How to Overcome Food Triggers

Growing up, if we had Oreos in the house, they wouldn’t even last the day. To this day I don’t purchase Oreos unless I have people to share them with, because I know I can’t trust myself to stop at the recommended serving size.

To me, Oreos are a total trigger food. A trigger food is one that you struggle to eat a moderate portion of, or one which sets in motion a longer binge of other indulgent foods.

Food triggers can be a food, or they can be an emotion or environment, and we all have them. The trick is learning to set yourself up for success around your triggers by creating a relationship with your indulgences that allows you to enjoy the things you love in moderation.

Let’s discuss what makes a food or situation triggering and some helpful tips on how to overcome those triggers.

Anatomy of a food trigger

Trigger foods include those you crave because of a feeling or environment or simply because they are extremely pleasing or indulgent. Trigger foods are usually calorie dense, highly palatable, and high in sugar, fat, oil, salt, or a combination of the four.

We are hard wired to crave these highly satisfying foods because of our history of hunter-gatherers. Long before we had delivery apps on our phones, we had to work really hard for food. When we got something sugary, fatty, or salty, we took full advantage because we didn’t know when we’d find something so filling again.

Today, this puts us at a disadvantage because there is such a wealth of indulgent food around us at all times.

Food triggers are not limited to specific foods, though. There are other types of triggers that cause that out-of-control feeling and the inability to stop eating. These are usually hard or stressful emotions or certain environments where overeating is common.

Let’s break it down further.

Three types of food triggers

Trigger foods

Like I described before, trigger foods are often highly palatable, calorie dense foods filled with sugar, fat, and/or salt. The Oreos I mentioned are a good example of sweet trigger foods, while potato chips are a perfect example of a savory trigger food.

The bottom line is that your trigger foods will generally be difficult to stop eating once your start. Instead, you will find yourself mindlessly reaching back into the bag again and again regardless of your hunger level and often without your awareness.

Your binge is not dependent on your stress, where you are, or the time of day, but by the food itself. It’s the simple fact that once you get started, it’s extremely hard to stop.

Trigger feelings

When I am stressed, I love a big bowl of Shoyu ramen or my favorite Thai takeout spot’s Pad See Ew. When I am happy, I love to celebrate with a decadent dessert like crème brulée.

Trigger feelings vary from person to person. There are some people who don’t associate stressful or celebratory feelings with foods at all, and there are also people who treat every emotion with food, good or bad.

The mechanisms are the same though, with the chosen food most likely having all of the decadent and indulgent characteristics we mentioned earlier.

Trigger environments

Have you ever eaten enough popcorn at the movie theater that you felt physically ill? I have. Or maybe you get a hot dog every time you go to a sporting event. Maybe it’s the sour cream and onion dip at the family barbecue.

A trigger environment is one that habituates a period of overeating simply by being in that environment.

Like emotions, trigger environments are not always avoidable, nor would you want to never see a movie or go to a family cookout again. The key is to find ways to manage your own habits to be able to tolerate exposure to your triggers.

How to overcome your trigger foods

Like we decided, the goal should not be to completely remove trigger foods from your life. In fact, strict, restrictive dieting is one of the biggest causes of binge eating.

Research shows that when you deny yourself any indulgences it actually causes you to crave the trigger food more as well as making the eventual binge even worse.

Instead, use tools of moderation, mindfulness, and other healthy methods to limit your exposure to triggers and build them into your lifestyle in a more sustainable way.

Eat a well-balanced diet

Many people who are susceptible to food triggers eat highly restrictive diets, skip meals, or are otherwise lacking adequate nutrition. When your body is undernourished, it starts to create grhelin, the hunger causing hormone.

When you have grhelin in excess, you are likelier to make poor decisions around food and lose control when you do finally eat. One way to prevent overeating is by nourishing your body regularly throughout the day.

Not only is it important to eat throughout the day, but make sure your meals have a good balance of protein, fat, and carbs to be properly satiated.

For more tips on eating a balanced diet, check out my other post on macronutrients.

Keep triggers out of the house

Until you can learn moderation, it’s a good idea to just keep your triggers out of your pantry, just like I don’t keep Oreos at home unless it’s a special occasion. If I do want something sweet, I might indulge myself by walking to my favorite bakery or making a batch of cookies that I can share with my friends and family.

By using this method of making your indulgences special, you can limit your exposure and increase your intentionality when you do reach for decadent foods. Creating intention around when you indulge is a great mindfulness tool that helps you to not overdo it.

Measure your portions

Instead of heading to the couch with a full bag of chips, try measuring out the portion you intend to eat in a bowl. Similarly, take one cookie out of the box and then put the box back in the pantry.

When you don’t portion your food, it can be really easy to mindlessly reach for the bag again and again until it’s empty, often without even realizing it. Not only does portioning your food prevent this, but it is actually more satisfying to your brain to see your food plated, and you will unconsciously register what you are consuming with higher accuracy.

Proper portions are helpful in snacking and in making sure you are eating full, satisfying meals. Food logging is helpful to some people to build awareness around what they are eating. To learn more, check out my previous post on food logging.

Habituation over time

One method employed by food and disordered eating specialists is called habituation. When we are triggered by a food it is often because we have created rules or stories around that particular food. Examples of this can be that a certain food is bad or a “guilty pleasure.”

This causes us to overindulge because we feel like we are doing something decadent or wrong when we indulge, or because we aren’t sure when we will get to eat our trigger food again.

Habituation involves eating a small amount of the trigger food every day in order to rid the food of its mental power over us.

If you want to try this method, introduce the food in small amounts after a meal, so that your body already feels satiated. Eat mindfully taking notice of the smell, taste, and texture, and then take time to reflect or journal after eating it to process how the food made you feel.

Practice Mindfulness

Mindfulness is a tool that you should employ at every single meal and snack. One of the biggest causes of binge eating is a lack of awareness or attention while we are eating.

To increase your mindfulness around food, start by eliminating distractions while you eat like television or scrolling on your phone. Tap into a feeling of gratitude for the food on your plate and all that it took to get it there from the farmers to the processors to the delivery drivers and even the grocery store workers.

When you eat, be present through the full experience by observing taste, smell, temperature, texture, and anything else you notice about the food. Keep this level of awareness while you eat.

Mindfulness can help you to develop a healthier relationship with food as a whole. Find more tips on healing your relationship with food in a my past post.

Have alternatives

If you are not ready to enjoy your trigger foods in moderation, try to substitute them with healthier options.

For example, replace fruit flavored candy with actual fruit salad. Instead of potato chips try kale chips or dried seaweed. Finally, instead of a snickers bar try a dark chocolate and nut Kind bar.

You can even recreate healthier versions of your favorite trigger foods at home. Use Pinterest to find all sorts of yummy recipes.

By replacing your triggers with healthier versions, you are still satisfying some aspect of the craving in a way that is easier to moderate.

Conclusion

Triggering foods, emotions, and environments will always exist in our lives and it’s not sustainable to simply try to avoid them all together. Instead, you should try to find ways to work on your skills of moderation so that you can live your life more fully and without guilt or an upset stomach at the end of the day.

If you have concerns about your relationship with food, you should consult a health professional for extra support working through those concerns in a healthy and controlled environment.

Otherwise, I hope that these tips will help you develop a better relationship with your triggers.