Something stressful happens at work, home, school, on the road, during your commute or wherever. It feels out of your control, you feel powerless to fight it and you have no idea how to solve or fix it. The stress weighs you down -- metaphorically and literally -- to the point where you feel and think more slowly and react as if you're under pressure.
And then you eat. It could be something sweet, something salty, something fatty or something you're emotionally attached to -- it doesn't matter. You eat it, and you feel better.
This is the cycle of stress eating, and it will get you every single time.
