Food is not just for sustaining life. It is very closely related to emotions, self-representations and social relationships.
In the first psychoanalytic theories, nutrition has an important place in early relationships with the mother. According to these theories, babies are born with the instinct of sucking, and since the mother is at the forefront in meeting oral pleasures, attachment develops towards the mother (Bayhan and Artan, 2004). If every time the baby cries, it is responded to with feeding, the baby may learn that food has a comforting role. While the baby has other physical needs, feeding may alienate him from his own body, and this may prevent him from understanding his hunger and satiety (Orbach, 1998). When parents fail to recognize their children's actual needs and wants, they can decide when they will be hungry or full. Children treated and raised in this way cannot learn to distinguish their own internal states. Additionally, children may learn overeating from their parents as a means of coping with tension and anxiety. Deterioration in eating attitudes is described as a situation in which children who cannot distinguish their own internal states and develop self-confidence due to their upbringing try to hide their inadequacy and weakness. (Bruch, 1982, cited in Sart, 2008).
In recent years, with the emergence of the concept of 'emotional eating', the idea that eating is related to the individual's expression of himself has begun to be accepted. Conceptually, emotional eating is defined as individuals' use of food intake as a way to cope with their emotions. This concept, which was previously mentioned within eating disorders, is now addressed as a separate issue. Emotional eating is considered a psychological support used to cope with negative affect. If individuals are in an intense emotional state and have difficulty understanding what these emotions mean, they may think that they cannot cope with this emotional state. Individuals who have difficulty expressing their emotions can also avoid the uncomfortable situation they experience by distracting themselves through food (Serin and Şanlıer, 2018).
Eating should be considered as a physiological and psychological dimension and divided into It may prevent the issue from being fully understood. At this point, instead of separating and categorizing it as a diagnosis and title, resorting to existential psychotherapy seems very valuable in terms of addressing and making sense of the issue holistically. In the existential approach, eating is closely associated with the individual's way of being in the world. In other words, the difficulties a person experiences with their state of being in the world will be very helpful in understanding eating problems. When we look at it from this perspective, the limitations that we are all subject to in the world, such as death and finitude, our choices and responsibilities in our lives, and the difficulties that the individual experiences in relations with others, can be controlled by the individual's ability to take or reject food on his own body. This control over our body, which is the most concrete form of our existence in the world, brings with it the perception of control in all other areas. Eating/not eating can represent many things in the relational world. Longed-for love, unattainable ultimate peace, a reliable friend... When we associate it with our state of being in the world, what is meant is that it is the answer to the state of being together with others in the world. The individual meets the expectations of others from the person by eating or not eating. At the same time, eating/not eating can be performed as an action to get rid of feelings such as failure and guilt regarding one's self-perception. The area described as emotional eating is actually conceptualized around these themes. At this point, the existential perspective argues that, on the contrary to these distinctions, the physical and psychological are not separated from each other. Psychological motivations and bodily actions overlap and are imperceptibly related to each other (Schneider and Fitzgeral-Pool, 2005).
Some clients say that food calls them. In fact, they use food to relieve their existential anxiety. In cases where food is similarly seen as worship and pleasure, individuals have difficulty taking responsibility for the difficulties and problems they experience. Food, which is used as a means of consolation in stressful times, comforts the individual without expecting anything in return, unlike what happens in relationships. sign of life Our relationship with food can be explained by many different reasons and meanings, such as coping with feelings of lack, loneliness and helplessness, feeling a sense of control against the limitations inherent in life, pleasing others, and thus getting away from the fear of being alone.
Eating is also closely associated with the cycle of feeling guilty and self-punishment. The individual may use food as a means of punishing himself because he thinks he has behaved inappropriately. These people can get stuck in a cycle of overeating, guilt, and eating more. From an existential perspective, this situation is considered as a way to escape our freedom of choice and responsibilities (Schneider, 1990).
In the context of these evaluations, it is important for the person to ask himself what role eating/not eating has in his life, how it can be a source of pleasure and peace, and how it provides satisfaction.
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