Davina, if you need to, feel free to totally abstain on the 26th and go for like the cleanest salad possible. I find that when I first start to take control of my diet, it is easy to fall apart during the first few weeks, so I have to start off strict to wean off cravings. For me anyways, the joy of seeing that I actually can say no takes away any scariness of "missing out on big food events" and I feel pretty victorious for doing so.

I found that the best way to modify my old eating habits was to do what I can when I feel ready - so if I am not ready for moderation, I choose to be strict. Almonds and nuts in general are very hard to put down!

my mom and my sister found some of my notes/rant about my sugar and weight obsession and other things that bother me in life and i feel so embarassed and i just don't know what to do right now, how to behave around them. they haven't brought it up yet but i heard my sister talking to my other sister over the phone about it and saying how i am much more complexed than they thought
i cringe everytime i remember what i wrote in there. things i would never say to anyone especially not to them. aaaaarhhg i'm so mad at myself. i just want to go to store and buy some chocolate and stuff my face with it.
i feel theypre supervising my food even more than before.
i just want this to pass but i know it will be brought up again soon.

Thank you very much. my roomate is more of a friend and we share foods,etc it's not strict yours/mine in the fridge so I can just help myself to what I want in the freezer. I don't want to really announce I am on a diet because technically I'm not and don't want to go into a long explanation.

Thanks It's chinese so I am thinking of just going for the most protein/veg options, non fried although it's hard as most everything is in some kind of sweet sauce. I don't want it to look like I am dieting to anyone. I agree on the almonds I find yogurt is the one snack that doesn't make me binge so I 'm going to look to incorporate more yogurt snacks in diet.

I'm so sorry to hear that. I don't know you're exact situation but maybe try ignoring it unless they bring it up. Those are your most personal feelings so you don't have to discuss them if you don't want to. Maybe that is terrible advice and you should ignore me but I've been in similar embarrasing situations and it will pass and be forgotten

Oh my goodness, I'm so sorry that happened! I don't know what I would do if my parents and siblings read the private things I write, whether about food/weight issues or other personal things. One thing I have learned from having private things become not so private is that people eventually forget. Forgetfulness can be a blessing
This brings up something I've been thinking a lot about lately- how insecure I am. I have such poor self-esteem. I can't imagine how awful my mom would feel if she knew how down on myself I can be. I tell myself that if I lose weight I'll feel better about myself, but I hate the idea that my weight determines my self-esteem. Well, since I got home last wednesday, I've been working out most days, and that alone has been helping.

Some more good news- After the first couple of days of being home, I straightened out my eating habits a lot and have been doing well. I weighed in at 167 yesterday, which is great! Today would be Day 6, but I'm going to take today off for the holiday and will resume tomorrow.

I really hope that by the end of this break, I will have developed better habits and when I get back to school, I'll be able to control myself more.
Happy Holidays everyone! I hope they're not too challenging to get through!

missunshine I just wanted to add that I bet you are dwelling on this more than your mom and sister are, even though it might not feel that way at the moment. This too shall pass and you don't need to binge to get through it. I'm sorry that has thrown you though
I have been pretty lax about eating and exercise the last week (like everyone else I'm sure! ) and today I bought a huge bag of salted popcorn, one of my biggest binge triggers . However, I've just eaten half of it and put it away because I'm full. I've never done that before- I usually inhale binge food completely in minutes even if I've eaten a 3 course meal and I'm about to go to a feast! I couldn't think of anyone else to share this with and I'm really feeling like this is a successful and positive step. Well, either a success or an indication that I really have eaten too much over Christmas I probably shouldn't have even eaten that first half bag but I did stop. I did!

Hello Binge Free and Overeating Free Folks! I'm reading a great book on...well, it's hard to describe what it's about. I would say that so far it's about how to co-exist peacefully with one's thought patterns—thought patterns about eating, about exercise, about losing weight, about housework, about everything. Instead of being a self-help book, it seems like a book on not needing self-help books anymore. It's Amy Johnson's Being Human. It's already helping me feel more at peace, and I've only read a few dozen pages. It's the kind of book you want to stop reading frequently, just to absorb what the author is saying. It induces a state of mindfulness, a state of relaxed meditation.

My diet is going well, and I'm still binge-free. I just realized today that while going on the Atkins diet and sticking to it carefully was the cause of my binge behavior—my "storm eating," to use Brooke Castillo's phrase—that's actually not a bad thing. It's like I got all my self-sabotaging eating under one roof—cookie binges—which made it easier to deal with. Once Kathryn Hansen's Brain Over Binge showed me how to get rid of my urges to binge, and I did so, now I feel at peace with the diet.

After a week long binge I am trying to pull myself together and attack this situation for January. I'm tired of being held prisoner by food. Food is a love Hate relationship for me. Its that poisonous lover that I keep returning to, even though I know the relationship is unhealthy I return to the behavior. I get something out of it but don't know what, positive wise, I only see negitive, the self Hate, the horrible emotional and physical response I get from the binge. I have felt like a super hero, the amazing pack food away woman able to eat three times her body size. Ive eaten to the point of being sick, bloated, miserable, gas and constipation all super attractive. An online friend reminded me that years ago I went on a fat fast or a period of time when I ate mostly protien to kill any and all cravings. I am debating doing that again. I have binged so badly and lied to my family for a week about food that has disappeared, loves of bread, boxes of cookies, containers of ice cream, cakes bags of chips, a bag of peanut butter cups. Ive binged each day and have been thrilled to get up first to be able to eat, or raid the freezer while husband is in tub.

Keep your chin up.

J.

mainecyn— Have you read Kathryn Hansen's Brain Over Binge? Your intelligence and self-awareness suggests that you're exactly the kind of person who could make good use of Hansen's technique. For me it's been a real game changer. Not only have I been binge-free ever since I read it, I don't even have the urges anymore. It's such a relief to be rid of that maladaptive behavior pattern!

Happy New Year everyone!
I've been bad about posting here lately,
but today is Day 4, and I've been going very strong. I had some salty snacks and wine last night to celebrate, but nothing crazy. I had a banana this morning, then got hungry so I snacked on carrots, kale, and hummus. I'm going out to eat with a friend in a couple hours, so I need to make sure I'm plenty hungry for a big restaurant meal.

I hope 2014 brings success to all of you!