I can't stop eating my way through stress. Help?

TianaCherii

My binge eating episodes are becoming more and more frequent now that my stress levels are over the roof. I keep telling myself "tomorrow is a new day", but then I mess up tomorrow too. I've lost motivation to get back into my diet and exercise plan. Any advice?

Carol_L

I guess my first question is can you identify anything in particular that is the stressor? Having been in that situation before, it's easy to just say "EVERYTHING!". I was feeling stressed with my work, and my overeating, and my lack of organization, and my lack of discipline, and the weather, and......but once I forced myself to sit down and take a deep breath, I figured out the common thread to all of this.

For me it came down to a sense of a lack of control. Once identified, I started trying to look at the various situations that triggered the binges and forced myself to categorize them as things I could control, things I could not control but could influence, and things that I could neither control nor influence.

If I could not control or influence something - I developed a strategy to cope with it.
If I could influence it - I examined how I could turn something into a positive or at least neutral for me.
If I could control it - I looked at making the changes required to take that control. Not everything, not all at once, just starting with small things to develop a pattern of success.

Hope this might help give you a starting point.

Good Luck.