Oh I am so glad I posted here. You guys are blowing my mind with your insights! I thought I had a pretty good handle on what to or not to do but so many points here are rich:

-Kaplods' note about tying guilt in with abstinence, so true. I don't want to feel like I don't [B]deserve[B] certain things, but I need to come around to the idea that I don't want them because they don't make me feel good/they don't taste good (after awhile as many have mentioned). YES.
-diamondgeog's post about exercise and how that controls appetite. I used to get discouraged with exercise, since as we know the calorie-burn factor is not as great as we sometimes like to hope. Earlier in the month I did well with adding light exercise in 3x week and felt good, slept better, started to feel a tiny bit fitter (I didn't want to weigh myself since that wasn't supposed to be the point) then I had a treat meal, which evolved into a treat weekend, to a treat week, to a... well, I was back on binge train. I definitely need to get back into walking again.
-I love Nelie's point about how binging can be caused by feeling like you're not allowed to have something. YES. I know this feeling. That's why I've avoided abstaining from certain things. But I think I need to give myself at least a decent timeframe where I commit to avoiding sweets (my trigger) and seeing how I feel in, oh, 3 months or something. I would hope by that point I would no longer crave them and they would be replaced with new foods I love (healthier, non binge-triggering ones!).
-which leads into Crispin's great post. I definitely never laid off the binge triggers for a long enough time period. I was too concerned with not feeling deprived or cheated out of something special, especially for holidays and birthdays. Well neither are coming up for a while now (not sure when Easter falls this year..) so now is the time to get cracking!

My plan: I'm going to begin the practice of eliminating sweets/pizza/pasta tomorrow (3/1). I may count ww points for a time to assure I don't go crazy with overeating other things. I will take note of what foods (if any) cause triggers beyond sweets and eliminate them as well. My focus is on finding filling, tasty and healthier foods. I will look at this as a short run process, but allow no "off days" or cheats anywhere for at least 2 months. I will make adjustments as needed but the no sweets/binge triggers can not be revoked. I really need to find out if this will be the key to freeing myself!

Thanks so much for all your wisdom :) I will update with the results as I continue forth!

"but the no sweets/binge triggers can not be revoked"

I found this book to be incredibly helpful in dealing with the urge to binge:
Brain Over Binge by Kathryn Hansen. Best wishes to you as you move forward!

Nostone,

Go for it. It IS doable. I just said no matter what I am going to give it up for a month and see how it goes.

Now it is virtually effortless. Hunger is just gone with no grains, little to no processed food, and little starchy veggies, and moderate fruits.

Everything else is literally on my plate. My combo might not be right for you. But if you stick with it, it will get so much easier and be one of the best things you ever did.

Remember these are lifestyle changes not a diet.

I truly believe most times there is failure people haven't gone quite long enough to get over a transition period. Don't forget enough water daily as well.

Thanks diamondgeog! I agree, no matter WHAT, I have to stop this out of control freight train. I will be up over 200 (a first) and out of all my clothes in a matter of weeks if I don't make a real change. I definitely don't see it as a temporary diet solution: I want to not crave junk food ever, so hopefully abstinence will do the trick! You inspire me, it's exciting to think in a matter of weeks/months I could feel potentially feel indifferent to my now favorite processed binge items.

And mars- I have read Kathryn's book too! And I loved it. She writes so well in an easy to read format, and her binge experiences really ring true. I struggled to have the breakthrough that she did the way she did though. It was like, I read it, and said "OH!" It sounded so easy. And maybe with more practice it could have been? But it was difficult for me to not justify, well one more binge, then I'll try again. Sigh. I may get a chance to try it again over the next few days/weeks if any triggers occur though!

Same here. But I got some things that have really helped me: viewing the urges as neurological junk, & understanding my lower brain, in trying to help me survive, can be oh so persuasive! I know how to spot the pre-binge behavior more easily and nip things in the bud, like when I try persuading myself that I need something at the store just to have an excuse to buy binge foods.

There is another technique called surfing the urge. I haven't read up on it, but apparently you learn to ride the wave of an urge to binge as it intensifies and then falls off. Apparently it WILL pass in ?20 minutes?. Eventually they go away altogether.

I guess we all have to try different things and work out what works for us.

I am currently on my second serious attempt to quit sweets. I am more serious this time though last time i did it for six months successfully and got to a very low weight. A major change of my routine messed the whole thing up.

I started out that first diet doing exercise every second day. I started out with a long walk and got up to running about 10km by the third month i think. I may have been able to continue that for a fairly long time i don't know but sometimes i just don't really want to start exercise because i need to focus on other things like now.

So this diet i am doing now which i started two months ago, is also a quit sweets one. And as of about a week ago i feel a lot more committed to doing it forever. I would not quit pasta though as i'm a vegetarian type thing and rely on it. I also don't really binge on it.

but i do binge a lot on anything with refined sugars in it like iccream, lollies, cake and so on. And when i'm in binge mode, i will binge on nuts of any sort, weetbix with milk, cornflakes with milk, just anything basically except meat and vegetables. At one point i was even worried about the amount of milk i was consuming.

But for me its the sweets that are the key to my binging behaviours. You may find if you can just quit sweets you will be able to eat pasta and stuff like that without binging also. In the South beach diet, they seem to leave pasta and bread for phase two. I think it sounds like a sensible system they've got from the little i know about how that diet works.

Anyway so now i'm doing no exercise except in my garden and being active.

I think one of the things that triggers my binge behaviour is low mood brought on by disappointments i can't deal with, frustrations and other negative events that come in sequences and accumulate to wear down my positive mood. But once i start binging, even when my mood picks up again, i tend to keep on binging unless i get on a diet.

ON this one, i worked on my resolve quite intensely for the first few days and now its easy for me.

Also i avoid getting hungry and am not super rigid with myself. I don't restrict my calories too much but i am losing weight easily and steadily. I"m not in a big hurry. I'm not stressed about it. I am confident it will happen because i've done it before.

This time i'm already thinking about maintenance though and intend to try to keep a food diary even after i reach goal weight.

Its important for me to try to anticipate and be prepared for diet negative events so that i am not brought unstuck because usually my diets end fairly suddenly and its ages before i can start again. I tend to go with the flow whatever the flow is at the time.

Have a look at my food blog in my signature.

nostone I agree with you 100%. Abstain from what makes you feel out of control.

I too binge from sugar and carbs. I too am starting my no white sugars or possessed foods. I did it before I can do it again for life.

On a side note am a reformed Alcoholic , and a reformed smoker. No Alcohol for 21 years and No smoking for 34 years.

I know now that I can not eat these kinds of foods. Like mentioned before why eat something that makes me feel horrible and unhappy.

There are many diets and much advice out there. Just do what works best for you. Everyone is different. What works for me may not work for you.

But I can highly recommend not eating sugar. Get ready to feel wonderful.

Good Luck...

I haven't read everything. So forgive me if I'm repeating what someone else has already said.

You mentioned old WW, one of the things I keep using from very early on in WW is a concept called, red light foods, think of a traffic light, red, yellow, green, pretty simple, but involves figuring out how your mind and/or body react to different foods.

Red light foods are ones you can't control, for me chips, yellow you can sometimes control, green, no prob. Not saying you can't have these ever again, but knowing which are stronger triggers can help you plan when it would be ok to indulge.

I have chocolate just about every weekend, but never during the week anymore, same with chips, it's a delicate balance in the beginning, but for me now simply a habit, I know I can have it on the weekend so I can limit myself during the week, it's not as restrictive as never again.

Wishing you the best of luck finding what will work best for you, don't give up, keep trying, you will find it! :sunny:

Forgot, I wanted to say "knowledge is power"

I can identify with this so much. I know there are people out there who can swear off certain foods and let's face it, sugar is a completely unecessary nutrient in its processed form! We don't need it to survive or to thrive do we? Unfortunately for me when I put it off there comes innevitably a day that I will eat it again, and then it's a snowball effect that I can't seem to ever stop. Eventually I start questioning the logic of giving up something forever and it begins to feel inherently stupid (to me) and then I go for it, starting an avalanche that I can't stop.

The most immediate thought that comes to my mind when I'm cheating is "let me eat as much of this as possible because tomorrow I will punish myself heartily for this no matter how little of it I eat, no point in stopping now is there?"

So rather than abstaining from a certain food I've started abstaining from punishing myself from eating that food. Remarkably this has helped me avoid binges. I'm just a criminal when it comes to food, the more I tell myself not to eat it the more likely I am to go out of my way to eat it. There is no amount of dieting restriction or imprisonment that will change that fundamental truth about me. I can control myself much better with a little trust and freedom than I can control myself with massive restrictions.

Part of my particular journey was observing, tweaking, expirementing, more tweaks. As I suppose everyone does.

So for me after a number of months I could add some stuff back in without any problems. This may or may not happen to you. But my main point is the 'transition phase' doesn't necessarily become your longer term way of eating.

I found cutting out grains, just recently corn as my last one, had profound positives for me. It might not for you. And they weren't weight loss related. I was doing fine with corn weight loss wise. But cutting out stopped my back pain, even though I am running MORE, and allergies.

The other big point is you can always go back. You cut grains out for a couple months, not worth it for you or anyone, you can always go back.

I love this discussion. I agree it takes "self discovery" to figure out our triggers are. I have finally had a smack my forehead moment for my binges. It is not the food itself. It is the food, coupled with the stress/anxiety happening in my life.

No matter what is happening in my life, illness, death, crappy work conditions, I can't make that an excuse to eat sugar and carbs. Maybe I will feel better for five minutes but then it will only boomerang and cause me more anxiety because I gained more weight.

There are people who "can't eat" when anxious or stressed. This has never happened to me. ;)

I think this may be the key point. Even with alcohol and drugs, the focus of abstinence is on "one day at a time," not on "never again."

"Never again," is deprivation focused, "Just for today" isn't. And if a whole day doesn't feel doable,, focus on an hour or whatever DOES feel doable.

Even "maybe later, but not now" can be helpful.

I know this all, and it works wonderfully when I use it. I just forget too often to use all the strategies at my disposal.

My thoughts/experience exactly, except that I discovered I'm not really a binger, just an overeater (still a problem, though). I did not have the "Aha" moment that many who have read her book have. To be honest, I sort of got annoyed after reading it because it essentially boiled down to her realizing that her binges were mainly habit, deciding to break the habit, and voila, she was cured. I do not believe the process is so easy for many, though.

Yes, this does work, for me at least. As I mentioned in the previous post, I am not a binger, but I am an overeater. I find that if I can just resist the immediate urge, then 15-20 minutes later, I won't even think about the food I wanted (usually). The urge is so powerful sometimes, though, that the initial resistance is extremely difficult.

One thing I thought with mindful eating was if you weren't hungry and wanted to eat then distance yourself from the food and distract yourself. Often, the urge will pass. If the urge doesn't pass, then allow yourself the food but enjoy it and let it be the focus. But distance and distract works more often than you think it would.