If I were doing any of those things then I’d be gaining weight.

All I want to do is “get” this and move on from the emotional eating. I’m very encouraged after learning that people who have completed the Shrink Yourself program lose the desire to emotionally eat during week 5. That sounds great to me, and I can see why so far the focus has been on observing my triggers, habits, and actions. Stay tuned to see what week four holds!

If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!