Old Habits Die Hard

You know, when you've done something for 20-some odd years, it's really hard to change it. Not impossible. Just very, very difficult.

Which is, of course, what I'm dealing with trying to change my eating habits. I'm trying really hard to only eat when I'm hungry and not bored, or stressed, or anxious, or sad or whatever. But I'm failing.

And I know that this is part of the problem itself: seeing it as failing. I've used food to cope for most of my life, so trying to change a habit of about two decades is going to take some time. Not to mention that this is a whole new way of approaching things and there's going to be some trial and error. And that's ok. I'm on a journey after all. It doesn't have to be perfect; I just have to move forward in the direction that I want to go. But, like my relationship with food, my tendency to be hard on myself and want things to be perfect is an old habit and difficult to break.

So I guess a better term is that I'm struggling or that there have been several errors during this trial.
I'm usually pretty good during the day. I have breakfast before work, pack my lunch, and have a small snack packed for either before or after lunch, depending on when I need it. Then I get home and have dinner and a small dessert. All in all - great! The problem comes later in the evening. A few hours after dinner, I find myself going back to the kitchen for something else. Usually, it's something sweet, but not always. And then later, I go back again for a little more.
And I know that it has to stem from emotional eating. I'm not that hungry after dinner. If I am, it's when I have dinner early, so there is more time between when I eat dinner and when I go to bed. In those cases, I have a little something between dinner and bed and I'm fine. But those times are rare, as I usually don't get home from work until 6:30 or 7.

But it's not always easy to even figure out the cause of the emotional eating. What am I feeling? How can I dissipate the feeling without eating? Not to mention that sometimes, habit truly takes over. I get up, go to the kitchen, grab something, eat, and then realize what I just did.

*Sigh* I can tell already that this is going to be a long process.