So, my history: I've had disordered eating habits for quite some time now. It probably started somewhere in junior high. After shooting up a few inches, I slimmed out a lot, but I still - as always - had to battle to keep myself away from certain foods. Then I joined the track and cross country teams where thinness was a virtue...intensifying the battle with food. My efforts to stay away from it triggered binging - so I spent most of high school as essentially an exercise bulimic - binging on huge amounts of foods and then overexercising to get rid of it. Then, in college, it turned into ACTUAL bulimia... obviously, very bad for my health.

Anyway, all of this unhealthiness has actually caused me to gain weight outside of my comfort zone. It's nothing extreme - I'm at the high end of "healthy" - but this journey isn't just about getting back to a weight I feel comfortable at. (I've long since gotten over the body image issues associated with jr. high cross country) Now it's about getting over what I believe to be a chemical addiction to food that causes me to LOSE CONTROL around it. (mostly this happens with intense levels of sugar, salt, or fat... of course)

I started the journey of recovering from a lot of the emotional triggers for my bulimia this fall, but my relationship with food has still been extremely uneasy. I always felt like it had so much power over me. As someone who came from a home with substance abuse, I seriously see SO many parallels to what I have been experiencing with food to serious drug addictions. But when I say that to people I don't think that they really understand it... Of course everyone feels like they "can't resist" a cookie. But really, I CAN'T RESIST a cookie. To the point where I will go to any lengths - driving across town, spending all of my money, lying - to get binge foods. I mean, that's exactly what you would expect with a drug addict.

So I was pretty stoked to realize that there are things out there like OA where people have jumped on this bandwagon that sometimes food may actually be a sincere and debilitating chemical dependency on food! I actually just got done reading 'The End of Overeating' by David Kessler (highly recommend it) and it pretty much substantiates with science everything I had experience in terms of "wow I feel like an addict."

So now I'm trying abstinence from the binge foods - anything with high levels of processed sugar, fat, or salt. Which seems extreme, but seriously, for the first week I triggered a binge with italian salad dressing. Then granola. (I didn't even know they had high levels of sugar/fat/salt) This is week 5 of my journey, and I must say that even in this short period of time I can feel a HUGE HUGE HUGE HUGE INSANELY HUGE difference in my relationship with food. Like, it's a little insane. I can't believe it. While the binges are still intermittent, they've gotten less and less every week...as has food's "influence" over me. And I've lost 7 pounds, which is kind of amazing. People keep telling me how healthy I look!

But it's definitely not over yet. I'll still be in school for the next two months, and sometimes it's hard to stay on track when it's hard for me to explain to anyone about my 'addiction' to food. Especially since I don't overtly look like I should be on a "diet", I think people misunderstand my motives for eating the way that I do.

Supposedly after you make abstinence into a habit you can start introducing all of the binge foods back into your life in moderation and they won't hold the same power over you that they once did, but I know I'm not there yet. But hopefully I will get there!

So this is a twofold journey - ridding myself of my dependency on food, and weight loss! My weight loss goal right now is to get down to a healthy 140lbs for my best friend's wedding in the middle of May. I'm currently at 148, and my ultimate goal weight is 135. I'm about 5'7" (on a good day!)

Best of luck to all of you, and hopefully I'll be frequenting often to share about my good and bad days and to help motivate you all the best I can!

You will find a lot of support here. So many of us here have so many different types of eating issues and concerns, and this forum is full of so much support. I also like the fact that this forum acknowledges that our relationship with food is about so much more than just the food itself (like other sites), so, people are A LOT more understanding.

OA is a good program, and I have heard some good things about FA (Food addicts anonymous). The reality is that food, for a lot of us (myself included), have become this intense coping mechanism---sometimes it is just mindless nibbling throughout the day out of boredom, and sometimes it is the result of some pretty heavy (no punn intended) life experiences where we learned to comfort ourselves with food, rather than affection from others, support, etc.

Welcome here, and I hope that you find the support and comraderie that you are looking for. (((hugs))))

Welcome!

And how can we help you? That's what we need to know. For this to work, you need to work these boards. When you feel shakey or uncertain, get online & start posting. Or sign up & make a pledge to yourself & to us. Or tell us something about how you cope.

We look forward to hearing more from you in the future.

Hello. It's nice to meet you. Thank you for sharing so much of your life with us. We have a lot in common in terms of food addictions, specifically sugar & fat, (butter, cream and high fat cheeses and salad dressings for me). Though I never really got into a purge mode, (thus the starting weight for me. ) I definitely struggled with binging and still do on occasion.

I did want to comment on this that you wrote:


I went MONTHS without "cheating" when I first started. I seriously went from March 4th to December 25th without any refined sugar. I totally removed it from my life. Unfortunately after the first taste...the first little bite, I was a total addict again. All it took was one little Christmas cookie to send me on a month long addiction struggle. I don't know, maybe I didn't wait long enough. But, in my very humble opinion, I don't think it ever goes away.

Anyway, welcome to 3FC. Hope to see you around a lot.

I am in a binging mode right now...I have been doing so well, and then I had 1 piece of cake and it sent me into a controlled binge. I eat very healthy and then binge on cake or chocolate of some sort and then go back to healthy eating. It is such an internal struggle, I was talking with my husband last night and compared it to him never eating meat again he would go nuts...but I have to find some way to give up the need for these little binges so that I continue to be successful.

What has worked for you? Do you have something you tell yourself to get you through the times you want to binge. Mine usually occurs after my 5 yr old and 7 month old are in bed at night and I start thinking of eating something unhealthy and if I don't eat it then that feeling will follow me into the next day and then I'll usually fulfill the thought.

It is good to know that I'm not alone. Any advice would be very much appreciated! Good luck to everyone going through this.

Thank you all for your replies! As per the comments - I am actually starting to think that this lifelong battle with high levels of sugar especially may mean for me total abstinence for my entire life. Like I said, I come from a family with strong addictive tendencies... so I think maybe food has just become my coping drug of choice. Like an out of control drug addict, it's all or nothing.

I tend to get out of control with my eating when I feel like my life is out of my control. Today is actually a great example of why I need this site for support! I'm doing so much better than I have been in months/years past, but I'm still just only beginning to figure out what works for me and what my triggers are. I'm still in school, and one of my professors had us rewrite a paper recently. I'm a busy person, so I finished it early and turned it in in the same format as the previous paper. Surprise, actually we had to turn it in differently - not online, but printed out with our first paper attached. (This was written on our syllabus...which I haven't really looked at in quite some time.) Anyway, long story short, today has been full of STRESS STRESS STRESS and lots of emails! Ended up saying "oh, well I'm feeling awful today, I'll just have a little bit of ice cream." Which of course, as I well know, is a horrible idea. Ended up binging, no surprise there.

But I think it's interesting that now I can see specific patterns that are leading me to binge - food acts like a drug to change my mood when I feel like I don't have the tools to make myself feel better. I react strongly when I'm super stressed out, antsy, or I feel like I just need to SLOOOW DOWN. Those are when it happens....

Anyway, last month I had about a 1:1 ratio of binge to 'good' days (by binge I simply mean 'eating with a feeling that I was out of control'. Although by the end of the month I was getting some good 5-6 day stints without binging (I found out that bread is actually another trigger for me, took that out and have been doing better) My goal this month is to make that ratio much better!

I noticed that you guys do challenges - like 7 days without binging or whatever, although the one for this week has already started. I have a lot of trouble over weekends usually - anyone want to join me for an abstinent, no-binge weekend?

(:

Welcome, I know you will find lots of support here, I don't know what I would do without it. I used to only have a few trigger foods, stopped buying alot of them, but now I want to binge on foods that were not my usual trigger. They are new triggers! And you don't find out til it's too late, that's scary. So I don't even taste anything that is different from my usual natural whole food diet. That way I'm safe and i know what I am allowed to eat. So, don't even have a taste of it!! or you'll be back for more.

Liz228,

I'll join you for a no-binge weekend! I really need support on the weekends, it seems as though mentally I feel the weekend is my relaxing time and I'll allow myself a treat, which only triggers a binge.

Fruitlady- You said you've removed your trigger foods, what happens or what helps you to push the thoughts away to eat those foods? I never have anything in my home that will trigger me, but then when I'm in a store if it's a bad day I'll give in and buy just enough to binge. How do you get thru those moments? if you have them?

koceank29- It wasn't easy not to buy my trigger foods. At first I just didn't buy them for a week or two, then if one of them would be on sale at the market I would think to myself "wow I have to buy it" and i did. Then I would binge of course and gain weight. So, I was so sick of gaining and feeling guilty I think I learned my lesson. I don't care if they are on sale anymore, I don't give in. It's not worth it! Hope this helps.

Liz, you sound a LOT like me. And I'd love to do the binge weekend thing, even though it's already Saturday. At least I can have a binge-free Sunday, right?
All I can say is....I haven't figured out the binging thing yet either, but we're all here to support you! I recommend, which I'm sure others have as well, to come here as often as you can when you feel like binging. I've started doing that and it REALLY helps me.
Isn't it just weird the power food can hold? I'll have days where I decide I will allow myself to eat a little more (which turns into binging, of course) and the almost....relief I feel knowing I can eat....it's so ridiculous. And then of course I feel horrid after. So not fun. You're awesome for taking an abstinence to foods....I don't think I'll ever be able to.