Overeating In The Office

Quit Nibbling At Your Desk -- Your Gaining Weight!

By
Relationship Advice Expert April Masini

Q: Dear April Masini,

I enjoy my job, but I'm packing on more weight than the freshman fifteen from college! This job pays well, but I don't want to sacrifice my waistline. Got any tips?

Sincerely,
I Need A Desk Diet

A:

Dear I Need A Desk Diet,

There's no question about it — being in an office and undergoing the ups and downs of office life DO affect eating and diet. And this is true for everyone. But everyone undergoes stress in different ways and expresses it in different ways.

Are you a procrastinator overeater?

Some people eat less when they are busy. Some eat less when they're stressed. Being busy and being stressed is not always the same thing. Some people eat because they have nothing to do or they can't figure out what to do at work. These are usually the same people who procrastinate - and I call them procrastinator overeaters. If they work at home, they'll check for the mail twelve times a day, clean the house and make every call possible before conquering the work task at hand. In the office, there are fewer things to do to procrastinate without getting caught, but eating is one of them. That's why procrastinators in an office are at risk for becoming procrastinator overeaters. 

Lunch hour -- are you hungry? Or is it just time to eat?

In addition, some people who don't normally eat lunch, will eat lunch for the simple fact that there is a lunch hour, a lunch break or a time when everyone else in the office is out to lunch and picking up sandwiches to bring back to the office to eat. It's sort of peer pressure. When you're at home, you're less likely to notice the lunch hour because everything doesn't just stop and people don't start asking you to have lunch with them or if you want some takeout food. You're more governed by your own hunger at home and by a lunch hour at work. 

Did you order because you're hungry? Or because it's free?

Then there are those people who have expense accounts and eat because the lunch is free. If you normally only order an entree at a restaurant when you're paying, but you have an expense account, and the appetizer and desert are not on you -- they're on the office, you find yourself ordering and eating more food than your normally do. There are also those people who have to wine and dine people as part of their job, and feel funny not ordering an appetizer and desert when their clients are, so they order because of peer pressure. They eat to keep their clients feeling comfortable, and they gain weight that their clients don't as a result!

Emotional overeating - does comfort food really comfort you?

Women are not necessarily more vulnerable to emotional eating than men, however, women talk about it more, and, as a rule, are more weight conscious than men are. Women are also more in touch with their feelings, as a rule, so that when they feel bad — they know it and they want to talk about it -- often over lunch or some comfort food that's warm and smooth -- or cold and chocolate. Men may have emotions, but they don't necessarily pay attention to them. A woman may feel badly, know she feels badly, and know that she wants to feel better. Instead of confronting the feelings that are making her hurt, and figuring out why she feels badly, she may try to numb the feelings or distract herself from the feelings by using a substance. The substance can be food, alcohol, drugs, work, exercise or something more damaging like cutting.

To avoid emotional overeating, follow the following steps:

1. Try to identify your feelings. This is a discipline for many people.

2. When you identify a feeling, figure out what made you feel that way.

3. See if you can eliminate the things that made you feel bad — or rather than eliminate them, face them and solve the problem that is causing the bad feelings.

4. Recognize this pattern when it occurs again.

5. Keep at it. This is not an overnight fix.

And no matter what, don't forget to keep working out!

April Masini -- nicknamed "the new millennium's Dear Abby" by the media, is author of the best-selling books Date Out Of Your League and Think & Date Like A Man, the two (just released) step-by-step dating and relationship manuals, Ideas for a Fun Date and Romantic Date Ideas, and the critically acclaimed dating and relationship online magazine www.AskApril.com.

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