The other day I wen ton the OA website and looked at their list of qualifiers of what makes someone an emotional overeater. I checked out on nearly all of them...

I think I binge daily, but I don't know what actually counts as a binge. I am calling it a daily binge because I rarely ever feel hungry, rather, I always feel full.

Sometimes it's like, if I'm slightly hungry, it's a permission to go eat until I'm so full that I feel bad about myself for the rest of the day. Does anyone else feel like this?

I mean, seriously - all day long, I am NEVER actually hungry. My stomach does not growl. My stomach is bloated all day because there's pounds and pounds of food - and I'm reaching for more. I have food next to me ALL DAY! Isn't that binging - on a daily basis?

Let me just also add, I am always watching something about food - be it pictures, youtube videos, whatever it is. It's on my mind 24/7, too.

I could be wrong so take this as just one opinion please.

I see binge eating as having massive quantities of food in what is usually a somewhat limited period of time. I have days when I binge like that until I feel so full that I can feel the food going up to my throat.

However, once I'm in this crazy mindset, I will just overeat all day long...and that can last for days, weeks or months and I will gain tons of weight by over-eating. I never feel hungry but I don't consider that a binge unless it's what I described above.

I hope you figure out how to stop it but up until now, I haven't been able to stop.

haha i TOO am always watching something about food, because I love to both cook and eat lol

The days i binge I have that all day full feeling where i just feel bloated, and toward the end of the day, just straight tired from stuffing myself with food. I consider binge eating when you keep eating even though you are full. Usually that happens to me when i wait too long to eat, and by the time i actually do im already starving, so I binge eat. For example, Sunday I let myself have a "CHEAT DAY" and ate 3 cup-o-noodles IN A ROW!! I was so stuffed, but 45 minutes after i still managed to eat a PBJ sandwich, and a bag of flamming hot cheetos!! LoL ...

I think bingeing is a very subjective experience. For one person, a binge is 5,000 calories, for another, it might be 500 calories. I think most people agree that a feeling of "loss of control" tends to accompany all binges, otherwise they would be overeats like something one does on Thanksgiving.

For me, a binge was always eating when I wasn't hungry and eating large amounts of food within a 2 hour time period. Usually my binges consisted of ice cream, cookies, candy, cheese and crackers, cheeseburgers, etc.

I have no problem eating those foods in moderation when hungry, but when taken all together like that in one sitting, definitely a binge. I would eat so much I could hardly move, and then I would spend most of the night sweating (I think from increased metabolism trying to burn it off), and barely able to sleep because my stomach would be so distended. Worse than the physical was the guilt and regret I always felt.

That's what a binge is to me anyway. Some freakish, out of control feeling like an alien has possessed you and compelled you to drive to the grocery store and fast food places for food you clearly don't need. You sit in your car ordering your second hamburger feeling ashamed, yet that's not enough to stop you either; all you want in the moment is the pleasure. It's a pretty scary place to be.

Noteworthy for me though is that I did not start bingeing until I started dieting, and stopping dieting is no guarantee that bingeing behavior will cease either. It has to be erased from the mind through action, or rather INACTION.

I love the way you said this. Perfect.

Eating a whole bag of potato chips, or half a pie or eating half a jar of peanut butter right out of the jar or how about a full bag of Pepperidge Farm cookies? Those are all binges.

This exactly. Binging is feeling out of control. it's like something else is controling my body.

Usually my binges are that I'll eat more than one meal in a short period of time, or give myself 2 or 3 portions at one time.

I agree....there is that out-of-control feeling. Also, a related thing i've noticed is that i always get this panicky feeling before a binge. Usually i am panicking because i've eaten all my calories for the day--i panic at the thought of having to stop eating, and then i go off on a binge. It happens at other times too--just this panicky "i need to get my hands on some sugar RIGHT NOW" feeling. Weird.

If you're obsessed with food and constantly overeating and never hungry, that sounds bingey.

Social binges happen too - you're at a party and everyone else is enjoying it and all you can do is refill your plate and think about the food.

For me there's a big difference between overeating and bingeing.

Bingeing for me = out of control, frenzied, shoving food. Doesn't matter if it's 400 calories or 10,000 calories, it's the mind set. Of course most of my binges end in painful fullness, but there have definitely been binges on healthier foods, low calorie, ends not feeling overfull. Always ends in shame and guilt.

Overeating for me = mindless eating, boredom eating, it tastes good so I'm not really stopping when I'm full. Don't feel shame, though perhaps some guilt.

I social binge certainly, but I have to seperate "societal pressure eating" from my secret totally out of control binges.

That's where I'm acutely aware what I'm doing is wrong but I can't stop.
An entire large pepperoni pizza by myself and I hide the box from my boyfriend. Then he comes home and we eat together.

A fried egg sandwich with bacon. Then lastnight's leftovers. Entire of a medium jar of nutella. The last of the ice cream. then brunch with my mother. stop to buy a (family size) bag of chips on the way home. That's easily 5,000 calories in 3 hours.

Sometimes to stop myself I have to empty the fridge and spray the food contents with windex...and then I lie and tell my bf that the power went out and I think it went bad...