Hi. Something I think I didn't mention when I first joined here is that I am a recovering from an eating disorder. Technically ED-nos because I have had bouts of anorexia, bulimia, and binge eating. The most prominent of these being bulimia. I fear that it is impossible for me to do a healthy diet without spinning out of control. What do you think?

Well I think its better to ask you what you think? I mean has "dieting" ever really worked for you before? Personally I am done and going very gently with myself. Right now I am gaining, the next step to turn it around can not be a drastic one, because the addict in me that is eating disordered can not handle anymore extremes. For me, dieting is extreme. So what do you think?

Chris

Thanks for your input. I'm really not sure what I think. I'm just confused and scared. I know I am a very ditch to ditch person, I go from one extreme to another.

Ditch to ditch and hamsterwheel and monkey minded, you and me both gf

Chris

i know where you are coming from. I have had suffered from anorexia, bulimia and now battling binge eating and compulsive eating too. I do everything extreme too! it is so frustrating!

whenever i try to be moderate, i just end up bingeing. so sometimes i just go 'hack it' and go back to being extreme because it seems like the only way that works even though i know that it actually is ruining me!

does anyone understand?

I have had a hard time with this subject myself. I suffered from anorexia a few years ago. For a year and a half I threw up almost everything that I ate. Once I began treatment, it seemed that everyone's main goal was just to get me to stop throwing up - which I did. Since then, I have steadily gained weight, which thrills everyone but me. I am now actually quite overweight (5'2" and 176 lbs.). I guess I would now classify myself as a compulsive overeater. I have been dieting off and on for the last few years and it is really hard to draw the line between "normal" concern and obsession. I started the South Beach Diet today. My biggest New Year's resolution is just to start treating myself better. People like us really need to work on building self-esteem. I told my husband that I am just going to "fake it 'til I make it" - and start being nice to myself and make myself a priority and pretend that I am oozing self-esteem and maybe one day I will wake up and actually have self-esteem If anyone has any better ideas, please let me know
~B

I was put into treatment, not hospitalized or anything, just visiting with a dietician once a week back last June-July for 8 weeks for anorexia/bulimia. It was brought on by school and how dedicated I am to my work. I went to cosmetology school, and when another one of my classmates would refuse a client, I'd take it because I knew more than likely their clients would probably tip well, which usually wound up being the case. So I'd go for days without eating, maybe drinking a little water, but nothing else because I was so busy. Anyway, it got to where when I finally did have time to eat after a few weeks of off and on being busy at school, I started throwing up because I had gone for so long without eating that it had torn the muscle up in my stomach. It did suck because it didn't matter if it was my favorite food or whatever, I couldn't keep anything at all down. So I went to the doctor and he referred me to the dietician. They put me on 1/4 cup Gatorade and saltine crackers for 2 weeks and I was finally able to start eating solid food again and able to keep it down. I've not had any big problems with it since, but I have been extremely restrictive with what I eat since I started dieting back when I weighed 315. I'm down to 185 still which is what I was at when I started treatment. Most people that see the diet I'm on right now think it is highly restricitive, but it works for me as far as weight loss. For breakfast, I have 3 egg whites (cooked of course) and 1/2 a grapefruit; mid-morning: 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce; lunch: 1 can water tuna fish (with the water drained); mid-afternoon: 8 oz. flavored nonfat yogurt with 1/2 cup fat free cottage cheese mixed in; dinner: 4 oz. diced chicken, 1/2 cup chopped celery, 1/2 cup broccoli, 1/4 cup chunky salsa, 1/8 cup sugar free apricot preserves; post workout: 5 saltine crackers; and all the water you can drink.

I can TOTALLY related to this thread! In fact, I've never heard it put as perfectly before! I struggled with overeating alot as a younger kid. In high school I weighed about 168 at 5'3'' which seemed massively overweight compared to my size 4 classmates/friends etc. I became bulemic, then anorexic, then both only eating alittle and throwing that up etc. I ended up in the hospital after I got the flu. My blood pressure dipped VERY low (they take ur blood pressure lying down, then sitting up, then standing up, but they wouldn't even risk sitting up with me!). I also couldn't keep ANYTHING including water down so I was very dehydrated. Of course after this I went into treatment. There is were the all or nothing syndrome came out. The binge eating began and I slowly and stedily gained up to 208 (more than I ever weighed before the ED!). Now I'm starting again to lose weight. That sense of control is POWERFULLY addicting and when I start restricting anything I find that I start restricting more and more. What I am trying now is only keeping "good" foods (fruits and vegetables) in my apt and not "restricting". I am also trying to get lots of exercise instead of a strict diet. Everyday is a struggle... If anyone wants to chat.. you are definately not alone!

One most common thing I see here is the "all or nothing" thinking. Now, I can MOST definately relate as I am fighting the same battle that all you strong women are fighting. The fact is, you have to have that certain type of personality to succomb to an eating disorder, and the ironic part is that is most often the women who want to be good at everything they do, not to mention doing the right thing; when what we allow ourselves to resort to[the ed] is in fact very self damaging. I too struggled with anorexia, and dangerously restricting, and excercising like crazy, getting high off of that sense of power, and that this is one thing I can control in my life right now. I slowly stopped the restricting and excessive excercise, and turned to bulimia, then to binge eating, then back to a serious case of bulimia, with anorexic tendencies. And I realize now how both mentally and physically damaging purging and not eating can be, so I was able to control the sypmtoms by finding out what caused them. So, I haven't literally purged in over two weeks which is awesome for me, because I have taught myself the risks and harmful effects it can have on both my body and mind. Yet, I can see myself turning to yet another symptom, which is overeating. I to try to just eat "moderately", but I honestly think I'm colorblind to gray. I can see black, and I can see white, but there's no gray area. So, I once again find myself going "extreme" and giving it what I call my "all". This is the one thing I know works for me, and it honestly doesn't sound too bad right now. I don't know, but I do know this is a battle that is worth fighting, because if I don't, I'll end up losing me, defiantely mentally, but maybe physcially too.

I think the best thing we could all do is take it in really, really small baby steps. For me what has worked best is taking it really slow, and like Chris said, being really gentle with myself. You have to make mini goals and keep them until they are habits (but good ones at that). For me I started with eating a healthy breakfast in the morning. I have been doing that for about a month now, so I have started on the next step... back to the gym. I have to really force myself to take it slow there. But I won't work on the next step until I get going to the gym every day. And it doesn't have to be the gym... just anything generally to keep yourself healthy, such as breakie in the morning, drinking lots of water during the day, adding more fruits and veggies to your diet, getting out for a walk every day, stretching every morning, etc.

To me the most sure-fire way to fail is to try to do it all at once. But going slow for me is difficult as I'm an instant gratification person. But already the benefits I am seeing from slowly altering my lifestyle make it worth it. And that's the thing - I don't think in terms of a diet. I think in terms of having a healthy lifestyle. To me that's the key to success. I want to reach my goal weight but I want to do it in a healthy way and have it be something that I can maintain throughout my life. Just take it one small step and one day at a time.

Cheers,
Dietrie

I have to say I am so greatful to have found this thread! Everything you have all said rings soooo true to me. I was annorexic during high-school and then bulimic towards the 'end' of the annorexia. I certainly am a bit of a control freak with everything and despite this have never really had it in control. I never had any treatment for the ED's and just kinda started eating, thus I have never ever learnt how to eat healthy and what are the right things to eat. Because I couldnt be annorexic and control what I ate I simply gave up and ate whatever I wanted whenever I wanted. I am now 101kg (230+pd) and extremely overweight. I am starting using Dr. Phils book to actually LEARN how to eat, why to eat, what to eat and when to eat. I am concerned that I will take it to the extreem, when ppl say nice stuff im like oh thats good, ill try a little harder... I already miss some of my planned meals, coz im busy, not on purpose, and im worried I will start excercising sooo much and end up back in a rutt. Things seem to change for me when I have a lifestyle change, start of high school, end of high school, start of uni, end of uni. Right now im looking for a new (my first) full time job and am worried it will start another collection of bad choices...

Ok, so, yeah, your fear happened to me. I think it's important you RECOGNIZE it in yourself now to prevent the problems later. That was my mistake.

My anorexia ended when I was 14 or 15 after only a few years. I thought I was "cured" b/c I started getting fat. By college, I weighed over 200lbs. By when I should have grad college, I weighed nearly 300lbs. I didn't recognize that as a disorder b/c all I was told after the anorexia was that eating was good and not eating was bad.

I had NEVER tried to diet in my entire life b/c it was beaten into me that anorexia/dieting was BAD and made me BAD. I tried WW w/a friend and within a week, I fell into SERIOUS restricting. I really fault WW for not asking its meetings members if they have suffered ED before they begin the program. I think there is a warning now, but there wasn't at the time.

The points made it SUPER easy to restrict....I knew what I was supposed to have and I tried for that...but then, I would eat just a little less, and a little less, and a little less each day. I had to quit after a month b/c I knew I was out of control. I found myself barely eating 10pts a day (when my range was like 28-33) and SO excited when I found a super low point food.

So, I stopped...but emotionally, I was gone without the restriction. I didn't notice it at a time, but stopping restricting caused me to feel out of control of EVERYTHING. I was so off balance that I left school the semester before graduation, came back for half of spring semester, and left again taking f's for that term.

That rock bottom allowed me to follow weight watchers per the letter, probably out of NEED for control and routine, for over 6 months. I did well, lost over 75lbs, felt great until I hit a plateau. At that point, something in me SNAPPED. for the first time, I was confronted w/the urge to purge...something I had never even been able to force myself to do before.

Up until then, I really had thought that bulimics just made a choice to puke up their dinner. That's really how I thought it worked. Once it hit me, I realized there is no choice. I wasn't just purging after binging, I was purging after a regular meal. I was thinking, if I can just puke up half of it, this ickiness will go away. I have NEVER felt some compulsive about anything in my entire life.

That was about a year ago...I purged for months straight, 4-5 times a week...gaining all the way. I tried zoloft and it helped the purging but made me feel very strange otherwise, so I stopped. As of today, I have only purged once in the last few months and I was able to stop myself about halfway through it. However, I am totally afraid to start WW again without a FULL support system in place, including therapist.

I am making an appt tomorrow for a counselor with a clinic. Our school has the highest rate of ED in the SouthEast and our counseling center kinda doesn't care...so that's not the best place for me. I just really want to beat this before it beats me. I am getting too old to have ED...I am 26 and I feel like I should have been strong enough to beat it by now. Plus, it's hard explaining to people that yes, I am 100 lbs overweight but I am a recovering anorexic/bulimic ranging over 14 years of drama.

Anyway, this is long. I don't know you but I wanted to offer my story as a worst case scenario. Just get a support system in place. I truly don't think I would have spiraled out of control IF I had adequate support from educated people who could keep me in check when I lost control.

Good luck
Hugs
Toni