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Carlee
Have you ever eaten your feelings? If you have, you're not alone and you've made it to the right place. I'm Carlee Myers, your friendly, stress management expert. And this month, we're talking about physical health. Now, I've brought on a good friend and emotional eating expert, Jessica Procini. Now she is on a mission to help high achieving women heal the roots of their emotional eating so that they can use food as fuel rather than as a way to cope, soothe or attempt to escape from their busy, stressful lives. Now, from over a decade of research and her own personal emotional eating journey, Jessica consciously created her uniquely effective escape from emotional eating process and programs because, quite frankly, Overeaters Anonymous didn't resonate with her, and the nine hundred thirty two hours she spent in therapy never helped her and her fight with food. I laugh. We've all been there right now being one hundred percent free from her compulsions with food. Jessica helps other high achieving women do the same. Through all her levels of support, such as her year long transformational programs, her retreats called The Escape and through her various public talks, events and workshops. Jessica, I am so excited to have you back on the show.
Jessica
Yay! I'm so happy to be here.
Carlee
So, you know, I've heard your story before. Some of the folks that list tuned into your last episode have heard it. But it's been probably about a year since you've been on. And I think your story is so powerful. So would you mind your humoring us and share a little bit about how you ended up here, how you ended up in this line of work?
Jessica
Yes. So from about the time that I was six years old, which is my first memory, I always had a very love, hate tortuous relationship with food. It was the first thing that I thought about when I woke up. It would haunt me all throughout the day and it would be the thing that I would think about right before I closed my eyes at night. Food always had control over me. And as I moved through my life and life got more and more difficult, especially the most challenging times. Food was a safety blanket for me. It was a place that I would find comfort. I would soothe myself and try to armor up for the really stressful, overwhelming life that I lived. And as time went on and my issues, just food got worse, I got really clear that food wasn't really the problem. It was everything underneath the food that was the problem. And I had tried to talk to friends about it and they couldn't understand what I was going through. I tried to seek help and they just wanted to put me on antidepressants. And I never fit the stereotype of Overeaters Anonymous. I didn't have hundreds of pounds to lose. I knew how to eat healthy. I just wasn't doing it. And it was at that point that I really felt hopeless and deeply misunderstood, that I got really clear that there had to be another way. There had to be another way to heal my relationship with food. And it was through 10 years of discovery and research that I uncovered the four roots of emotional eating. And from that I really dedicated my personal experience to healing them. And when I did, everything changed. Now, fast forward to today. It's been over four and a half years since I have emotionally eaten or overeaten in any capacity. I have a peaceful, nourishing, healthy relationship with food. Food is a nourishing asset. It is no longer a way that I hide or escape or destroy myself. It is literally the thing that is the foundation on which everything is built. And now I help other people like myself who have a very stressful, high achieving lifestyle and need to use food as fuel instead of a way to self-destruct.
Carlee
I love that. And it gets me every time, you know, I have clients who have shared some of a very similar story. Right. And, you know, going into Overeaters Anonymous, for instance, and not fitting that they didn't feel like I don't I don't belong here, I look normal. But my relationship behind closed doors with food is so unhealthy. And then going into the restriction piece, you know, like, you can never eat this food ever again. And I know that you don't teach that you know all about, you know, how fixing the root, getting to the root. And I really I really love that. So I just wanna be clear. How would you define, you know, for our listeners? Like what? How would you define emotional eating?
Jessica
So I define emotional eating as using food for a purpose other than fuel. Plain and simple. Keep it clear. So this has nothing to do with what you are eating. So you can over eat healthy food, which I did for a very long period of time and was under the illusion that I wasn't emotionally eating because I wasn't eating 10 bags of potato chips. But whether you're eating, you know, something healthy or not does not constitute emotional eating. It's about why you are eating. And for me, it was to avoid, distract, to numb, to celebrate. It was all the emotional stuff.
Carlee
Yeah.
Jessica
And and emotional eating also has nothing to do with quantity. You don't sort of cross a threshold once you have five cookies, right. It's like the little things and the little aspects where we are not in integrity. And that's what emotional eating is. And healing it is really about is about coming back into integrity with your physical needs, your emotional needs, and having those needs met in a healthy way.
Carlee
Yes, I love that. And I keep thinking about that commercial. I don't even know if it was a commercial, but I remember hearing Oprah say like she was over eating almonds and I was like, how is that possible? Like, I would never eat. Like, I don't like almonds that much. I'm like, how is that possible? But, you know, like, it's true. Like, she she thought she went to like, well, I'm eating healthy, so I'm not. It doesn't matter. But it's that's where emotional eating shows up. So I'm curious. I'm curious because like thinking about. Oprah, like, you know, the Weight Watchers trends and the diets and the meal plans and the like. All of that. What is your take on that and what can we do if we're like, oh, crap. This is me. I'm eating my feelings?
Jessica
Yeah. So the diet, the meal plans, portion control cleanses and you name it, everything under the sun does not help emotional eating. It completely misses the roots of what's going on and what truly is, you know, at the core of it. And instead, we need to get to the roots. And that's what my work is all about. That's what I'm so passionate about communicating is that it's not about what you're eating. It's about everything underneath that. And I've discovered the four roots of emotional eating, and we must focus on that because it's basically like a weed in your garden. Right. You can either chop it off at the soil level, which is, you know, the diets and the meal plans and just trying to manage it through healthy eating. Or you can do the real work and pull it out at the root. And that's what I'm really all about. So we have to be willing to have a different kind of conversation around what we are doing with food and really take a deeper look at why we feel compulsive. And what are we trying to avoid? And what are we trying to distract from?
Carlee
Mm hmm. So if we if we are listening, we're like, OK, I'm I'm tired of weed whacking the lawn. I'm tired of being in that space. And I'm ready to get to the root what is maybe a first step that we can take to like on our own right now to to head in the right direction.
Jessica
Yeah. So I have a free resource on my Web site that goes in-depth to what the four roots are. And from that, you can really self identify. And we can start to have a deeper conversation. And that's escape from emotional eating. Dot com is where you can enter your name and email. You'll receive a short video about the four roots and you'll notice that we're not talking about cookies or cupcakes. We're talking about fear and hyper vigilance and self-loathing and things like that. So my recommendation would be to go to escape from emotional eating dot com right now. Enter name, email. Watch that video. It's three minutes long. And let's start to look deeper beneath what's really going on in your relationship with food.
Carlee
Wonderful. Three minutes or less. Guys, no excuses. It's free. No excuses. Right now, I want to know. For those of you who are listening, did this resonate with you? Like, are you in that space? And if you if it resonated, you don't have to say anything. You put a little hands up. If you know somebody, you can put a little thumbs up. We just want to know do you want to hear more like this. Now, we also have some big news. And this news is that the stress less space is back and it's more affordable than ever. This is a self love accountability group. And it's self-love taken to a whole new level. Join us twice a month for one, our group accountability sessions to make sure you stay on track with your self-care goals and aspirations. Now you can find more information by going to Stressless co dot com slash virtual stressless space. This concludes this episode of the stress less show. If you've enjoyed this week's episode, let us know by giving us a big old thumbs up and hitting that follow or subscribe button. Thanks for listening and we'll see you next week.