Eating Behaviour As A Child

My friend and I have a running joke as she has 8 siblings and I have 4 brothers. We both we had similar experience, which we named ‘big family syndrome’.

Where, if you found biscuits, chocolate or any time of sweet in the cupboards you wolfed it down. There was no waiting for others.

You snooze, you lose!

Then I discovered, our self labelled ‘big family syndrome’ eating behaviour had a real term – Rebound eating in the form of food competition.

This is where a person’s experiences of fearing not having enough food, would instill future worry about food deprivation, which could lead to overeating behaviour.

Thankfully, my friend and I both grew up where food was always on the table.

But I think, this is really important to take note of especially in a world of COVID.

There has been a lot of talk of food being used as a coping mechanism but I think the economic uncertainty also presents the perfect situation for ‘food competition’ eating behaviour.

If you have been eating more than usual, but you don’t feel it’s emotional as such…it’s possible you’re experiencing some food deprivation worry.

I’m posting about this, because it shows just how eating behaviour, food, health, weight loss is so complex. Yes, the principles are true – energy in/energy out. But there’s so much more, because we’re human.