Studies have shown that cravings are highly dependent on your mood. Food does more than fill you up, it also satisfies your feelings.  If you avoid dealing with your feelings by indulging in your favorite food when you’re not hungry, you are eating emotionally. A person might be driven to eat comfort food to avoid what they are coping with internally.

When an individual eats his or her favorite food, a pleasure chemical called dopamine is released to the brain.  This is why eating may fill a void in a person’s life; however, the feeling is only temporary. When you finish eating your treat, it goes away.  This is an immense reason as to why many people over-eat junk food.  But emotional eating doesn’t just entail eating when you’re gloomy, or bored, it can also be used to simply maintain a good mood.

If you struggle with unhealthy cravings, a way to destroy them is by brushing your teeth. Brushing and flossing distracts you from that tasty treat you’ve been thinking about, and it leaves you with a minty taste in your mouth, one that you won’t want to ruin with the taste of food. Don’t forget about how much you’ll impress your dentist the next time you go in for a check-up.

Another good option is chewing gum.  It is likely gum will quench your craving and prevent you from consuming a large amount of calories when you feel like you are about to eat for reasons other than hunger.

 It is also essential to stay hydrated because many people mistake thirst for water as hunger. This is different than emotional eating but it will cause you to eat when you’re not actually physically hungry. There are several discrepancies between actual physical hunger and emotional eating. You will notice that if you are physically hungry it can wait, but if you are craving something, you feel like you need it immediately. The urge to eat that specific food happens suddenly, while real hunger occurs gradually. Another way to tell the difference is that if you are craving food, only that specific food will satisfy you. If you are actually though, you have more options to quench your hunger. When you’re eating to satisfy your feelings, it is more common that you will over eat, and if you’re eating because you’re actually hungry, you are more likely to stop when you’re full. In addition, emotional feelings can leave behind feelings of guilt; physical hunger doesn’t.

If one continues the bad habit of “eating their feelings,” this person may eventually struggle with health risks. Now you now why you get cravings and how to be proactive to stop those crazy cravings right in there tacks. Don’t let mood swings make you reach for the cookie jar any longer.