I would LOVE to know why this always happens to me. I'll be doing SO good for two or three weeks, eating really well, working out almost every day.. feeling great, looking better. And then one day, just like that, WITHOUT ME EVEN NOTICING, it goes down the drain and I have a binge day. It happens without me even noticing though, that is the scary part. I'll just sit there eating and then I eat more. And then more. Then I turn to baked goods and it just goes wayyy downhill from there. I can't stop. I've been on this binge for a week now. Haven't worked out. Gained 8 lbs in less than a week. How disappointing. Why does this happen to me every time? I try to be positive now too, I'm trying not to focus on this but it's hard not to. I just want to be STOP thinking about food 24/7. Sigh.

Tomorrow, I am going to try to do the Calorie counter thing and stay on track but it's just so hard, I feel like I have no control over myself and little portions just don't satisfy me. I just keep thinking about food, like I'm obsessed, like I'm addicted. It's embarrassing. I'm going to go on a diet again on Saturday and hopefully get back on track so I look decent in time for NYE.

Please give me some words of encouragement, advice...
What can I do to finally stop obsessing? What to do to stay on track?
How do I stay on the wagon? And not fall off without even noticing?
Please help My self esteem is extremely low now.

Are you allowing yourself enough calories for the weeks when you're on plan? What are you generally eating? If you're constantly feeling as if your food isn't enough for you, and generally feeling deprived, then no wonder you're having difficulty staying on plan. Anyone would. It sounds like part of the problem may be finding a realistic plan that works well for you.

As for binges happening without your even noticing, you could try planning what you will eat before you will eat it, writing it down/entering it into your diet software, getting out exactly the amount you are going to eat, and putting the rest away before you sit down to eat.

I feel your pain, its hard staying on track when your just starting out! I read an interesting article on sugar in the December issue of women's health magazine. It's not on the site yet but it said that when we eat sugary things like baked goods, cookies, cakes and what not it your body actually craves MORE food. It truly is an addiction! I find this to be really true, whenever I go off plan and eat something sugary after that I want to eat everything in site. It's sugars natural effect on our body, so all those cravings you have even after you had your first cupcake/cookie/pie etc are normal. It happens to all of us, try not to feel to bad.

The real challenge here is getting back on track! Take it one day at a time, promise yourself you will stay on track for one day. At the end of that day make another promise to yourself to stay on track just one more day. Before you know it you will be staying on track for weeks at a time. I found that if I stayed on track for 1-2 weeks straight my cravings for those sugary foods actually plummeted. I didn't feel the NEED to go to the store and get something tasty anymore.

Also take into account are you addicted to the food or the process of eating? I like eating. I don't even need to enjoy the food! I just like the whole ritual of eating. I took me a very long time to realize this and it's taking a long time to get over it as well but when I clued in that I was eating just to eat something clicked in my brain and it was easier to resist. If you feel the need to eat, go for a walk, drink a glass of water, go for a drive. Anything that keeps you out of that kitchen! A lot of the time dehydration can actually make you think your hungry so make sure your getting enough water!

You might also want to try a buddy system. It could be a friend, family member or even someone on here! Whenever you want to eat something off plan, talk to them first. Most cravings last 15mins so if you can keep yourself occupied for that long it could very well pass

Good luck! You can do this, you just have to get up, brush yourself off and move on

The thing about sugar makes a lot of sense, whenever I start I just can't stop. It's neverending. Crazy. I just need to get over my obsession for sugar, I guess.

I think this might be a toughie. I LOVE food. The tasty treats and all, but I think I love the act of eating more. A lot of the time I don't even realize what I'm eating, I just eat it, espeically during a binge. I take huge bites and I don't appreciate the texture, the taste, etc. I just eat. Devour.

I'm going to try to take it one day at a time. Ignoring sweet treats might be the most difficult part about all of this. Ahh!

The only advice that I can give you is that you should not have those foods around in your house. If it is not in the house you won`t be eating.

I live in a dorm so I don't really have any of that food in my house... but it is there in the cafeteria. For free, no less.

I have been through this over and over, the only advice I have for my success this time is 1. Dont restrict your calories to the point you feel you need to binge, you will be better off eating more and losing slowly then being stuck in this never ending cycle. 2. Some people will disagree but have planned cheat days! I have one a week and over the last 4 weeks I have not fallen off track and I have lost about 14 lbs!

Congrats! I actually read about cheat days and I think I might incorporate them into my diet as well, just gotta make sure I don't go too "crazy" on those days either. Sigh. Thanks for the advice! The hardest part is sticking to a realistic diet over a long period of time - I am always searching for a quick fix. And that's what puts me back in this cycle.

Cheat days don't work for me, because in one day, I can undo all the progress of the prior seven. I've even undone the progress of an entire month over the course of three days - in fact that characterized most of my life for more than three decades.

I'd be on plan (a plan that should have resulted in weight loss) for 27 days of the month, but I would be completely out of control during TOM/PMS, because of what I called "rabid-hunger." I couldn't control the hunger, and in three days I'd undo all the work of the previous month.

Doctors told me that birth control pills might help, but warned that it was just as likely (perhaps even even more likely) that I would gain weight as a side effect of the pill. I wasn't willing to risk it, until my PMDD and menstral pain got so bad that getting fatter felt like the least of my problems.

The difference was miraculous. Hunger didn't go away, but it cured the hunger rabies. I didn't have to put intense "tooth-and-nail" effort into maintaining my weight.

I still had remaining issues, and the primary issue turned out to be carbs.

I had always thought I was an emotional eater and a carb addict. I used to think I was a food addict, but I realized after reading the book "The End of Overeating," by David Kessler, that every one of my food triggers were carbs. I wasn't addicted to food, I was addicted to carbs, and the sweet/salty/fat combination that he describes in his book (that even lab rats overeat in response to, and appear to "self-medicate" with when under stress) fit me to a T.

I found that "deprivation" did trigger the emotional urge to binge, but that indulging in high-glycemic carbs triggered a physiological drive to binge. The more I ate, the hungrier I got. I'm less hungry on 1000 calories of very low carb, than on 3,000 calories of high-carb foods. On high carb foods, the more I eat, the HUNGRIER I get.

This also made me realizethat I COULD (and would have to) avoid my addiction. I didn't have to avoid all carbs, but I did have to avoid the sugars and the starches as much as possible. And when I did eat fruit or starchy veggies and grains, I had to make sure that I ate the slowest digesting ones. It's a lot more difficult (and less harmful) for me to gorge on Honeycrisp apples than on chocolate, but it's still important to limit even the good carbs (because I have binged on apples - usually it results in diarrhea before weight gain, but I still need to recognize and be prepared for the "addiction" potential).

When I don't overeat carbs, I don't get that "rabid" hunger that inevitably leads to the binges that unravels my progress.

I'm not really trying very hard to lose weight. Compared to prior weight loss attempts, I'm barely lifting a finger - and the only reason is that I've been able to avoid bingeing and backsliding. My progress didn't have to be fast for me to lose 98 lbs (in fact, it's taken me 7 years - though mostly in the last 4 years). I just had to put a stop to the backsliding.

I think backsliding is a bigger temptation when you diet very strictly. One of the reasons I diet with only a tenth of the effort I used to put in (other than I'm just too bone-weary sick of dieting to put in the full-steam effort) is because I don't ever binge because I'm sick of the deprivation. I never deprive myself to the point that giving up seems attractive. There's nothing to give up, because I'm not working all that hard in the first place.

The other reason my progress is slow, is because I do fail a lot. My problem substance is difficult to avoid, because virtually everyone, including sweet grandma, is a sugar pusher.

If I fail at sugar abstinence, I won't go to jail, but the consequences are still pretty severe (I discovered that concentrated high-glycemic carbs aggravate my health issues), and yet I still fail a lot. Not because I'm an idiot, but because even when keep it out of your living area, sugar is everywhere.

If you can find the time, I'd highly recommend reading The End of Overeating, it's really helped me look at food differently. I try to make food choices based on it's addiction-potential. Which foods are the least likely to trigger a binge?

I'm not sure any of this is true for you, but you can find out, by keeping a detailed food journal. Write down everything, even when you eat off plan, EVEN WHEN YOU BINGE. This way, you'll be able to see your own patterns. What foods do you binge on? When do you binge? Is it TOM related? (some women get hungrier during ovoulation, some before or during TOM, or even both.... finding your patterns can help you prevent the binges).

You just described MY struggles word for word. Seriously its soo infuriating when I'm good for a week or two, dieting/ exercising every day and noticing the great results...and then out of nowhere I'm binging...stuffing my face with EVERYTHING in sight! It makes me feel sad, guilty and most of all angry with myself for not having enough self control...and I rationalise that my behaviour means I'm WEAK and that I don't love myself enough because if I DID i wouldn't be doing this to myself, would I?...Also, another downside is that it discourages me from starting another diet because I think 'well if I failed before...many, many times before...that means i'll surely fail again'. MY advice to you is that once you get back on tract w/ your healthy diet/regular exercise is to NOT allow yourself ANY cheats...because I find that even though BEFORE you allow yourself a treat your brain starts convincing you of all the reasons why you SHOULD have one: i.e. you were soo good ONE treat won't make a difference, you DESERVE it, you'll only just have ONE..wrong, wrong, wrong!!! the problem I find is that once you allow yourself a treat you immediately feel guilty (leading to more eating) and unsatisfied with the small portion..which explains what you described as your 'unconscious binges'...the problem is that 2 weeks time simply isn't enough to kill your bad eating habits...so that's why its vital NOT to allow yourself to cheat...until you've got your eating AND emotional habits under control. Another important thing is..which many have previously said is to stop feeling guilty and get back on track! I hope this helps! I also had a bad 2-day binge and today is my 'get-back-on-track-day' ..it is dec.1st after all...and rather than feeling discouraged by all my previous diet-failures...I set a goal...and keep repeating to myself what i just advised you...NO CHEATS..just say NO!!! Goodluck!

Maybe you have to stop thinking of it as a diet and start thinking about it being a life style change. There is no quick fix for weight loss, no magic pills. The quickest fix is eating better and getting healthier. I believe you can do this, it just takes trial and error to find your "groove" and to find what works best for you. Be careful with "cheat days" they sound good in theory but you can actually undo your whole week! I know I used to. It may be better to have a cheat snack once a week or a cheat meal once every couple weeks. Just something to think about

Yes, cheat days are a must! Without them I couldn't be on plan. And let's be real, skinny people eat a lot sometimes! Just not always.

I'm 5'8" and currently 156-157 pounds. I've lost 12+ pounds eating a max of 1550 calories per day. I also focus on the WEEKLY maximum so I can cheat. 1550 x 7 is my maximum intake for the week. So if I eat under my max of 1550 any day, I can "flex" those calories into my cheat day. Yesterday I ate 600 calories less than my max (B/c I worked out- I figure a low-end estimate of those calories in too). So today if I go a couple hundred calories over, it's no big deal. This works!

And I mean, maybe you actually had calories left over for your binge since you ate well the rest of the week? Don't get me wrong, binging isn't good, but overeating can be ok sometimes as long as it's all balanced.

I still try to leave a deficit at the end of each week, even if it's only by a couple hundred calories less than the 1550 x 7. But a lot of times I don't and I've still lost weight.

I haven't read all the replies but I struggle with binge eating too. I find what's helped me is being AWARE with food. Intuitive eating really. Here's something you can try.

Get a plate and put the following into 4 seperate areas of the plate, not a lot just a couple teaspoons or a couple chips:

-chocolate chips
-salsa
-tortillia chips
-shortbread cookie

Now grab a piece of paper cause your going to become aware of how food triggers your emotions.

Go as SLOW and mindful as you can. Don't rush this next part, take the time and just do everything VERY VERY slow. Bring your attention to ALL of your sense with every step and jot things down if you like.

Start with the chocolate chip. Start slow, just look at it, analyse it, notice it's texture, the shape, everything visual you can see about it, notice it. When you are ready, slowly touch it, feel it in you hand, notice the texture, does it melt? Pick up another one if it does! LOL etc. Then smell it notice what's happening to your body as your doing this, are you salivating? What does it smell like? Now just hold it to your lips and recognize what your body is doing. Then put it in your mouth, slowly notice what happens with your tongue, how does your mouth open, what is your tongue doing, notice your stomach, your reactions and your saliva, keep it in your mouth and savour it and become aware of how your body is reacting to it.

Now write down your experience.

After this, close your eyes and think of something that has hurt you, an incident where you were really upset. Close your eyes and visualize it and conjur up the emotions again. Feel it. It doesn't have to be something horrible, just something that irritated you or something someone did that bothered you. Now once you are feeling that way again, rate your emotions on a scale of 1-10 (1 being calm, 10 being angry or irritated) write it down

Now pick up another chocolate chip and put it in your mouth while thinking of the incident. Eat it the entire time you are thinking about the incident, notice what your emotions are doing. Have they escalated, calmed down? After your done eating it write down and rate yourself on a scale of 1-10 how you feel.

Repeat and do the same thing for each food item

Once your done notice what foods have calmed you down the most and put them in order, the highest number at the top of the list.

If it's chocolate at the tope, it does not represent sugar as your comfort food it's FAT! This was a HUGE surprise to me cause my binging are with cakes, pastries etc, the fattening stuff

The shortbread represents sugar

The Salsa represents spicy

The tortilla chip represents salty

You can recognize your trigger food and now how they effect your emotions.

Also you may realize the more intuitive you are with your food by slowing down and becoming in tune with your food, you may realize all you really need is just 1 chocolate chip and not 10 or 20. Try eating that way, with everything, breakfast, lunch etc. Yes people might look at you funny but it's bringing your body and mind into awareness about how you FEEL when you eat. It's been a super powerful exercise for me. This is going deeper than just control. Good luck hun, you can do this! Don't be so hard on yourself, you can't change what you don't acknowlege!

I love this idea! Will definitely try it...as I've also read when you concentrate on your food, and your senses without having other distractions while eating (i.e. tv, computer) you eat less and more slowly...it works, just difficult to kick old [bad] habits

I am sorry you are struggling sweetie....to control my cravings, I made sure to divide my calories in to sometimes as much as 6 meals-if I ate every 3 hrs or so, I never got hungry and never got hungry enough to have a real craving. Make sure you are getting in enough calories as well, at one point, I was eating too few calories and boy oh boy was I every hungry. I also try to make sure I had replacement food- instead of full fat, full calories, I weaned myself off with these kinds of foods.

I also agree with thinking about the food before eating; when I concentrate on my food, I find I eat less without even try. Stray strong and there is always another day- you will get there!~