I'm 25 and currently in my final year of law school. I'm a stress eater by nature. When I'm depressed/stressed I eat. Law school as seen me go up and down the scale several times. I've reached 145 twice now. The first time I ended up going off the deep end and regaining most of the weight I'd lost until I hit 180 this summer. This fall I was in a really good place emotionally and in school. The result? I dropped back down to 145.
Now? Over break I got an externship offer. Which is great-but it's also been stressful. I have to find a new place to live (I managed to sublet my old place finally!), move in within 10 days, get a drug test, complete a background check, etc. AND I'll be moving to a city where I know NO ONE. Which has been super stressful.
So I've found myself binge eating. Yesterday I ate Thai food, a McDonalds value meal (Big Mac), and a carmel ice cream sundae. When I'm bingeing I know its wrong but I can't seem to control it. And once I've "ruined" my day I go whole hog and just eat whatever I see. While I'm doing it I feel nervous...and not good about it. Sometime I eat so much I literally feel sick-and I've puked. I haven't induced it, but I literally eat so much in a short period of time that I get physically ill.
Today I'm being super strict with myself. I need to get my mind in the game. I'm tryingto focus on ticking things off of my to do list in the hope that it will help me feel less stressed.
Found this forum and thought I should come here to help me figure out how to control my binges.
I wish I could offer some advice, but the reasons for binging are so individualized. For some it's better to eliminate all or nothing thinking and/or find ways to cope with stress and anxiety. I hope you find what will work for you.
Hi! I have also dealt with bingeing and other eating disorders in the past. Have you seen a therapist for this? That would probably be very helpful. Many times, it has nothing at all to do with the food so working on the underlying issues is really the only way to get disordered eating under control. Good luck!
Hi guys . I had another binge session today. This time I have no idea what triggered it. I ate over 1200 calories in less than 30 minutes. I don't know who to talk to about it. I don't have a therapist. I don't know how to make myself stop. Ugh! So frustrating!
Your binge trigger sounds very similar to what made me binge in the past: impending major changes+having to do it alone+feeling out of control of my future.
For me, I tried to do things that would help me feel more in control of my situation, like make lists (of anything...available rentals, things to pack, address changes to make), google all sorts of things near my new home/work like grocery stores, health clubs, dog parks etc., and start discarding unneeded junk and packing things that could be packed ahead of time.
I'm not saying this always worked, but I did feel better after doing these things than I did after binging.
I can relate. I think therapy might be a good idea (although if you're about to start an externship in a new city, now might not be the best time). For what they’re worth, some things that help me get on-track when I start on that downward spiral are:
1. Establishing structure and daily rituals that aren’t focused on food (or aren’t focused on unhealthy eating habits, at least). Making lists of things that you need to do can help with this. Making a point of having a good, healthy breakfast with a lot of protein and fiber is also helpful (imo).
2. Reminding myself that I DO have control over what I eat, and exercising that control, even if I sometimes exercise it a bit late. Making the conscious decision to leave a restaurant meal that you’re not enjoying and don’t need unfinished or tossing the junk food you just bought but didn’t really want or need in the trash and making yourself a healthy meal instead can be very empowering (and actually kind of a relief, I've found), although it can definitely be difficult to do the deed. And if you think somebody's criticizing your decision to leave or destroy food you don't want, so what? It's none of their darn business anyway, and your health and happiness with your decisions are more important than the opinions of some waiter or passer-by, right?
3. Mitigating. Even if you still really want food you think is unhealthy, and decide to go ahead and get it, see if you can make some little changes that will make it healthier for you. For example: ordering water or diet soda instead of regular soda, getting a kid-sized cheeseburger and fries instead of the regular fast food “value meal”, making a point of getting vegetables, fruits, or salad prepared in relatively healthy ways and eating them first, regardless of the quality of your entree, asking for a to-go box with your meal so you can go ahead and put part of it away for later, only buying treats if they come packaged in quantities that you know you can handle (or separating out what you know a reasonable portion is and throwing the rest away – as somebody pointed out elsewhere on 3FC, it’s not like Cheetos or Twinkies are in danger of becoming extinct, we can buy more if we must have them). Mitigating tactics really help me maintain and regain full control of my eating. I think this is largely because once I make one good decision (even if I don't want to), it becomes easier, at that time and in future instances, to build on that and make multiple good decisions. They also help me stay mindful of what I really want to accomplish without becoming overwhelmed by a sense of restriction or deprivation.
4. Crediting myself for good actions, and recognizing where I messed up and figuring out ways to improve without beating myself up too much. For example, if I make a poor choice about what to eat and a good choice about what to drink, I can remind myself that I did make at least one good choice (and that I did it intentionally). Then I point out to myself that the bad food choice wasn’t such a good idea, and think about realistic ways to do better in the future. This helps me break down what I did wrong into manageable parts that I can consider and work on (this sort of contemplation and planning might help you figure out ways to channel the stress and other emotions into healthier channels), while helping reinforce good habits by praising myself for starting or sticking to them.
5. Giving myself a variety of healthy options, and recognizing that if I can’t stand the thought of having a particular item for a while, that’s okay. I just have to try to insure that any replacement food items are healthy and complement the rest of my diet. I know that when I’ve tried to be super-strict with my diet it usually backfires ‘cause I JUST DON’T LIKE SALAD THAT MUCH, and then I get irritated and emotional and end up binging on unhealthy food. Giving myself a variety of healthy (or relatively healthy) foods makes it a lot less likely that I’ll binge.
6. Being obstructive. I think what you’re doing with your list is probably an example of this. Keeping yourself very busy, putting off indulging in food that you know will probably start you on that downward cycle by saying to yourself “maybe later” or “let me think about it”, and arguing with yourself about indulging (I don’t like the way I feel during and after binging, I have too much to do, it’s keeping my weight up, I want to save my money for something else, etc.) until the desire to binge passes, becomes controllable, or becomes logistically impossible to fulfill are ways of being obstructive. I knew one guy who described his internal debate about not getting breakfast at fast food places on his way to work as a board meeting. He just kept his internal businessmen talking until he had driven past the fast food joints, and then he was clear of that temptation for the day.
7. Really thinking about what I eat and cutting out stuff that doesn’t really taste good or makes me feel bad after I’ve eaten it.
8. Exercising or indulging in non-food hobbies or rituals. It’s hard to binge when you’re busy dancing to your iPod or reading posts on a weight-loss message board! Exercise is also a really good stress reliever. I tend to eat when I’m stressed too, but I’ve found that if I sit down and make detailed to-do lists and double-check what I need to do when the situation I’m stressed about is something I can control (engaging in rituals, in other words) I usually feel better. If it’s not something I can control, then I try to avoid excess food intake by really focusing on what I have to do, reasoning through my feelings, talking to someone, exercising, or sleeping.
9. Implementing changes incrementally and accepting that I’m going to fall down, but I have to keep getting up if I want to reach my goals. It’s not all-or-nothing. Starting slow, picking up good habits that I can sustain indefinitely, and losing steadily is better (imo) than a quick loss due to rigid adherence to a very restrictive diet/exercise routine that often seems to set people up for massive struggles to continue to exert exceptional amounts of willpower.
That's what's coming to mind at the moment. I hope some of this helps you. Good luck with curbing the binging and with your externship!
Theox has produced some really credible points for consideration. Learning to control binge eating takes EFFORT, and application. The list making is a brilliant idea! I find that I never think about eating if I'm busy with a list. And I'm a personal chef, so I'm actually involved with food most of the time. Still, my problem has never been bingeing on the food I create, but the private bingeing I do at home after the kitchen is closed for the night. 2 pints of Haagendazs, usually. Historically, I only ever binged on one food at a time. I once ate Peanut M&Ms (only) for six months straight! NOTHING else! I find keeping the food out of my house is key. To do this, I avoid the grocery store at the end of the day (because I'm most likely to crave comfort food when I'm finished with everything on my list)! Interestingly, I don't usually eat after dark. I make sure I've got stacks of good reading and/or movies to amuse myself, and have got into the habit of walking before bed. If anything, I tend not to eat ENOUGH of the healthy foods I've brought into my regimen! I think I get so excited about losing weight, the part of my that's dealt with eating disorders all my life tends to think "less is more". I've educated myself to the extent that I now know that small meals, eaten often, are the way to encourage a healthy metabolism, so I fight really hard not to starve myself (and subsequently being less able to resist a binge). If you start each day with a really great, healthy breakfast with plenty of protein and good carbs, you're kicking off with the best of intentions. A good snack two and a half hours later sustains you til lunch. And - hey - if you don't like salads, know that skinny chicks don't EAT salad! Beans is the way to go at lunch! A bowl of chili, something made with beans - they're very "trendy" these days. You can take beano if you're worried about the consequences later. But, fibre is key to effective, healthy weight loss. So eat beans! Very hard to binge on those. The point is, they go a long way to keeping your system in line so you don't crave those bad things that do you in! Fight it! There's no other word for it - you have to fight to make the right choices. I find it interesting that we refer to it as "comfort food" when, infact, after we swallow it we feel so BAD! I think we binge eaters are actually punishing ourselves with food. Anybody got an opinion about that?
New to this forum (not the board)...hi!
