Do you binge every time you over eat?
 

Hello listmates, :hug:

I was wondering if you feel that once you go over your alloted calories or foods, do you feel like, "ok, I've blown it, so I might as well eat the house?" That's how it has been for me. However, there were a couple of days recently where I ate a few hundred calories more than I should have and I actually did not turn it into a full on binge....although I really wanted to. I don't know what stopped me, but I basically left the kitchen and the next morning, I felt a lot better.

Does this mean I'm getting better? Maybe, but I'm not out of the woods...it has only been a few days! ;)

So, what's your style? I kind of suspect that some of us here are perfectionists and when we go off track a little, we feel like failures and then we use the binge to suppress some bad feelings....but that's just part of it..and maybe that's not everyone....I was just wondering.

Thanks! :D

Overeating = binging USED to be how it was for me. I've realized that my perfectionism tripped me up time and time again when it came to losing weight, so now I just try to be a little kinder with myself.

Granted, sometimes when I overeat I get the "it doesn't even matter what I eat anymore" feeling, but mostly, I can overeat without feeling totally out of control. I still overeat a lot (go over my daily calories by a little bit), so I'm working on that, but my binging has decreased significantly. And yeah, like you, I feel a LOT better when I overeat a little instead of all-out binge.

luckymommy - this is the way it used to be for me as well. But I'm proud to say that this time it's been different, and I credit one of the secrets of my success is to not let eating more than my daily alloted number of calories derail me from my long term goals.

I use myfooddiary.com which calculates how many calories I can eat per day to lose weight (taking into consideration exercise, etc) as well as how many I can have to maintain weight. I can truthfully say that since I started on my plan in early September I have not gone over the "maintain weight" range, although I have certainly topped my "lose weight" range several times.

I call what I do a "controlled binge," meaning that if I make a decision to eat more calories that day than I should in order to lose weight, I make sure not to go over the number of calories I need to maintain. This has worked well for me, particularly during my vacation in October. I was able to maintain my current weight that week, something I'd never been able to do in the past.

The important thing, I think, is to just understand that this is all part of the process and to take it as it comes. We just have to jump right back on plan the next day. And no, I do not feel bad when I do overeat any particular day, because I know I now have the willpower to not do it every day.

When I realize I am over-eating, sometimes I say "Screw it" and end up bingeing... then I feel horrible about myself, and feel physically/mentally miserable for the next few days.

But you always have a second before you plunge head-first in a binge to say "Screw it, I'm going for it" and bingeing or saying "NOOOOO!!!!" and ending the conversation there.

I feel so, so proud of myself when I begin to over-eat, realize I am doing it, and then STOP. Every day is progress. Each time I tell myself "No" and end the conversation there, it gets easier. I am trying very hard to get over my perfectionist all-or-nothing approach... it just ends up hurting me.

Yes, I understand this. It is part of the reason I have decided that diets do not work for me. They simply give me another thing to hit myself over the head with when I come up short. I'm trying to focus on making healthy choices for a lifestyle change instead. I am trying to learn how not to obsess about food either way.

Congratulations on your choices!

Thanks for the input, ladies! I wonder if there is a huge correlation between binge eaters and perfectionism. Hmmmm....

Southern Maven...what a GREAT idea! I will figure out how many calorie I need to maintain so that even if I do go over my alloted calories, I'll at least know I'm not gaining! Why didn't I think of that?

k8t, I could never survive without my calorie plan, but that's why we're all different. I'm so glad you found a method that works for you!

Thanks again. :)

Agreed....One size definitely does not fit all.

I think i view binging a little different. I don't mind going over my calories by 200 or so. I don't see that as binging. I think binging is when you start eating something you really love, then you can't control yourself and end up eating so much you feel sick. I have done this many times, and once I start, i can't stop. For me it has to be a food that is my favorite and tastes so awesome, like natural peanut butter! I feel it has to be worth it to gain the 2 or 3 lbs that I will gain from doing it. So I don't binge on anything that just tastes good, it has to be really, really good!

oh yeah, I have a long history of this. I am getting better at handling the urge to f it, blow it all to **** and go crazy.

When I graduated college I talked with a therapist who said something that really struck me. It was so true. She was saying, ok, you ate an unplanned plum, why does your day have to be shot to sh*t over it. She certainly put it into plain words that rang true. Of course feeling understood and changing long standing behaviors are 2 very different entities.

fruitlady, I think maybe you misunderstood my post? When I binge, it is a massive amount of food until I am sick and have a hung over feeling the next day. What I'm referring to is being a perfectionist and letting one little mistake lead you to make a much bigger mistake. Actually, maybe I misunderstood you. Maye you feel that the only thing that makes you binge is eating a trigger item. That could do it for me too. If I have a bite of cake, I will go on to eat that cake, and then, something else like pizza and then, something sweet again and so on.....I can easily gain 10 lbs. a month. Sad but true. Anyway, I hope we can all figure this out and make sense out of our habits so that we can control them better.

I'm really glad I found this place. It's a haven to discuss what we endure.

Overeating and binging are two different things for me.

Overeating is a mealtime thing & usually occurs when I have a plate full of healthy food in front of me. I take a little too much. It's a portion control thing. It sneaks up on me. I realize I'm full. And there's food left, which I have to tell myself to leave, because I am full, and normal people stop eating when they are full.

Binging is something else entirely. It's not due to obliviousness. It's a kind of **willed** mindlessness. My thoughts shut off to some extent. I am completely absorbed in what I am doing. I feel furtive about what I am doing, as if I need to hide it. I eat too quickly. There's a certain automatic quality to the movement of hand to mouth. I'm more inclined to do it standing. I feel unsettled & not grounded & nearly animalistic.

I feel like Justice Potter Stewart when describing the difference: I know it when I see it.

Thanks for sharing this. It's just like you were describing me.

I am reading "Eating by the Light of the Moon", and it has been very helpful to me as I try to figure out what makes my mind tick. That willed mindlessness is specifically addressed in the book. At times, the book is a little too "mystic woman" for me and I think most parts of it work for a male or female with an eating disorder of some sort, but overall the points are usually good. When you are in the middle of a binge, you're basically not thinking of something else for as long as the binge lasts.

What I should have said, more simply, is that binging for me is not about quantity of food. It is a behavior & a state of mind, which I have gradually gotten better at identifying, when I can feel that it's coming on, or might come on, and have over the years learned to stop, though sometimes not until it gets into motion. (It's like pulling a car out of skid sometimes.)

This is how I know it's happening: The simultaneous willed mindlessness & a sort of automated quality, sped up too much & jerky, like an old film, and behind it, a desperation. The immediate goal seems to be partaking of a particular, delicious food, but really, it's oblivion that I want. And when one food doesn't give it -- and what food could, really? --- then I go for quantity, or variety. I suspect I want to go back to being a baby at the breast, thinking of nothing but sucking in that sweetness & with no consciousness developed yet.

The triggers are strange. If something catastrophic happens -- my father dies before me in a hospital bed, I am fired from a good-paying job -- I do not go off & binge. But if I feel a sort of low-grade anxiety, with something monstrous & mysterious bothering me in the background for a long period of time, or a lot of accumulated things, and it keeps me on edge for a while, then I am vulnerable.

Thus, for me, anyway, I need to differentiate it from overeating, which is simpler, and more like what I'd imagine your average person experiences, reputedly often at their Thanksgiving dinner. ;-)

I am not sure everyone's so careful about labeling the two actions differently, but I know that personally, I have to be, if I want to be honest with myself.

i have this problem. i usually say... one more bite... and one more bite turns into a huge binge. i get obsessive about it too... i wake up thinking about food, go to bed thinking about it... it's definitely hard to keep on track sometimes. i know ill feel better if I don't binge, but it's so easy to fall into. and when i binge i BINGE i went through a week where i had so much junk food in the house ( i dont buy it but when someone else does, it's like a drug) i probably consumed a good 7,000 calories a night. I'd torture myself and try to purge, but i have no gag reflex (thank god because i can only imagine) so it would just result in my toppled over feeling completely ashamed and miserable, but almost justified because i felt like i deserved it after not being able to control myself.