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FRIDAY, APRIL 16, 2010

Stuck, Part Two, My Marriage Makes Me Eat

My last blog about emotional eating and being stuck elicited many very interesting comments, so today I would like to use those comments to illustrate some important points about emotional eating. The common theme of four of the commentators was that the frustrations of their marriage was the cause their emotional eating.
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Manxiety said it quite clearly:

This is a light bulb moment. Unfortunately I can't see how to redress emotional problems that are causing the emotional eating. Been married for 44 years and it's OK but not emotionally nourishing. Husband too dominant - I'm too passive. Tried marriage counselling, but in the end have just settled for being content with what I have and making the best of it. Divorce would be too drastic and cruel for all concerned.

I would say to Manxiety:

You have a strategy for adapting to your reality. You have made the important decision of staying in your marriage. But you have not yet settled for being content and if you are still eating to quell your frustrations, you have not accepted your own advice…making the best of it. These are not emotional problems, these are decisions about coping with reality. You haven’t finished your work and your emotional eating is the sign that you a little bit more work to do about your passivity, and possibly more along the lines of the next commentaror, Mrs Kitty.

Mrs Kitty said:

I sympathize with your situation! I, too, am married but eat because I am left out of activities as well as the loop with my husband and stepson. At 50, I hate to start all over again yet, he's a good provider, just unable to comprehend how I am so lonely. I stuffed myself every time they left me home alone while they went out and had fun. Finally, I realized because I had God, I was NEVER alone and focus on Him now instead of punishing/consoling myself with food. You have love inside you that needs to be given. If you choose to stay in the relationship, join/become active in church, help with a charity, walk dogs or pet cats at your local shelter, take up painting or poetry. Let your energy and talents out into the world to be appreciated by many instead of keeping them at home where they are underappreciated by one! We're cheering you on!

I would say to Mrs. Kitty:

That’s the right attitude. If you are lonely, you can find many more things to do with your time and readiness to connect to people than waiting in frustration to be filled up by your husband, or your husband substitute…stuffed in food.

shirley61 said:

I can relate to this article, I have been married for 36 years but we do have a lot in common. That has never been a problem. He has more energy than I do sometimes and he doesn't know how to relax. So I get upset when he wants to go go go and I want to relax and read or exercise. I have some medical issues and one thing I have to do is exercise. So I turn to eating when I get frustrated. He is a very busy person with his job and he also works in our home. So his job is always facing him at home. So to keep me company I eat. I just started this program in March/2010 and I can already see how I am stuffing my emotions. I also worry about him so that makes me want to eat. We do have outside interests of boating, skiing etc. We are also in a situation of caring for my dad who is 92 and his mom who is 83. His mom lives 5 hours away and my day lives in Florida. We are both from Canada. We have alot on our plates but he seems to handle food better and stress better than me.

I would say to Shirley 61:

That eating to keep yourself company is one of the worst ways to deal with the frustrations of loneliness, and the differences in style and temperament between you and your husband. The frustrations of your marriage are challenges to deal with creatively in the realm of reality. Eating to keep yourself company is creating false comfort in the confining world of inner reality where no creative solutions can occur. In this area of your life you have to live in the world around you, not inside you.

jstango said:

When I was divorced, the weight fell off. I grieved but I did it out loud - no reason to eat to hide it. I'm married again this time husband not abusive but I am choosing to impose some of the same mental limitations I had in my first marriage. Our relationship is not perfect, he hates to talk, we struggle to communicate but I, like the rest of you, know there is no perfect relationship out there. I need to figure out how to live out loud even when I am a wife.

I would say to jstango:

Thank you for illustrating the one major point I had hoped to make. Yes there are frustrations in marriage, and in life, and they are inevitable. A successful life means you creatively adapt to your reality, and turn every frustration into what it is, a challenge to be dealt with. But when it really comes down to the final act of adapting and coming to peace with frustrations, it is something about yourself that you have to change. And it’s almost always a piece of personal development, some unfinished piece of work left over from your childhood. For you it is figuring out how to “live out loud”. For Manxiety is was how to stop being “too passive.” For Shirly 61 and MrsKitty it was taking responsibility of staying connected to people without waiting for one person to fill you up.

Thank you all for your comments. More next week.

POSTED BY !DR. GOULD! | 6:55:46 AM

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12 COMMENTS

LEFCO said...

Wow, isn't it amazing how what you swept under the carpet is under so many other carpets as well. It becomes easy to make another responsible for your "everything" in life and you don't realize u're doing it until you read about others and you have an "aha" moment. We all grew up with the 'knight in shining armor' carrot hanging out in front of us, and never told we were responsible for ourselves, or could be responsible for ourselves. So when we're faced with emotional voids because what we've expected is unrealistic, we turn to the one thing we all have in common, how our mothers soothed us as children the way we all have learned to handle life's ups and downs. None of us from a certain generation were given a feeling of power for the responsibility of ourselves. We were all left to believe we would be 'saved'. Well, now we know, no one is coming to rescue our boat, we have to jump in with the sharks and save ourselves.

mtn bike girl said...

It's helpful for me to read all of these. What I have learned over the past year is that I don't want to divorce but that I need to do things differently. My husband is introverted but is a good man. I used to be frustrated by him and his lack of interest in people but now I find it helpful and healthy that we have different interests. I joined a painting class and have made several good friends and I also make sure that I meet with friends for lunch etc. Then with my husband and family, we do the family stuff like skiing, camping, cycling etc and we can enjoy each other that way. I realize that I was expecting something from him that just isn't going to be forthcoming. I have to remind myself not to get frustrated and angry with him sometimes because I still wish he was a little different.....but reality check here for me.....he's pretty happy with himself the way he is and it's me who needs more interaction with people so I need to do it for myself.

jamiemiz said...

I could relate to this blog especially because even though my husband and i love each other, the intimacy is gone. He turns to beer, and i to food. Hmmm.

Michelle said...

Wow. I know life is not perfect and that to place the responsibility for my happiness in another human's hands is futile. I know these things in my head, but reading these posts made me tear up so I suspect I am caught in a trap of my own making. We believe marriage is for life and so my husband and I are as good to each other as possible but we are two different people with different love languages. And he does not speak mine. I know he loves me he just is not fluent in "me." Food is always there when I need it. Not good. I think I need to sign up today.

DeeDee said...

I also have an emotionally unsatisfying marriage and definitely do eat to fill myself up and ease the loneliness. I am aware that I do it, and aware that I am only punishing myself in the process. It helps to read that there are many other people doing the same thing. I am not alone. I am also 55 years old, and do not see divorce as a viable option. My husband is not abusive, not is he a mean or vindictive person. He does not drink or do drugs. He provides well, helps clean the house, and is generally supportive of me. Others might be envious of this. But I am lonely, because we do not communicate well, and I don't think that we have much in common, except our children and a long history together. I also realize that there are no perfect marriages. I do think, however, that some people have happier marriages than mine is, and I am envious of having a true life "partner". But accepting my reality, which is that I still have one child in high school and I am not going anywhere, is a good idea. How to accept my reality and stop sabotaging myself is the true goal. It helps so much to read that others struggle in exactly the same way.

slhiaz said...

This is, unbeknownst to me, the one issue that I have not been able to conquer "my marriage makes me eat." When I saw this topic, it hit me. I guess I never thought that other people had this problem too. I totally agree with jstango in talking about getting divorced and the weight just falling off. Even though, I know that you're suppose to make the best of it, your husband, wife, partner, what have you, is still there. How do you separate yourself from these issues that are making you eat, when divorce isn't an option right now. I don't want to wait until my relationship is over to work on my emotional eating, but it is so hard to get through. I have read every post and agree with all of it but I can't get through it. This has been an issue with me ever since I've been in relationships. It's almost as though there's some sort of disconnect and I can't put my finger on it!

knit1bake1 said...

I'm pasting in this from the blog: You haven’t finished your work and your emotional eating is the sign that you a little bit more work to do about your passivity, and possibly more along the lines of the next commentaror, Mrs Kitty. I haven't finished my emotional work. I joined sy nearly 2 years ago, though I've been an emotional eater my whole life, it's just caught up with me in terms of too much extra weight in the past few years. I was a preemie and was very thin for the first half of my life! I still continue to buy new books on emotional eating, and learn something from each of them. One lesson I learn over and over again is that even though I'd like to be a "normal" eater, the truth is that if I have treats in the house, I will eat them. They will not languish in the closet. It used to bother me when Dr. Phil said that it was necessary to "clean up the environment" but apparently for me that is a necessity. Today for the first time in several months I no longer have dark chocolate in the house. I do have cocoa powder, so that if I absolutely have a "need" for chocolate, I will make one cup of hot chocolate. I don't drink, so that my husband's wine and liquor do not tempt me. But cookies and dark chocolate will always tempt me, and I will find a "reason" to eat them. It's frustrating that going through the program, and reading books does not erase my problem. I must learn how to deal with ee myself, in ways that work for me. I'm a much wiser person than I was before joining sy, but the work still remains to be done, and must be practiced everyday. It won't happen through osmosis, or solely by being optimistic. For me it really hit home yesterday that even if I eat 1600 calories per day, every day for the rest of my life, I may not lose weight. Again, sticking to the 1600 calorie mostly healthy plan won't happen through osmosis. It will happen by being conscious, and by making good choices.

karen said...

The core message and personal stories were some of the best I have read on this site in the many years I have subscribed. The learning or take away was crystal clear, no excuses.

shirley61 said...

Thank you Dr. Gould for your comments. You are correct about doing something to fill up my time without waiting for someone else to do it. That has been a struggle for me these last few years but I planning on correcting that. Starting to do more things on my own without waiting for my husband. I have been working on that. My two daughters live about an hour and a half away from me so I have made two trips to see them on my own staying for the weekend and it feels really good.

jj said...

These comments are all very inspiring. I too am in a situation where i feel very trapped. Married but lonley. With divorce not being an option at this time. We have nothing in common anymore except our daughter. There is no relationship between us at all but we are civil for her sake. And I eat, and eat and eat. I'm currently 40 pounds overweight, and these comments above have given me some great insight as to how I might move on and start loving me more. Thank you.

Manxiety said...

Reading the comments of others on this topic I realise I've left an important factor out of the equation in my emotional issues and inability to stop grazing on food. Being an only child I became the emotional support of my mother ever since my father died in 1979. She is now 92 and for the last 3 years has been slowly dying. She is incontinent and has vascular dementia as well as other medical problems. I have been so used to this situation and the conflict it causes with my husband that it didn't dawn on me how much it has impacted on my life. I do painting, walking, gardening and all sort of things but always there is this weight around me of responsibility for my mother - and bearing the resentment from my husband about all the time it takes to keep organising her care. Then I feel double guilt that I can't be all things to everyone - least of all myself.

jstango said...

Thank you, Dr. Gould, for these insights and the ongoing blogs. Connections are being made in my mind and bringing realizations that I have been using food to dull for a long time. It has become clear to me now exactly when I stopped living out loud and why. It has also occurred to me that maybe, just maybe, I can experience my emotions without becoming hostage to them but first I need to figure out what they are. This week's assignment for myself is practicing a nonjudgmental pause before eating. I struggle to pause even momentarily before I eat something because the girls in the attic/my head don't want me to decide that then we can't eat what we want. So we have struck a bargain. I will begin by pausing 1 minute before every meal and snack and examine what I may be feeling. We still get to eat what we had planned to eat, this is simply a fact finding mission. I plan to increase the pause time as the week goes on but always with the promise to those girls that we still get to eat what we planned to eat - unless they decide they no longer want it. These blogs and everyone's comments have been so powerful for me and have gotten my brain on rapid fire again. Thank you all! I hope you will not stop any time soon.

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