Holly Bertone - Emotional eating
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[00:00:00] Elizabeth : Welcome back to the Woman of Wellness podcast. I'm so excited. I have a great guest here today. We're going to be talking all about emotional eating, which if you're, if you're, if you've listened to even one or more of my podcasts, we talk so much about emotional eating. So I'm so excited to have an expert. We've got Holly here to talk with us about eating and all of that. So before we dive in, don't you share a little bit more about yourself with us, your story, why you talk about this, why this is so important to you.
[00:00:31] Holly Bertone: Oh, yeah. And thank you so much, Elizabeth, for having me on the show. And it's just, it's great to be here. And yeah, again, my name's Holly Bertone, and I'm a certified holistic health coach. And I specialize in helping women and more specifically women in midlife who are high achieving have successful careers.
[00:00:48] Break those emotional eating habits and, and patterns and triggers so that they can achieve sustainable, healthy weight loss. And I'm going to tell you right [00:01:00] now, I'm very much against the traditional diet culture. And I was an emotional eater when I was 50 pounds overweight. I was an emotional eater when I was 110 pounds, I was thin, I was healthy.
[00:01:14] I was a. I'm a mountain bike racer and an XTERRA triathlete, and I have struggled with this, um, pretty much, you know, almost my entire life. And you know, it's interesting because you get a health coaching certification and you learn a lot of information and you get a piece of paper that you can put on a wall.
[00:01:35] And everything that I, I teach, everything that I. No, and how I help my clients. It comes from my own battling my own monsters and also from the years of experience that I had as the chief of staff for FBI counterintelligence and [00:02:00] because What I learned there was number one, how to, how to really identify those patterns to connect us to that threat, to, to find the blind spot.
[00:02:15] We all kind of know what we know and we know what we don't know, but we don't know what that blind spot is. So to really peel back the onion layers, to identify the pattern so that we can get to that blind spot and then look at those, those trends. And to be able to stay ahead of the threat, and that's what I used to do in FBI counterintelligence and is exactly what I do as a health coach.
[00:02:42] And so many people are like, how did you get from point A to point B? And, and that's exactly it. And it's funny because the skills are identical. A threat is a threat, you know, and, and you think about it and we, you know, kind of jokingly, you know, the FBI, we had Russian spies. That was our threat and counterintelligence.[00:03:00]
[00:03:00] In everyday life, it's cake day at the office, it's, you know, driving, you're, you, you have to work late at night and you're driving by Chick fil A and the car just automatically goes to the drive thru because you, you want to reward yourself for making it through a tough day. You're like, you know what? I want to reward myself.
[00:03:20] I am, I'm not going to make dinner tonight, I'm just going to stop at the drive thru. Or that threat is, you know, you, you get in an argument with, you know, a friend or a spouse or something and you're like reaching into the freezer and getting that ice cream out. So a threat is a threat. So it's really to be able to not just stay ahead of that threat, but to identify those patterns so that we can get to the root cause of those threats and to be able to.
[00:03:47] Elizabeth : break.
[00:03:49] Holly Bertone: release them
[00:03:50] Elizabeth : be
[00:03:52] Holly Bertone: of them. And as someone who has struggled with this, you know, like I said, my entire life, I know that.
[00:03:58] Elizabeth : back
[00:03:59] Holly Bertone: [00:04:00] present day
[00:04:01] Elizabeth : just
[00:04:03] Holly Bertone: am in that place of such overwhelm. I feel it. I don't act on it, but I feel it. And I think for some people that release can be a release forever.
[00:04:14] I think for some people it's an addiction that they may struggle with for the rest of their life. So that's why I am so passionate about this topic and about helping women with overcoming emotional eating.
[00:04:30] Elizabeth : Yeah, and I, I think we could probably all agree, you know, maybe we don't, we don't all have the same job that you do. That you had, right. That was a high stress job. But one thing that I am, I think this is really important to understand is a lot of the emotions are the same, right? If you feel overwhelmed, you can feel overwhelmed in a really high powered job, or you can feel overwhelmed with kids running around the house or, uh, overwhelmed with your schedule.
[00:04:55] And so recognizing that these emotions are all the same, [00:05:00] regardless of. Uh, situation, regardless of stage of life season, right, we can experience all of them. And so I'm excited because you have been in different stages of life and you're going to teach us, you're, you're going to teach us kind of, you know, what it looks like to heal emotional eating, right? Make peace with food, um, without, or being able to make peace with food. while also recognizing that those emotions are going to come in, right? They're part of life. So, since we're kind of talking about emotional eating, I think that's a little bit of a trigger word, and it can mean a lot of different things for a lot of different people. So, what do you think is the biggest, I don't know, what people don't understand about emotional eating, or the misconception around the phrase emotional eating? Is it good? Is it bad? Like, let's talk about it.
[00:05:56] Holly Bertone: Yeah. So let's first talk about that word emotion. And you [00:06:00] brought up a really good point is, you know, you can be in any stage of life and in any situation, those emotions can be big and they can be overpowering. The overwhelm, the stress, the anger, the betrayal, the agitation, the jealousy. I mean, you name these big emotions.
[00:06:17] They, they are big. And when those, those wounds aren't healed, we have these triggers. And I like to think of it from the perspective, if you've ever played the game whack a mole at one of those, you know, kind of summer carnivals that you go to. And it's almost like that. Like you think about, Something happens and, and I love to say, and I'm going to answer your question here in a second, but I just want to kind of give a, give a little bit of context.
[00:06:43] Let's say you don't get a good night's sleep, right? So when you don't get a good night's sleep, we're typically a lot more agitated the next day. So something that may not normally bother you, you're just like, oh, and you just kind of get that agitation. And I like to think [00:07:00] of it like that game of whack a mole, like the, the little, the whack a mole comes up and you take, you know, the, the, the, the trigger and emotional eating becomes that mallet and you just start pounding the whack a mole back in the hole, you know, and you're like, oh, you, you know, grab the Reese's coffee, you grab the ice cream, you grab the chips.
[00:07:19] And you whack that mole down and then something else pops up and it's kind of the same thing. And I like to think of emotion eating like that game of, of whack a mole because until we can get to that root cause, there's always going to be something it's, it's called life. It's every single day, there's going to be a rainy day.
[00:07:36] There's going to be, you're running later, you know, the kids got something or, you know, it's anything and everything. And depending on your mood and your state is going to be dependent upon how big those reactions can be. And our emotions are not, they're not good or bad. They're not really negative or positive.
[00:07:56] They're just feedback. They're just information. And I think so too. [00:08:00] So often we think of, you know, the, the anger, the fear, the stress, the worry, the overwhelm, all of these big emotions is something bad or negative. And all it is is information. It's our body having a conversation. with us to say, okay, here is the situation.
[00:08:14] Here's how you're reacting. And then our brain always wants to go to homeostasis. It always wants to be in this. I like to think of a brain's homeostasis. It's like when you're cuddled up watching, you know, Hallmark lifetime movies, right? You got the fireplace going and the puppies sound asleep next to you.
[00:08:31] Like that's homeostasis. That's. where our brain wants to be in all the time. So it's always looking for this regulation. So just wanted to say a little bit of context before we kind of get into answering your question and really addressing, you know, what can be a charged topic when we talk about emotions and emotional eating.
[00:08:48] But I think the biggest misconception, and especially with the women that I work with, typically they are. Successful. They're high achievers. They, you know, have a successful job. They've, they've, [00:09:00] you know, risen to the ranks in their careers and or, you know, have these amazing families. They're running their families, you know, so, so one or the other or both, and they're very, very successful at what they've accomplished.
[00:09:13] And all of the, the discipline and the habits, I see you've got atomic habits, you know, behind you, you know, all of these things that we've learned that make us successful in life. The discipline, the habits, the willpower, the, you know, just, just powering through it. I mean, we're women, we just power through it.
[00:09:30] We just get it done. And we have these skills that were pillars of our community and all of these areas in our life that were so successful. But when it comes to. Losing weight when it comes to emotional eating, we feel like none of this works because we think, Oh, I just need to try harder. Oh, I just need to have more discipline.
[00:09:55] Oh, I just need to have more willpower. Oh, I just need to be good, right? When [00:10:00] you're walking into that situation, when you know you're going to that, you know, dinner party or you're going out to eat, you know, there's going to be the dessert. Or, you know, it's cake day at the office and, and you're like, I'm going to be good.
[00:10:12] And you, you have that running through your head, but then the food's in front of you. And the next thing you know, you're, the plate's gone and the food's gone, the plate's got crumbs on it. So I think one of the biggest misconceptions is that we use the same skills and tools to make us successful in all other areas of our life, but they don't work when it comes to this.
[00:10:38] And then we can't figure out why.
[00:10:42] Elizabeth : Yeah, and you kind of mentioned a couple of things that I think are really important to point out. Um, first of all, emotions are feedback. So when you were talking about the whack a mole, a lot of times, it's We can consider that a very reactive approach, right? We're constantly [00:11:00] whacking at the emotions and the, and the whacking is maybe turning to the food or whatever. Um, and so it's very, very reactive, but when we can step out of a reactive space and into more of a proactive space where it's like, okay, I, I identify, you know, we first have to identify this emotion. I identify that as I'm feeling an emotion that's leading me to want to eat and. It allows us to create a little bit of that feedback loop of, okay, now what do I do with that emotion?
[00:11:32] Right? Rather than I'm just going to whack them all down because we can't always control the emotion. Sometimes things, bad things happen in life and
[00:11:40] Holly Bertone: Yeah.
[00:11:41] Elizabeth : hard things and we feel feelings, especially as women. And.
[00:11:46] Holly Bertone: I'm, I'm 53 and dating for the first time in 16 years. So yeah,
[00:11:51] Elizabeth : Yeah, so lots of emotions,
[00:11:53] Holly Bertone: lots of emotions.
[00:11:54] Elizabeth : And learning how to navigate those as, maybe this was one that [00:12:00] you said roundabout misconception is that eating isn't really all a bad thing because it gives you a clue to be able to prevent it. So do you want to expand on that? Or did you have any other thoughts about, you know, why, Why it's kind of that trigger phrase, I'm an emotional eater.
[00:12:22] Holly Bertone: Yeah. I mean, and I think it's, and it's back to that automatic response, you know, the, the, the trigger response and when, all right, so let's say we're going on a diet, okay. And. So things happen. You get excited about the diet. You say I'm going to lose weight and that at first week or so you get like kind of amped up and you get excited.
[00:12:52] But then one of two things happen. Either the thing itself gets hard. So I'm gonna be [00:13:00] restricting calories or I'm gonna be exercising more. I'm gonna try to eat healthier. So either that gets hard because sometimes it does get hard. Or life happens and life gets hard, which makes it harder to do the thing that you want to do.
[00:13:16] And in both of those cases, when either one of those happen, that's when it is the easiest to quit trying to go on a diet, trying to get healthier, you know, whether it's a new year's resolution, whether it's another Monday. Whether it's trying to get ready for, you know, vacation or swimsuit season or whatever.
[00:13:37] But when the situation gets hard, that's when those triggers can really rear their, their ugly heads. Right? And, and it makes that situation that those triggers happen. And you're like, this is where everyone quits. This is the valley of despair. And when you can actually recognize that and say, okay, [00:14:00] I know that this is actually going to happen.
[00:14:03] So a lot of it is that awareness as well and say, I know this is going to happen. Either the thing is going to get hard, which, you know, I mean, if you're, you know, and, um, Separating emotional eating and weight loss, but so often they go hand in hand. So you're trying to get healthier, you're trying to lose weight, you're trying to stop this emotional eating, and the thing gets hard.
[00:14:23] Or the situation gets hard, and that's when everyone quits. And that's what I really like to say, and look at this from this perspective of We know this is the place that everyone quits back to the FBI, like we got to stay ahead of the threat. So what is that gap between I'm really excited and I can stay on this path to this is the exact place where I have quit every single time before and everyone else has quit as well, right?
[00:14:53] So what is that gap in between? And that's what we have to uncover because once we can figure out that gap and it's going to be different for everyone. [00:15:00] Once we can figure out that gap, right, like we've got a path, we've got a game plan.
[00:15:05] Elizabeth : Yeah. Explain that a little bit more for us, you know, like how do you help people discover that gap or out their unique place in the gap?
[00:15:16] Holly Bertone: Okay, so I'll actually give a perfect example of this and then I'll kind of explain what it is. So I'll show the story first and I'll explain. Uh, earlier last year, I was speaking at MIT and I had a very tight, uh, flight schedule to get there and get back. And so I did all the preparation that I can, but you know, I mean, in any kind of.
[00:15:38] travel, there's going to be that anxiety of I need to get to the place, right? I mean, we're all getting on a plane because we need to get to a place. Well, they came on and said, the plane's just going to be delayed. They didn't say how long. And everyone's just kind of like, okay, whatever. 30 minutes later, they're like, we're still going to be delayed another 30 minutes.
[00:15:58] And at that point, people were starting to get a [00:16:00] little agitated. That was when people started going up to the counter and they started yelling at the attendant. Like I need to get to wherever and they couldn't get them on any other plane because everything was was so so they're yelling at the attendant and then the next time they announced the delight and I'm just there I'm on my laptop I'm just working just watching everyone and the next time I see people actually get up they go over to the Dunkin Donuts and they get bagels, bags of bagels, bags of donuts.
[00:16:32] They go over to the bar and they're drinking and just scrolling on their phone eight o'clock in the morning. So this is kind of an automatic response that we have to a big stressor. And when we can look at it from being in that that sympathetic stress state, the fight, flight, freezer, fine response. So when we can start to uncover, okay, [00:17:00] when I am put in that situation, when those triggers happen, how do I uncover this?
[00:17:06] Is it a, is it a fight, flight, freeze, or fine? So the fight response, I mean, the people, you know, yelling at the, at the attendant, or let's say you get home after a rough day, and you just tear open that bag of chips and just start eating, right? So that would be a fight, a fight response. Your flight response is, um, eating while you're distracted or maybe eating while you're working.
[00:17:32] Like when I was at the FBII was notorious. I would take a family sized bag of m and ms and peanut, of course, because protein and I would dump them out. I'd mix them up, color code them, and I would speed eat them with my left hand while I'm cranking out PowerPoint decks with my right hand. So that's another response.
[00:17:55] Um, you've got your freeze response. That would be numbing [00:18:00] out what they were doing. Um, you know, whether you're going to use food maybe as procrastination, or maybe when you feel overwhelmed. Um, things like that. Like, I'm just, like, I don't even know what to do. Or maybe I'm bored, maybe I'm lonely, and I'm just going to eat.
[00:18:20] Right. And then finally is your fond response. And this is when you're going to eat to appease other people. Right. So you're at dinner, everyone's ordering dessert. You don't want to order dessert, but we're brought up to be the good girls. We've all been brought up to be the good girl. So we don't want to hurt anyone's feelings.
[00:18:37] So we're just going to say yes. Um, you know, things like sitting in front of the TV at night, you know, maybe your habits making a bowl of popcorn and just snacking on popcorn. Popcorn's low in calories, you know, still snacking on it. You're still numbing out and, you know, binging and probably scrolling on your phone at the same time.
[00:18:59] Right? So [00:19:00] these are kind of signs that, okay, hey, I'm, I'm using food as this coping mechanism.
[00:19:05] Elizabeth : Yeah, I want, I want to, to like pinpoint those a little bit more because I love this. If, if someone was saying, okay, Um, we've kind of covered that misconception of, you know, the emotions aren't bad. Let's not, let's not get mad at the emotions, but let's talk about the response to the emotions and then identifying the response to those emotions. We've got fight, flight, freeze, and what was the other one? Spell that.
[00:19:33] Holly Bertone: F A W N. Like a deer?
[00:19:36] Elizabeth : Okay.
[00:19:37] Holly Bertone: Like a deer. Fawn.
[00:19:39] Elizabeth : Like be sweet.
[00:19:40] Holly Bertone: Mm hmm.
[00:19:41] Elizabeth : Okay. And so I just, I'm just thinking, you know, as everyone was sitting here, think about what, may be a typical response for you. Would you, would you say that certain people trend toward a similar response? Like do certain people, um, they usually do [00:20:00] this? I would probably say, I'm trying to think, um, you know, when I was in the thick of emotional eating and struggling with my relationship with food, it was always turning. It was always just getting food to say, I made it through the day, right? I accomplished something. I just, I don't, it was either like I passed a test and that was awesome or I just made it through the day. So I deserve it. Where would that fit into those four categories?
[00:20:24] Holly Bertone: Yeah. So, um, reward eating, I think is what should be under freeze. Um, and I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, but reward eating is a big one. Um, I was always a big reward eater. And I think, again, this is just how we're brought up, right? We get a good grade, we get taken out for ice cream and we associate at a very early age food with a reward.
[00:20:50] And we also use that food to just kind of numb and comfort us. So, you know, so all of these emotions, and I think there's going to [00:21:00] be some, there's, there's definitely going to be some dominant patterns, but I think anytime any one of these can emerge.
[00:21:07] Elizabeth : Yeah. just kind of helpful for people to know, okay, am I using emotions to turn to food, right? And identifying that and then having, having awareness. I think that's the biggest thing that you have shared with us is having some awareness of recognizing that, Oh, this is an emotion. I'm feeling this. And then I do something with it. Right. So
[00:21:35] Holly Bertone: And, and sorry, can I, can I add one more thing real quick? So, and I want to talk about another emotion that's really common, but this emotion comes after the emotional eating, and that's either going to be shame and, or guilt. And, or punishment. So, we have this big emotion. We use food to comfort that [00:22:00] emotion.
[00:22:00] To, to regulate our nervous system. To keep our brain in homeostasis. And then afterwards, there's a lot of shame. You know, or even things like, um, I know a lot of women who will go out in public and they'll have a, you know, a salad. I call it the sad little salad for lunch. Because they want to put up appearances that they're eating healthy and then they go home and just binge on the treats.
[00:22:27] So, so we feel guilty afterwards because in our heads we're like, oh, I know I shouldn't have done that. And then there's this shame, like, why did I do that? Why can't I stop? Why am I a failure? Why do I keep doing this? Why do I do this all of the time? And, or. The punishment of now I need to go to the gym and work out extra hard or now I need to skip my next meal, right?
[00:22:53] So we have all of these narratives that continue to go on and it's just this [00:23:00] cycle that that continues. So I did want to address. The shame, the guilt, and the punishment as well, because they, they close out that cycle.
[00:23:09] Elizabeth : Yeah, the, the starting emotion and the ending emotion and it, and it causes the cycle to continue. Right. We feel shame. We get desperate to change or we, you know, feel shame. So we experienced more emotions than we eat more. Um, and it's a vicious cycle. So. There, there's probably a lot of different methods for dealing with emotional eating. And I'm just curious, do you see any trends in this space that you would be like, uh, that's not that way, or, or just like kind of what's not working when people talk about here, try this for your emotional eating struggles.
[00:23:49] Holly Bertone: Yeah. So my favorite one to debunk is everything in moderation. And that is like nails on a chalkboard for me, because. Well, and [00:24:00] here's the thing is that if you are fully, fully emotionally regulated, you don't use food as a coping mechanism. If you are within your healthy weight range and you're happy where you are, you can get away a lot more with everything in moderation.
[00:24:19] But if you're trying to lose weight and or you're struggling with emotional eating, everything in moderation is not going to work because everything in moderation becomes everything. Right? It's not a moderation. It is everything. And when, and I know a lot of people, when they have that, that food addiction, it's not, I, I, you, they say, what was it, the commercial, you can't just eat one?
[00:24:47] It's hard to eat one. You know, can you really open up that bag of cookies? and eat just one. For me, Girl Scout cookie season time, it was an entire sleeve of Thin Mints and [00:25:00] sometimes the entire box. It was not just one. And even if you do this thing, you portion out your treats. I was that person. I know a lot of my clients portion out their treats and they're like, I'm going to portion out my treats.
[00:25:14] Well, what happens? You go after the bags. So now you have all of these bags of portioned treats and then you just go after the bags of the portioned treats. So even the portioned treats don't work. Remember the little snack bowls, the individual 100 calorie? You open up the box and they have it perfectly portioned out.
[00:25:31] Okay, just one little bag, 100 calories. Well, the entire box ends up disappearing. So for a lot of women, it's that moderation doesn't work until those underlying root cause can be addressed. And even then sometimes moderation doesn't work. I mean, to the point of even comparing it to one drink to an alcoholic to, to be that, to be that severe,
[00:25:56] Elizabeth : It's.
[00:25:57] Holly Bertone: here's, here's the thing too.
[00:25:59] Is that [00:26:00] when you get to that place, and I know so many women who have lost the weight and they get to that place and they're like, Oh, now I can eat normal again. And then they start eating quote unquote normal. They follow this everything in moderation and all of a sudden the food gets more and more and the weight starts to creep back on and then it becomes again, this, this.
[00:26:24] This, this self cycle of gaining the weight, losing the weight, gaining the weight, losing the weight and emotional eating is always right there at the root cause. So everything in moderation can work for some people, but if someone is struggling with their weight and or struggling with emotional eating.
[00:26:43] It is probably not going to work, at least in my experience.
[00:26:47] Elizabeth : do. hear what you do. I, I think this could be a bit of a controversial conversation moment, um, where it's like, okay, well, how do I, how do I enjoy treats or food without feeling [00:27:00] like I mean, how do I get out of that space of all or nothing? Because a lot of times, if you say moderation in all things, the opposite here could be all or nothing, right?
[00:27:10] Um, and that can also be really scary for someone that has a tricky relationship with food. So, speak to that a little bit with someone that goes, Wait a minute, what do you mean I can't have moderation in all things? This doesn't make sense.
[00:27:24] Holly Bertone: Absolutely. And I'm glad you brought that up because it really depends. It really depends on the person and the personality and what, and I just kind of like to say the monsters, because I call it, you know, the monsters that I've dealt with and the monsters that they're kind of dealing with. And until we get to the other side of this is, you know, Some clients and I mean, and I've got one, I would think it was like 10 days in the program and she came back to me and she said, I was, um, I was out to dinner.
[00:27:50] I ordered chocolate molten lava cake. Okay, if you put chocolate molten lava cake in front of me, I'd eat the whole thing. Right? She took 1 bite and she put the fork [00:28:00] down and she's like, I just. There was no deprivation, there was no, like, willpower, she's like, I just did what you taught me, and I just put the fork down, and she goes, and I felt so proud of myself, and I was like, wow, that's impressive.
[00:28:11] Whereas other people, like me, I just wouldn't eat the whole, I just wouldn't touch it, because I knew that that would be a gateway to eating the whole thing. So I think it depends on the personality, and how that emotional regulation is there, and how much that addiction is there as well. So, you know, but what we do then is replace those treats.
[00:28:34] with healthier options. So, for example, sugar is extremely addicting. And it's like, oh, Holly, you're telling me I can't eat sugar?
[00:28:44] Elizabeth : room who are going to be
[00:28:46] Holly Bertone: Can you?
[00:28:46] Elizabeth : and we're
[00:28:47] Holly Bertone: Right? Is it working?
[00:28:48] Elizabeth : couple
[00:28:48] Holly Bertone: And sugar is very addicting.
[00:28:51] Elizabeth : I'm going
[00:28:52] Holly Bertone: Um, I work with a lot of cancer survivors. I'm a cancer survivor myself.
[00:28:55] Elizabeth : his
[00:28:56] Holly Bertone: Uh, sugar is very detrimental, especially to,
[00:28:59] Elizabeth : to
[00:28:59] Holly Bertone: know,[00:29:00]
[00:29:00] Elizabeth : see his
[00:29:00] Holly Bertone: to individuals who are cancer patients, cancer survivors.
[00:29:04] Elizabeth : have
[00:29:04] Holly Bertone: Um, it's not that I'm against a little bit of sugar, but at the same time, I think as a society, we have so much of it and it is in everything. So my own personal choice, I've been sugar free for a very long time. It's just my own personal choice. I don't say that anyone has to be sugar free. But if that is a choice, I help them get to the other side and let's replace that sugar, typically with healthy fats, healthy fats is the best place, the best way to replace that sugar, because the healthy fats are going to go right to your brain and make your brain happy.
[00:29:42] Things like, uh, avocado, things like, uh, nuts, as long as they're again in moderation, um, things like, you know, wild salmon. Wild caught salmon, you know, some, some fatty fish, some olive oils, even, you know, real, real butter, things like that. You're [00:30:00] healthy fats. They're going to go right to your brain and they're going to make your brain happy.
[00:30:04] And that is going to be a really good replacement for sugar.
[00:30:09] Elizabeth : Yeah, so what you're kind of saying here is we're trying to replace the addiction and to, so naturally sugar has addictive properties, right? And so we, um, We recognize that and we don't want to maybe the trend that we might think is like quote food freedom where I have freedom with food that doesn't mean a free for all, but rather I like to call them, you know, setting some boundaries or some guidelines for yourself.
[00:30:41] And I think that's kind of what you're giving us is okay, recognizing certain certain foods can cause. Um, certain behaviors, certain addictions, and how can we replace that food addiction with maybe a food [00:31:00] that satisfies Um, that part of the brain, right? That needs those things in a better way.
[00:31:07] Holly Bertone: And, and I like coming at it from both perspectives too. We come at it from the emotional regulation perspective, and then we come at it from the, are you eating the right kind of food, the right quantity of food, you know, the right types of food. So if you are full and satiated, you're going to be less apt to reach for those emotional triggered foods.
[00:31:30] Right. But if it's a really bad day, all bets are off if you're not emotionally regulated. So I like coming at it from, from both perspectives. In fact, I was working with a client last night and her, the majority of what we worked with her was on her food. Was that she actually wasn't eating enough and she wasn't eating enough food that filled her up.
[00:31:49] So it wasn't so much the emotional, I mean, the emotional was a smaller component, but the bigger component was she just wasn't eating. And, you know, that right there [00:32:00] is, is, is going to solve a big piece of it. So I like coming at it as a holistic health coach. I like looking at the entire puzzle. You know, looking at everything and looking at all the pieces and see how all the pieces fit together to find that best solution for that individual, because again, we're all different.
[00:32:20] Elizabeth : Yeah. And if we're not getting the right nutrition, we can't rely on our bodies to give us the signals that we need, right? To be able to manage those emotions. So why don't you just give us one. First step, if someone said, you know, I'm an emotional eater, I identify with one of those four responses. I identify with the things that you're talking about right now. Uh, I'm a little nervous about your moderation and all things, um, you know, not approach, I guess. And what would you say to them? Just a quick takeaway. Where can I start to this healing process?
[00:32:56] Holly Bertone: Oh, that's such a great way to end this conversation, [00:33:00] Elizabeth, because I love this and I love. You know, going to leave your listeners with a great takeaway that they can do and it's basically going to take you 60 seconds and awareness is the biggest thing. I mean, awareness is going to give you the biggest amount of power is that when you are aware, you can start to make decisions.
[00:33:19] So the, the, the exercise is when you feel these big emotions coming on, when you feel yourself, you know, reaching for the ice cream Reese's reaching for the Reese's cup, reaching for the bag of chips or the cookies. Is to actually just stop, put your, put your watch or your, your phone, 60 seconds. That's it.
[00:33:38] 60 seconds. You can do longer if you want, but 60 seconds and just take a pause and ask yourself, what am I feeling? What emotion am I feeling specifically? Name it. Why am I feeling this emotion? Am I [00:34:00] really hungry or is it something else that my body is craving right now? So name the emotion specifically.
[00:34:08] Why am I feeling this emotion? Am I really hungry? And what is my body really craving right now? And here's what's going to happen. The win is in the pause. The win does not is, is not about what you do after the pause. The win is in the pause and after those 60 seconds and after you answer those questions, You may decide to go drink a glass of water.
[00:34:38] You may decide to go do something else. You may decide to go for a walk or just go about your business. Or, you may still dig into the food. But the awareness was the win. And that's one of the most important things because I think so often, you know, I have, I have clients come in and they're like, Oh, Holly.
[00:34:56] Uh, I really messed up. I ate two cookies and then I realized what I was doing and [00:35:00] I stopped and I went through, you know, I went, I went through some of these exercises and I, and I stopped and I put it down and I was like, okay, I was like, that's the win. The win wasn't like, don't worry about the two cookies.
[00:35:11] The win was in the stop and the awareness. And the more we can train ourselves to, to stop, to pause, to be aware of our feelings and our emotions and what we're doing, the more we can make those decisions. And the, the, the win is really the awareness.
[00:35:28] Elizabeth : I love that. So you, now you have a takeaway. You have 60 seconds, anytime you feel like you're going for the food or you, or you're feeling something, just pause for 60 seconds and now you have a dialogue, um, to work on. And so we'll make sure, I think it'd be really fun to kind of include that, um, in our, a newsletter.
[00:35:46] I'll kind of write it out so someone can just print it off, which will be really nice so they can just follow along because that's such a good dialogue within 60 seconds. I can have a conversation with myself to go back to the awareness, right? Go back to, um, the feedback of [00:36:00] what's going on. What am I feeling?
[00:36:01] Where is this coming from and why, and what can I do about it? That's so powerful. So thank you so much for sharing your expertise with us today. Holly, will you just tell everyone where we can find you? Um, and, and if they want more support,
[00:36:14] Holly Bertone: Yes, absolutely. So the best place, uh, two places, uh, the best place number one is your midlife comeback story podcast. And I would recommend scroll down a little bit to episode one 36, and it's called uncover your covert weight loss. Uh, block using FBI tactics. It's one of my favorite episodes. Um, so it's, it's just a lot of fun.
[00:36:36] And so your midlife comeback story podcast, episode 136. And then the other place I hang out is Instagram. And that's just my name at Holly dot Bertone B E R T O N E. And, uh, in my Lincoln bio, there's a, there's a quiz that you can take as well to uncover. Your own, um, uh, self sabotage and find out [00:37:00] what the strategy is on the other side to, to get past it.
[00:37:04] Elizabeth : awesome. Thank you.
[00:37:05] Holly Bertone: Yeah. Thank you.
