Camille Schwartz
It’s 2 a.m. on a Thursday night as I set my empty coffee cup on the cold table. I stare at my computer screen blankly, wondering why I always wait until the very last moment to begin writing my twelve-page essay. I get up and reach for the bag of cookies my mom’s friend sent me in the mail. I’ll just have one cookie for inspiration, just a little bit of sugar to get the juices flowing.
After the first bite, I am immediately swept away into a state of complete and utter bliss. I decide to eat one more, than another and eight more after that.
After I finish my ninth cookie, the sweet taste turns to chalk in my mouth and I wince as my stomach grumbles in protest. The guilt begins to settle in when I realize what I’ve done. I have crossed the line of eating to nourish my body into the realm of emotional eating. I begin to ask myself why I felt the need to binge on cookies when all I really needed to do was finish my essay.
Why is it that I give into my cravings on some days, while on others I am perfectly content eating a proportional amount of healthy food? After doing some research on the correlation between food cravings and emotions, I learned that there may actually be a scientific explanation behind my hankering.
According to the blog Nutrition Wonderland, reductions in serotonin — a chemical in our brains that increases our energy and calmness and decreases our stress levels — can lead to overeating or binges on junk food, especially those rich in carbohydrates. This may be due to the fact that 80 to 90 percent of the body’s total serotonin is found within the stomach. When we are low on serotonin levels, our guts sends our brains messages, which may explain why we desperately crave chocolate covered strawberries at two in the morning for seemingly no good reason.
Fortunately there are steps we can take to increase our serotonin levels when we go through these emotional funks, and prevent junk food binges. Here are some tips I have found helpful for keeping food cravings at bay during difficult times.
1) Replace excessive cravings for carbohydrates with protein. Why? Because overeating carbs such as sugars can actually lead to a decrease in serotonin levels. The best article I read on boosting serotonin, entitled “Understanding Our Bodies: Serotonin, The Connection Between Food and Mood” in the blog Nutrition Wonderland, recommends food high in protein like nuts, fish, yogurt, milk, meat, and eggs.
2) Avoid extreme dieting. Studies have shown that women who greatly reduce calorie intake and completely cut out carbs from their diet can have dramatic decreases in serotonin levels. This most likely explains my own vicious cycle between eating healthfully during the day and binging at night.
3) Try Vitamin B supplements. In a study of women who took Vitamin B supplements for an entire year, results indicated that these women had increased levels of serotonin and experienced a greater sense of well being.
4) Get outside. Sunlight and exposure to nature help to boost serotonin levels.
5) Get sleep. A lack of sleep can actually prevent proper serotonin signaling in our brains.
6) Engage in activities that naturally boost your mood. Try mediation, yoga, working out or any other activity that takes your mind away from that Dairy Queen Blizzard.
I don’t know about you, but it makes me feel better to know that when I overeat it is not necessarily because I lack willpower or strength. With this in mind, I can stop beating myself up and learn to better deal with neurotransmitter triggers that cause me to binge on junk food. Most importantly, I can begin to take care of my body’s need for serotonin without giving into unhealthy cravings.
Camille Schwartz is a writer for the Voice and can be reached for comment at CSchwartz14@wooster.edu. She writes a blog about healthy living called “Conscious Indulgence” which can be found at consciousindulgence.blogspot.com.