Emotional Eating... and Brownies!

So I have to confess that I'm a really bad emotional eater. I blame 99.9% of my weight on emotional eating. Whenever I am faced with a situation that is upsetting or stressful, I turn to food. Sometimes I may not even be aware of what I'm doing. I know how bad this is, but it's a difficult habit to shake. I've been in this pattern for years. And what's worse is that the sadder I am, the more I eat, which makes me even sadder. It's that "vicious cycle" rearing it's ugly head again.

These days I could not be more stressed. As a grad student, I am under constant pressure to get things done and push myself further and further beyond my comfort zone. On top of that, I think I may be depressed. I know as a psychology student, my professors have always said not to self-diagnose, but I pretty much have every symptom in the book (yes, I have a copy of the DSM lol). So as you can imagine, my emotional eating has been really getting the best of me lately. I wake up in the morning with every intention to stay on-plan, and then I fail as soon as something happens that upsets me, which is every day these days.

Anyway, this has been one of the most stressful weeks ever. Every assignment for the semester is due pretty much in the span of a couple of days, so it's crunch time. I have to say, I've been doing pretty well. I really have been staying on-plan for the most part. And everything has been tracked this week, which is great.

I did have a major chocolate craving today though, so in an attempt to make a healthier choice, I made brownies with squash (I couldn't find pumpkin anywhere!). They came out pretty good! A little rubbery and dense, but they definitely helped with my craving. Here's a picture. I tried to capture how dense they are lol. The only thing I didn't groove with was the fact that I could still taste that *squashy* flavor.