Emotional Eating
 

I'm not sure if I'm posting this in the right place so I apologize in advance if this isn't the place.

My biggest issue with food is that I'm an emotional eater. I eat when I'm happy, I eat when I'm sad, I'm eat when I'm bored, I eat when I'm depressed....you get my point. I get frustrated with myself because I know that I shouldnt be I know I should be using food as a substitute but this is a habit I've had for at least 30 yrs. It's a proper vicious cycle and I can't figure out how to break it.

Does anyone else go thru this? I feel like I'm the only one in the world who does this. And i do want to stop - just need something to 'click'.

Thanks

Lordy, you read my mind. My words exactly. They say walk away, wait 20 minutes, yada yada yada. I still eat.

My opinion, you and I are in for a long haul and a lot of false starts, trial and error. Good luck, and if you find something that "clicks" for you please let me know!

I have the same problem as you guys. I eat when I feel any emotion and also when I'm feeling empty and numb!
The diet I'm following uses CBT (Cognitive Behaviour Therapy) and TA (Transitional Analysis) to look at why we eat when we do. It's been really helpful for me - I didn't always recognise it before but once you know that you want to eat because you're stressed it's easier to resist.
I don't think anyone who has a real eating problem/addiction can successfully diet without having some sort of therapy too.
Hope this helped a little bit

Emma

Emma

Hope you dont mind me asking but what diet are you following? I'm doing (my best to follow) a low fat, low GI plan.

The CBT and TA approach sounds interesting.

Thanks!
Theresa

Yes, please do share. I suffer the same disorder and would love to get some help!

Hi Honey & Theresa

I'm following Lighterlife - which isn't the cheapest solution I'll admit (£66/wk), but it does include the food and the counselling and I worked out you could easily spend the same amount of money if you did it separately. And it works which is the main thing. I've lost nearly 3 stone in 10 weeks.

You can get books on CBT and TA though - some of the TA stuff is amazing - not just from a food point of view. You start to realise why you behave in certain ways with certain people. I had a strained relationship with my mum (she wasn't happy at me going on this diet for a start) and I realised that I spent far too much time wanting her approval for everything I did.

Anyway - good luck and keep up all your good work. I think I'm going to be trying low GI when I finally start eating again :)

Emma

Hi,

I"m right here with the rest of you-I do the same thing!

I've read about a book on Amazon called "The Beck Diet Solution" which is based on cognitive behavioral therapy. The author is Judith Beck. I've seen the book in Barnes and Noble, but it's ten dollars cheaper on Amazon. I may order it.

Emma, Lighterlife sounds interesting-I don't know if it's available in the United States, though. Thanks for posting about it.

Take care,
sherry

I'm with you ladies on this one. I tend to eat when I'm bored, which is almost all the time. I'm one of those people that almost constantly needs to be doing something I enjoy, though not much appeals to me lately.

Anyway, I got this book on healing your life by changing the way you think about things. It's rather interesting, though I haven't read it all the way through yet. I'm also studying reiki. Couldn't hurt, right? Once I get a job I might seen about some type of therapy. That sounds rather interesting.

I know what you mean!

One of the things I've been doing to help myself is bring along someone when I do my grocery shopping. This helps keep me more honest. I don't put those big bags of peanut butter M&Ms in my cart when someone else is with me.

If I don't buy it, I can't eat it! :)

Good luck to you.

being bored has to be the main reason i gained weight...in this past year i found myself gaining weight like never before...i got up to 190....when i finally weighed myself i was shocked.....i eat a lot more when im happy than when im sad.....and since im a student with finals two times a year, each a month long....its 60 days each year when i sit all day long and study eat study eat and repeat....what am i supposed to do....heeelllppp...

Iam in the same boat. Right after I get done eating, I start thinking about my next meal and how much of it i can eat. I feel so stupid letting food control my life. It is all I think about. I hate it too. You're not alone!:hug:

i've been a member of this club for a LOOOng time. i have an addictive personality and my drug of choice is either food or starvation. i started my eating disorder in grade 4 and have vacillated between my having it and it having me. The doc says i have an ED uncharacterized, and also have BDD ( body dysmorphic disorder ). The purging ended years ago...simply got tired of it, but i have restricted for weeks on end and then eaten myself out of house and home. Trust me, you are not alone in this. Finally gotten the " ED voice " in my head to shut up. i'm thankful for that at least.

I'll tell you what annoys me about our "addiction:" we can't ever fully stop. Drug addicts and alcoholics can give up their substance after good rehab and therapy. They can fully live without it. But us.. we have to eat to live and somehow have to find the fine line of eating enough but not too much.

Yuck.

Yes! Yes! I know what you ALL are talking about! How are you handling it? If the outside of us represents what we think about the inside of us, what does it mean when we hide behind food? Also, does anyone else "substitute" addictions? Like, for me, when I smoked, I could control weight by always smoking, never eating. Now that I'm eating better and focusing on being healthy....I've started spending too much! How do I break this cycle?

emot eat
 

i thought i was doing good. Yesterday was my 3rd day with no cheats, and then about 5pm i started feeling...anxious...pissy. And it wouldn't go away. Went to a restaurant to pick up a salad and walked away with a cheeseburger and chili cheese fries. No salad. On the way home i thought " it's ok; i can just throw it up ". Did my best to talk myself into purging this meal that i should not be eating in the first place. Got home, ate 1/2 the burger, 1/2 the fries, then dumped hotsauce on them and threw them away. After 8 years purge-free, in the end i decided to keep the food down. And then followed it up with 1/2 a pb&j, and 2 icecream sandwiches.:o

Was afraid of what the scale would read this morning, but the weight stayed the same as yesterday. As long as there was no visible gain, i can live with it. Not going to beat myself up over this binge. It could have been alot worse than it was. So i continue with my diet plan today.

Hey All,

I'm an emotional eater too. I eat to celebrate, to grieve, to relieve boredom, and just because the food is there. I'm so addicted to food, it's ridiculous. As a result, I've been running up and down the scale like a hamster on a treadmill since I was a kid (and I'm 51 so I'm getting tired!). I've never been able to do the starving part. I tried to vomit once but couldn't, but I have taken a couple Correctol when I thought I ate too much on many an occasion. And I'm totally addicted to carbs. So I hear where you're all coming from. If you're interested in trying the CBT approach...

Over on the Diet Central section of this board there's a thread under General Diet Plans for a bunch of us who are following the Beck Diet Solution. Its a 42 day Cognitive Behavior Therapy approach to eating that works with any diet. Each day contains a different principle/lesson that we follow to help us control our eating. It's made a big difference for me in that I now feel a bit more aware and hence in control.

If you check out the book at your local book store before buying, you might find it helps you. If not, at least it will give you more stuff to think about and our only ally (and demon) is our minds, right?

L

Thanks for the suggestions on behavioral theory...lately I've been thinking that some of the binge eating I do, and others do, is a form of violence, almost an attack. I've finally realized I'm an e.d. eater...wierd to realize, but I'm hoping it helps. I also have an addictive personality, which sucks...quite gluttonous. I'm hoping this community works wonders...Here's to everyone here :hug:


By the way, how do I get my damn ticker to display on my posts?!? I'm so vaclempt.

I'm part of this club, too! I've been up and down in weight all my life...most of my problem was eating when I was bored, but lately it's been because of stress (lost my job, running out of money, etc). It's very hard to learn to do something else in place of eat when that's all you want to do.

I grew up with my parents always handing me some sweet treat to get me to shut up or leave them alone while they drank. I continue to struggle with the temptation of alcohol as I live in a family that is basically made up of alcoholics but I found that I can easily deter that and it has given me some confidence to think that I can get over eating for no reason at all other than the food was at hand and I wasn't doing anything with my hands. That's another thing that I have found helps a lot. If I keep my hands busy, I tend to eat a lot less, but I'm not starving.

I also grew up w/ parents like yours, chevyjnova. It created some problems with food, that's for sure. Supposedly the first step is recognizing why you are eating, then you're supposed to slow down, chew a lot (better digestion, too), and try to leave some food on the plate. I read and learn a lot, I just don't follow through...this community should help with that, and it seems like emotional eating is really common. Another thing we "should" do is to go hungry for a day (eating very little) so that we can recognize the physiological feeling of hunger and fullness...it's supposed to slow us at the table...these are things I'm going to try harder to do. That and celebrate or sorrow w/different activities.

Dear thinnythighs,

I'm new here, but I wanted to THANK YOU for posting this! I also emotionally binge--and did so last night (after a whole day of clean eating) with a hamburger!!! I felt angry at some drama from work...and that burger was my emotional crutch. unfortunately, it sank like a tank in my stomach, i regretted eating it!!
I LOVE your method of pouring hot sauce on the food so you can throw it away. what a good idea!! I have so much leftover taco bell hot sauce in the fridge, which would be perfect! thank you!

Hello! I too was a binge eater. I had bulemia for 18 years mixed with anorexia at times. I went through CBT for food years ago. When I went through the therapy I had to keep a journal and write down what I ate, the time I ate it, and what I was thinking at the time I ate it (You have to write it down right after you eat or you are likely to forget the details). Anyway, that is the cognitive part. I started seeing a pattern of different "triggers" that would set me off to want to eat. My mother and sister are big ones! After I hang up the phone with them... I always want a big box of chocolate chip cookies!!!! Only now I recognize it and I don't mindlessly grab them. It sounds strange, but it really starts to change you. You see on paper the horrible things you say to yourself and you see the way your self esteem can become low by someone's words and cause you to want to stuff it all down with food. You will start to see your own personal pattern emerge. It really helps. My counselor asked me what I would do if there was someone following me around saying all of the mean things I said to myself. I said I would get rid of them. I learned to stop myself in the middle of saying something negative to myself and change it to a positive thought. You will learn to think kinder thoughts to yourself about yourself and catch yourself when people and situations set off your "triggers". The behavioral part is pretty basic. Eat at the kitchen table with no distractions like the TV, taste your food, wait 20min before having another helping, etc. It is alot of work, but I just saved you alot of money on counseling sessions :) haha

I hope this helped!:hug:

Sometimes it seems to be a power issue for me. I started overeating when I was a teenager. I collected coins and bought a Sara Lee cake. I took it up to my room and had a piece. Then I paniced. I couldn't put it the refrigerator. I'd be found out and punished. I had to eat it.

So full, so happy. I found my drug of choice. It was a sugar high and I triumphed over my Mom. I had my cake and she couldn't do anything about it - and I found a way to have this glorious experience without knowing and berating or beating me. Sheer bliss.

Food is still my security blanket. It is my best friend - alway there -- always available to fill the emptiness. But like any addictive substance, it is harming me. My frame cannot suport the side-effect of my addiction - waves of rolling , ugly, health robbing FAT.

Today it starts.