Thought I had cravings and binge eating beat. Nope!

Losingthedamnweight

I haven't majorly screwed up on my eating since June. June I say! I have been so on point with my eating and weight loss I thought my entire lifestyle changed to the point where my binge eating and insane cravings were behind me. Nope!

I'm learning more about myself everyday. I can have one high calorie meal no problem. The cravings don't come back and I'm good. I'll burn it off and go back to my calorie deficit. Eat two high calorie meals? I'm back on the binge eating train where my cravings control me and I just can't freaking stop thinking about food. It all started with thanksgiving...

When we celebrated thanksgiving I thought "why not just have a DAY where I don't count? It's only one day!" Then everything snowballed from there. I ate too much food, the cravings came back and after that, I felt like I was barely hanging on. And this past weekend I screwed up again for a DAY which turned into a weekend.

Lesson learned. I can handle a higher calorie than usual meal every now and then. But I need to know my limits before I revert back to my old self and gain all the weight back.

RodaRose

You are doing well. Keep learning

soulofgrace

With how frustrated you sound, I don't think you will "revert." I too pigged out on thanksgiving. I only just got back down to where I was before....just in time for the Christmas feast! LOL! But, I know more now, and so do you. This will be an ongoing process and you're hanging in there. Trust yourself and your new knowledge.

SezxyStef

I have the same issue but no BED...it's one of those things...it can be hard to get back on the wagon after a day or a week of not caring...

imagine after being at an all inclusive resort for a week...a whole week....it's hard to get back on the horse sometimes you have to want it bad enough.

missblondi2u

I'm right there with you! I started in June and lost about 40 pounds, then Thanksgiving happened! I told myself I would take a break for the one day since I had done so well. I logged but ate with abandon. Well that turned into about three days of over-eating, about two weeks of sketchy exercising (ok, I get a little bit of a break with the exercising because I did get sick), and a significant bump up in my weight trend graph. I've been in a bit of a funk since then.

BUT....this morning I got up early and jogged (ok, walk/jogged) 5 miles. I'm drawing a line in the sand and saying what happened has happened, I can't change it, and the only thing I can do now is get back on track.

AlciaMode

I feel you on this too. I have not been randomly snacking or eating candy for months. Than one day I decide to get a candy bar, next day it is poptarts, next pringles. Regained 5lbs and now am buckling down again to get rid of it again plus the additional 10lbs i still have to loose.

Unknown

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rrcorleto

Losingthedamnweight wrote: »

I haven't majorly screwed up on my eating since June. June I say! I have been so on point with my eating and weight loss I thought my entire lifestyle changed to the point where my binge eating and insane cravings were behind me. Nope!

I'm learning more about myself everyday. I can have one high calorie meal no problem. The cravings don't come back and I'm good. I'll burn it off and go back to my calorie deficit. Eat two high calorie meals? I'm back on the binge eating train where my cravings control me and I just can't freaking stop thinking about food. It all started with thanksgiving...

When we celebrated thanksgiving I thought "why not just have a DAY where I don't count? It's only one day!" Then everything snowballed from there. I ate too much food, the cravings came back and after that, I felt like I was barely hanging on. And this past weekend I screwed up again for a DAY which turned into a weekend.

Lesson learned. I can handle a higher calorie than usual meal every now and then. But I need to know my limits before I revert back to my old self and gain all the weight back.

I'll join the conversation with the same experience over a longer period of time. I started MFP on May 5th, 2013 after finally realizing that I was getting older and going to eat my self to death. I weighed about 350 pounds. I now realize I was grazing on food all day and packing the weight on. Someone at work had been using MFP for a few months and was having good results so I figured I'll try it. Well it worked great. I lost around 90 pounds by May 5th, 2014 (exactly one year later) I was down to 259. I remember feeling so confident at that time because I was having no trouble logging my food, walking a few miles almost every day, and running once in a while. I said to myself "I can keep doing this forever". But then I got over confidant. I thought I could skip a day once in a while with no problem, I'll just pick up again the next day. Then it became a few days on & off. Then I would not log for a week or two, skip my walks, and say "I can just pick back up at any time and continue on my weight loss journey". I put back on 20 pounds or so and made some half hearted attempts to start going in the right direction again. Summer turned in to Fall and then the Holidays hit and some more pounds found their way back on. 2015, same problems. A few poor attempts to get started again, a few failures, a few more pounds back on. And then, like you, the binge eating started again, as well as the constant grazing at night. So here I was, the day after Thanksgiving at 300 pounds again. I was horrified that that "first number" had changed again. I made a resolution to reverse direction. I'm two weeks back in the saddle, down 6 pounds, and exercising again. I haven't failed to log a meal or a piece of food since. Small goals, 10 pounds by the end of the year, back to where I was by May 5th, and if I can really get back moving again, down to 250 by that same date.

The point I am trying to make is that once you say "it's only one day" it can quickly becomes a slippery slope. Log it even if you go out and have the wildest cheat day ever. It keeps the good habit of logging going, and if needed, you can look back on that day as a reminder that you need to keep logging your food.

Jruzer

I have it in my mind that I have a chronic condition that I must manage for the rest of my life. It has flared up from time to time in much the way that others of you have described. I've got it under pretty good control right now, but I can never go back to "normal", i.e. not worrying about it.

LBL1986

I'm new to this journey and I'm experiencing the same things.

I'm amazed at how quick I was to feed my emotions. Every emotion I experienced I managed to use food to cope with it. Happiness, sadness, anger, love, etc.

Since I'm new i'm trying to start by just logging everything I eat and seeing the calories and using that for reinforcement.

bdfarrall

Oddly enough I did fine around Thanksgiving (I think). I've only been logging what I eat for about 1.5 weeks. In that short time I had one day where I just couldn't resist the chocolate. I was frustrated but as it turns out, I didn't go over on my daily calorie allowance. Every day I worry about overeating. It's hard! I get so tired of thinking about food all the time. It's just hard to ignore it.

BoxerBrawler

I let myself off the hook on Thanksgiving as well and for me, that's huge... ask anyone here who knows me. I didn't log and ate everything and anything I wanted. Then I went home, without any leftovers or takeaways, to my home where I had spent a day or two scrubbing for triggering food items. The next day was business as usual.

JaiRocket

I appreciate the number of people that are reinforcing starting with the habit of logging. I'm someone who has done the start and stop dance a few times. I've also done the ooh look I've started losing weight so I can skip a day of logging dance as well. None of these have turned out well for me, I go right back to being a binger/grazer. I'm starting the goal of 3 straight weeks of logging- even if it is logging a binge. Hopefully this will put me on the path of being successful in curbing some negative behavior.

SweetMsMara

I understand what you are dealing with. I'm trying to do better day by day and take it one meal at a time.