Hello 3FC,

I am so so disappointed with myself . I feel like crying. My diet was going so well I went down all the way to 155 lbs and was only 15 lbs away from goal but then I started binging for some reason. I would eat and eat and feel disgusted with myself then swear not to eat anything for days to 'balance things out' then crack from hunger and binge again, it was an awful cycle.

I banned treats from my house but found myself binging on wholemeal bread and hummus and honey sandwiches and cereal

My appetite is enormous, I seem to want something in my mouth at all times. I'm embarrassed and ashamed of myself.

Dieting now seems so hard, I get hungry a lot and I'm sure it's because of all these empty carbs I'm eating.

I have gained 17 lbs and I'm now 32 lbs away from my goal, 32 lbs seems like an unreachable distance..

What are your tips to get back on the wagon?

I've heard people mentioning that the term "getting back on the wagon" isn't a good mindset when you're trying to make lifestyle changes. What helps me is to have a designated splurge day, then after that, go back to eating healthy. Plan out your diet and know your limits, and recognize that eating more will not make you feel better - you will only continue to gain weight and be more miserable. Choose better snacks and practice saying "no" to others and yourself. Try chewing gum if part of it is wanting something in your mouth - distract yourself every time you are tempted. Boredom is a big factor for me - if I find myself bored, I find myself eating.

recognize that eating more will not make you feel better - you will only continue to gain weight and be more miserable

Very true. And boredom eating is a huge factor for me too.

I am thinking of using those appetite reducing pills.

I know how you feel. I did the same thing about 30 day ago. But the best thing that I could have done was come back here and post, like you did. Now I'm taking it one day at a time. First, I made a game out of not overeating, by giving myself stars every half hour I didn't overeat. Sounds childish but it worked for me. Even though my clothes still don't fit, I'm much happier now. I stopped eating foods with sugar, and that certainly helped me with my cravings. It's been a month now, and very proud that I could get back. Join a thread that's for you. I even started my own thread, Binge-free in September. Come join us. It's under Chicks in Control. In any event, best of luck to you!

Try getting rid of your carbs for two weeks, maybe three. Meats and leafy greens, celery and other low glycemic vegetables are on the menu, everything else is off. See if that helps your cravings. Wean back on to carbs slowly, keeping them on the lower end of the glycemic index, adding berries and non-starchy vegetables first. I think you might be pleasantly surprised at how much this helps.

FWIW, there are quite a few of us that are carb sensitive and will need to always keep them on the lower end of our diets. You might be one of them.

Another thing: Is there anything that might have happened to scare you or make you uncomfortable with your body or other's reactions to it. That will also trigger a binge cycle.

Best of luck to you.

Cat

If you are eating because you are bored - find something to do!

I am not a fan of diet pills of any kind - but I know some people use them. I would rather change my habits than have to rely on a pill that may or may not even help. What happens when you stop taking the pills?

I think your plan of trying to not eat anything following a binge is not a good one. I binge eat too - so I get that. But it just creates a cycle of binging that is hard to stop. If I have a day where I eat too much, I try to just do better the next day. It doesnt mean that I don't eat or even restrict what I eat. I just try to eat healthy. Sometimes it takes a day or two to get back into it. But trying to "balance things out" by not eating doesnt work - as you can see. It creates unhealthy eating habits. You have to eat. You just need to work on changing how and what you eat. It's hard and can take time. I'm still working on my unhealthy eating habits.

I binge on cereal - so I rarely buy it anymore. For awhile I was doing ok with a serving of graham crackers and yogurt as a snack but then I caught myself binging on the graham crackers and they are no longer allowed in my house. If you have to ban foods - do it. Don't set yourself up to fail by bringing in foods that for whatever reason you are binging on.

I read in another post about eating a bowl of high fiber cereal to help get back on track.

I find something restrictive, like the vintagecat is suggesting, or try to eat vegan for a day, something to break the cycle helps me, sometimes I throw in a juice fast. Something that I can't cheat on.

As for boredom, reading, crafting, maybe knitting a scarf or take up calligraphy, something using your hands for something besides feeding. I pop on here all the time, sometimes just reading, I also read magazines, books, anything I come across about health and fitness.

You might want to read "hungry the journey from fat to thin by Allen Zadoff" talks about how restricting after binging doesn't work and many other things, I thought it was a great read and was a free e-book.

I also would recommend staying off the pills if you can.

Best of luck to you, you took the first step, acknowledging you are struggling.

I think I am carb-sensitive, normally I would do a combination of low carb primal no sugar and intermittent fasting and this worked perfectly- a loss of 1.5-2 lbs a week and no hunger or cravings I remember plain apple juice being sickly sweet, but then over the summer I went to a lot of weddings/bbqs/parties and the bad eating habits slowly snuck back.

Tyla, thank you - I will join you guys over on chicks in control

Thanks guys

Summer is definitely tough, a lot of us are trying to get back on track after the summer, you're more active but there are definitely more temptations...

Primalgirl, looking forward to seeing you on Binge-Free in September! By the way, get out of the house and go buy yourself yellow flowers. Studies from Rutgers University, say that buying flowers not only gives you endorphins, but the color yellow brings you joy!

Most of us have been where you are. Like others have said, I think that low carb can help. When I get off track it helps me to focus on making sure that I get in my needs instead of focusing on what I can't have. Make sure that you are getting your protein, and plenty of low starch veggies. I find that a week on low carb really helps.

Hi primalgirl. Sorry you're feeling so down.

Even though you've regained some weight, you're still below where you started and you're working to turn things around. 172 may seem far away from 140, but it's a lot closer than 201. Good for you!

Some things that have helped me get back on track when I've lost my way include:

1. Not judging myself for having gotten off track. Nobody's perfect and changing eating and exercise habits does require effort. Difficulties are to be expected.

2. Making maintaining my current weight my short-term goal.

3. Tracking, whether it's calories or points. Even if I eat more than my target, I'm being reminded of what specific things I'm doing that are holding me back and where I can make changes.

4. Taking baby steps to getting back on track. Drinking one more glass of water a day, walking for five minutes, leaving just one bite of something I wasn't eating out of hunger on the plate, etc. This helps me keep from getting overwhelmed and frustrated and encourages the moderate approach that I find sustainable.

5. Celebrating those baby steps and other little victories. It's easy to let things keep sliding or get frustrated and quit; it's more difficult to work away at something over a period of time. Making the effort is worth acknowledgement and helps me take further steps to get back to where I want to be.

6. Trying to identify factors that contributed to the slip and rethinking my mindset or environment to make those same times of mistakes less likely to occur again. However, perseverating on this can be counterproductive.

7. Switching things up. Sometimes I find trying new recipes or treating myself to a relatively fancy, healthy dinner helps me break out of a dietary funk.


I don't know if any of that's helpful, but you've been successful at losing weight before, so I'm sure you'll work though whatever's causing you problems at the moment. Good luck!

Primalgirl! I know what you're going through. I struggle with binge eating.

From what I've read, binging can be a direct result of restriction. Even "reasonable" restriction, such as the magic 500 calories/day we've been taught, can lead to binging. For some of us, it is our body and mind's natural response to deprivation.

With that in mind, you might consider taking a few weeks to just maintain your current weight. Perhaps taking a break from the "lose" mentality will help.

If that's not an option for you right now, my other suggestion is to PLAN. I went overboard today, and I know the #1 thing I have to do is sit down and plan all of my food tomorrow and enter it all on myplate. Once it's in writing I have a much better chance of sticking to it. Plan a day, or two, or a week of meals.

Lastly, can you put a healthy splurge in your plan? For me, I LOVE Noosa yogurt, but it's higher in calories than a typical snack (and not filling enough to be part of a meal) so I rarely have it. Treating myself to a container of Strawberry Rhubarb Noosa feels like a major splurge for 280 calories. Or something like raspberries -- kind of pricey, so for me they are a treat.

Re: diet pills, if you're eating even when you're not hungry, and appetite suppressant is unlikely to help, no?

HTH!

I understand where you are coming from with trying not to eat after a binge. Here is a little different approach...if you can, try to think of it as balancing out your carbfest/binge with a day (yes, just one day) of eating as little carbs as possible. I tend to eat my higher carb days on the weekends. But, on Mondays I don't eat anything that has more than 1 or 2 carbs and my carb count (for Monday only) is usually 20-30 carbs. If I am really hungry on Monday, I continue to eat even if it is going over my normal calorie range; but I only eat more protein or fat.

Since low carb foods tend to suppress appetite this works well for me. One very low carb day gets me back on track and then I can continue the week on plan. For me that is carb cycling with low, medium and higher carb days. Usually the only thing that throws me off is TOM. I have an app to track it and I find that usually if I am having a really hard day it is almost always hormonal and can be traced to either PMS or ovulation.

I agree with above post switch to maintenance eating for a while. It tough cuz you want be donewith diet. I just am coming off a 3 months maintence. Cuz i started getting extreme hunger like you. Let body adjust where it is at then go for more. The last 10-20 are the hardest.