Can't stop eating

Malosis

I know everyone’s probably heard something like this a million times on this forum, but I can’t stop eating. Even when my body feels like crap and I’m heading straight for diabetes, I can’t stop shoving unhealthy food in my mouth. I want to detach from it so badly, but I have no idea where to start.

I promise myself that the next day will be better and that I’ll diet or cut back my food properly, but it never works. I just automatically find some way to go to a restaurant. I’m a terrible cook and I’m trying to learn how to, but ultimately, I give into my food obsession and just go out. I can’t stick to anything for more than a few days and its tearing down my self-esteem. It just confirms that I’m someone with no control over myself and it makes me feel worthless.

I tried talking to a therapist about all this, but I’m in college. I don’t really have the money and I’m still paying off medical bills. Please, somebody, give me some sort of an idea how to kill this obsession.

CupcakeCrusoe

If you can't cook, you must find healthier options out until you can.

Salads with grilled chicken are almost everywhere, and so long as you nix the heavy dressings and nuts, you can do a good job with those. One benefit of fast food at least is that most have nutrition numbers public to make them easier to track.

And then as you learn to cook, challenge yourself to make the things you like to eat out, but make them healthier at home.

Good luck. You can do this.

Silver82

Food can become just as strong of an addiction as drugs. Processed and foods served in restaurants tend to be created with just the right amount of fats, salts, and sugars to trigger your brain into the addictive cycle of eating more and more. Rather than stepping into the world of the "diet" and deprive yourself, start trying to -add- things to your diet that will satiate your hunger, be healthier, and help you free yourself from the addiction of eating this food.

It's important that you learn how to cook for yourself, it can be a very rewarding art and you'll find the food you can cook tastes far better than what you can buy pre-made. Take it one step at a time. Add raw foods that don't need so much preparation, decide what type of food you like and start learning to make it on your own. Not only will your body thank you, but so will your budget. Don't be hard on yourself or push too fast, that leads to frustration, just add new healthier options and you'll more than likely gravitate towards that rather than the other foods. You'll start finding that willpower and control. You have the power, everyone does, you just have to practice at learning to control. I wish you luck!

shellecollins

Hey lady, this is something I am struggling with TODAY!! I woke up late, it's too hot to be outside, forgot my snacks, the list continues. It's so easy to go to the dollar menu, but ease isn't worth the way it makes me feel later.

I've been a struggling college student, here are my suggestions!

-Buy when you find a sale! Chicken is currently on sale at the grocery near me, I bought more so I could freeze it.
-Know seasons, watermelons are $4 here, apples aren't. So buy what's in season!
-Recently learned, don't be afraid of frozen fruits and veggies! They're often times much cheaper!

That's all I have for now. I have a case of the Monday's, if I can think of more I'll let you know! Feel free to add me, if you want. I've been there, desperate, only affording grilled cheese, I can help keep your spirits high!

otter090812

My suggestion is to get a bit analytical about it. This is a basic summation of where I've got to since I sought advice for weight loss - mental/emotional and physical sides of things. Some, none or all of it may apply to you.

Think about what triggers your over-eating. Are you actually hungry (doubtful by the sounds of it)? Are you sad, are you bored, are you tired? What can you do to alleviate these feelings that doesn't involve food? Are there specific times of day that you have got into the habit of overeating during? How can you change your routine to combat this? Can you remember where the habits started, and is there an emotional issue or an experience that needs to be addressed in order to confront the habit?

Think about the effect what you're eating has on your body. I don't mean too much food = weight gain. I mean, are you eating/drinking loads of simple carbohydrates that may be giving you highs followed by slumps and a desire for more carbs? If you are the type of person who is affected by this, as I am, then protein-based snacks should keep you fuller for longer and reduce the spikes. I'm not anti-carb, but I try to eat most of my carbs as part of main meals, with a bias towards the complex carbs.

And, quite simply, I found that logging my food was a huge wake-up call.

headofphat

Start by eliminating the word can't from your dictionary. It sounds ridiculous. If you want to say you CAN"T beat LeBron James in a slam dunk contest then that's acceptable. Saying you CAN'T stop putting food in your mouth is just dumb.

Once you've eliminated that mentality then you should be fine.

angelexperiment

Sounds like me! I am constantly thinking about food even when im not hungry. When I get to that out of control place it helps me by realizing I want to be healthy and thin. For the first few days I eat very low cal like around a thousand. Eat higher fat foods like eggs bacon but cut the bread out. This gets the overeating under control and thoroughly chewing my food til its liqued this helps get me full faster. I chew 32 times. This is a newer concept to me but it actually works. Whats hard for me is after I no longer feel hunger I continue to eat but I try to stop bc if you eat til full or past full which I also have a problem doing especially if it's really yummy then you are overeating.

If you must eat out for breakfast id eat eggs and bacon or oatmeal. Or sausage and eggs. Steamed carrots or side salad. Or have salad and add chicken sausage or bacon hold the dressing. For lunches or dinners eat a salad eat chicken or some other meat source. Fatty fish nothing breaded or fried no bread either. At least minimize bread intake if you cant go without. Eat more fresh veggies. These are portable and negative calorie foods mostly. Eat fruits like berries. Or eat avacado and coconut oil these are healthy fats. Eat macadamias or beer nuts but only a handful at a a time dont eat peanut butter its very high cal.

persistentsoul

I can relate. Been in battle with food addiction as long as I can remember. As has been said it is a powerful addiction and food manufacturers target it on purpose to make money.

As with any addiction the only way to be free is to get yourself off the drug. Food is more complicated than most as need to eat to live. However if you want to live a life that you feel is really worth living I think you will need to get clean with food. It is not easy as temptation is everywhere but for those of us who are truly food addicted I think we have no choice but to put the effort in to get clean or be stuck in same miserable loop for rest of our lives.

I think what getting clean with food means can be quite individual but as has been said a general good rule to follow is to avoid processed foods. I agree with others. It is very much in your best interest to learn to cook, nothing fancy. I used to live in a little room with a two ring plug in mini stove. I got a basic steamer, a sauce pan and a mini frying pan. I did all my cooking that way. Steamed food is very fast, simple and healthy.

I have spent two decades trying to find how to master my relationship with food. Trust me it is so not worth looking for ways to eat the junk food in moderation. I can't do it, after 20 years trying i really really know i cant do it. Save yourself the same fate. Be really honest about what foods you are addicted to and then cut them out and go back to basics of whole natural foods. I used to think i was addicted to all food but mostly when it came to healthy veg for example it was what i put on it that i was addicted to.

It takes a little while to get used to natural foods without all the added extras but once you get through the detox and your body is free of the junk, you will feel so much better and the craving really does stop. I am doing a dairy and grain free version of ketogenic food plan. That is working well for me but only you can discover what works best for you. Just be really honest about what specific foods or additives get your cravings turned up and then cut them out. Also i avoid sweeteners because they make me crave too.

lynn1982

Start by only buying healthy food. If you can't control yourself around "junk," then don't keep it in the house. Take one day each week (perhaps Sunday) and sit down and plan all of your meals for the week. Make a grocery list of what you need for these meals and then go out and buy only what is on that list. And stick to it!! As for the emotional side of things, when you feel like you want to to eat unhealthy foods - when you get a craving for chips or cake or whatever it is that you can't stop eating - write down in a journal how you are feeling. Is it your body telling you that it is hungry (in which case, eat something healthy) or are you trying to fill an emotional void?

kewwyyy

Reducing food portions would be a good place to start, try serving your meal on a smaller plate so it gives the illusion of a bigger portion. If you weigh out ingredients before cooking you'll find it easier to calculate the calories.

Food-wise try not to think you're on a diet, instead just eating more healthily. Salads, soups, fruit, veg, nuts, Quorn if liked, yoghurts etc are ideal but you can still have your treats; I like to allow 200 calories a day for snacks so that could be grapes, an apple, banana with yoghurt, or even a bag of crisps, cereal bar or chocolate bar as long as it's within my 200. I find it helpful to look up menus online before going out to a pub/restaurant as a lot of them show the calorie information now.

Exercise-wise I recommend walking for half an hour or more every day (with or without a dog/friends), buying a Zumba/Rosemary Conley/other exercise DVD to do at home or buy an exercise bike/cross trainer to use at home to save on gym fees.

Elizabethgulick93

I suggest eating a lot, then! There are so many healthy snack options that are easy to cook and prepare. Salsa, for example, is yummy and low-calorie! You don't even have to put it on a stove! Also, things like roasted chickpeas, cheez-its (surprising), and some other things are low-calorie snacks. Half of weight loss is getting into the mindset to do it! You have to keep thinking about your motivations and why you want to get fit. Put them on your profile, and read them every day. If they don't inspire you and make you want to keep going, they're not good enough motivations. And lastly, find some healthier eat-out options. I don't know if you have a chipotle near you live, but it's delicious and will keep you full for most of the day! It's not too bad because it's nutritious stuff in it. Alternately, salads are everywhere. Your mindset can't change overnight, and neither can you! Don't be too hard on yourself! Have fun with your weight loss. GOOD LUCK!

angelexperiment

Also avoid eating noodles if you can. Go for buckwheat noodles. Those are carbs that only leave you hungry in a little while. Also avoid corn and peas and potatoes and sweet potatoes. Those are high starch carbs. Learn about healthier grains like quinoa, amaranth. Buckwheat, chia, flaxseed, millet, cous cous and more.

MissMissle

if you have no money how are you going out to eat so much? i can't even afford once a week? Cut up ALL your credit cards, using cash only makes spending more difficult...

And I dont cook either, but you can still make meals in advance. Go shoping on Sunday - get a melon, some apples, some sliced turkey breast, some cheese, a jar of peanut butter, a cucumber, and some frozen vegetables you just microwave. And voila! You are st for meals for the week!

aprilxlee

I've definitely been there! I have been battling with binge/emotional eating for the past three years and have lost my athletic body because of it. I knew I had to make a change when I wouldn't even wear a bathing suit in front of my own family. For me, what's helped...

I'm not a good cook. It's hard for me and takes a lot of time. However, eating healthy is essential to beating food addiction. There are very easy things you can prepare. Pick up fresh produce at the grocery store. Have fruit and veggies for snacks. Bring them in little plastic baggies with you. Learn what is triggering your binging - for me, I only binge at night, so I moved my workouts from the morning to the night after work. It leaves me no time to binge & I feel too good after a workout to do it anyway. Hope that helps.

caesar164

When I was in College I was addicted to sex lol... But seriously, life is not just about eating, find something to keep you occupied...

Nojoke81

Start by eliminating the word can't from your dictionary. It sounds ridiculous. If you want to say you CAN"T beat LeBron James in a slam dunk contest then that's acceptable. Saying you CAN'T stop putting food in your mouth is just dumb.

Once you've eliminated that mentality then you should be fine.

This.

oystercatcher3944

I second (third? fourth?) everyone who suggests learning how to cook. It is not only much healthier, but it saves you money (lots of it!) over eating out. Head out to the library and pick up a few simple healthy cookbooks. I always recommend Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone, by Deborah Madison. Even if you aren't a vegetarian (I'm not) it has so many simple, fast, vegetable-driven recipes that are fresh, tasty, and mostly low-calorie. You can always add in some protein like chicken breast or steak or whatever you like, too. Learning to cook is one of the most rewarding life skills there is, and an incredible gift you can give yourself. I find I appreciate food so much more when I put in the work to prepare it myself. And you can always start small - cook one or two meals per week, just to see how it goes.

martinel2099

You need to develop a better relationship with food. You are treating it like it's your enemy and that it has total control over you. Wrong, you are the one who has all of the control, the box of oreo's does not make you pick it up at the grocery store and does not make you eat the entire box in one sitting.

My recommendation is practice portion control and give yourself the tools you need to help. For example, if you put a giant bag of Doritos next to me while I'm watching TV, I'll single handily crash that entire bag. The Doritos aren't making me eat them, but if they're next to me in a big open bag I"ll keep going. What I do to fix this problem is I get out a kitchen scale that weighs in grams, weigh out my serving of doritos in the kitchen, record that entry into fitness pal, then go and enjoy my doritos. By weighing my servings I am practicing self control and after entering the food for the day helps me control how well I'm doing. If I want doritos I have to make an effort to go back and weigh them again and if I know I"m reaching my calorie goal for the day I'm less likely to do it.

bamagrits15

You may consider looking into Overeaters Anonymous or Food Addicts Anonymous. Or if you are of the Christian faith check out the book Made To Crave.

I have had this problem too for a long time. You aren't alone. One thing I am working on is to realize often times when I think I am hungry or just have a craving for everything in the house, more than likely I'm actually just tired. Sometimes when we overeat for so long we stop being able to identify other needs for what they really are.

I lost 50lbs 2 years ago. I was running about 15 miles a week and was in love with it. I felt great. Then I had a car wreck, messed my leg up, had some financial problems and found myself in a bad place emotionally. Instead of working through that I got fat again.

I needed a wake up call it seems this time. Only it wasn't some in your face deal some face. It was realizing I was killing myself. My ankles hurt. I can't workout with my kids. I'm ill as a hornet all the time because my weight has caused sleep apnea. I don't like myself. I was created to be more than this. And I will be more than this.

sorrias123

I struggle every day with food too! It is constant battle against what I crave and what I should eat. However, I find that if I continue to eat lean proteins, whole grains and lots of veggies, I don't crave the bad stuff quite so often. Also, you can have treats, you just have to be sure they are within your calorie range.

One trick I use is to plan ahead. I eat the same thing for breakfast and lunches so it's easy on me and by doing salads every day for lunch, I'm sure to get at least four-five servings of veggies plus protien. I alternate the types of salads I eat from week to week. One week it's salad with tuna, another week it's with deli turkey or grilled chicken breast. I always choose lighter viniagrettes over creamy dressing and no more than 1.5 to 2 servings per meal.

If you don't cook, salads are a great way to get lots of nutrition w/o out too much cooking. Someone mentioned chicken breast. It's not the healthiest, but if you don't cook, you can buy frozen pre-cooked chicken breast at the store and put on salads or eat with frozen veggies and a baked sweet potato on the side (cooked in the microwave).

As for cost, I'm not a struggling college student, but a parent paying for college for two students. I have to watch every penny I spend. A weeks worth of salad stuff at the store will cost me around $20 max if i buy the organic mixed greens or cheaper with romaine heads and that covers five lunches and three-four side salads for dinners. I started making my workday lunches of salads on Sundays by using some "Mason Jar" recipes. If you follow directions, the veggies stay fresh all week. I even pack up side salads for dinner afterward with the leftover veggies...they stay fresher that way...see www.organizeyourselfskinny.com for mason jar salad ideas.

Eating healthy takes a lot of planning and work at first, but it becomes habit after a while, much like going out to eat becomes habit. You can break the cycle...many of us have done it. I'm not perfect. I slip up but the trick is to keep going and not give up.

Good luck to you. I wish you success in your journey to become healthy, confident and happy. YOU ARE WORTH THE EFFORT...DON'T CONVINCE YOURSELF OTHERWISE. YOU DESERVE TO BE HAPPY AND HEALTHY!

martinel2099

Also inability to cook is not a problem. There are plenty of easy things you can prepare and even if you eat out you can still practice portion control and watch what you eat.

There's plenty of toaster friendly TV dinners you can make. http://www.amys.com/ "Amy's Kitchen" makes some really good dishes like enchaladas, brocolli and cheddar casseroles and etc that are easy to through in the oven and come out tasting great. I know how to cook very well but I am a busy man, sometimes quick and easy meals help.

Salmon- I'm a big fan of frozen and already marinated salmon, I buy mine in bulk from costco and it takes literally 30 minutes to cook. There's no preparation either, if you can boil water without burning it then you can cook well enough to do this.

AdamJBischoff

Yeah, we're called binge eaters.

We start pretty thin in our younger years and we can eat how much and whatever we wanted because of our metabolism. But, honestly, this is no issue to me starting today.

My first day today, and I am not touching the chips anymore already. Woah! I'll friend you and we can help out eachother. I'll tell you some good tips.


1. These are my calories organization. It's important to be organized. ^.^
- Breakfast 400 calories max,
-Lunch 600 calories max.
-Dinner 800 calories max.

Depending on how tall you are, you might wanna lower your calories. But my max calories of a day is 2180. That's a lot of food actually, and it's going to be hard to eat 2180 calories in one day, so I don't even care if I hit my max because I won't.
I'll only be getting around 2020 calories (I think. I need to double check). For shorter people, it's around 2000 to 1900 calories a day. I think you know how to do this.

2. Eat in a order.
-Get some sparkling water, or flavored water. Maybe just regular water, whatever you prefer. If you can't stop eating, flavor watered is good. Make sure everything is 0 on it. It's not water unless there's no calories, protein, calcium, sodium (duh), etc.
-Vegetable or fruit with your meal. Typically, I eat a lot of green beans. And one serving of that is only 20 calories. ^-^
-Main meal.
-Juice (NO SODA! SPARKLING FLAVORED WATER WILL REPLACE THAT).

3. Eat in this oder.

Vegetables or fruit first. Water to drink with it.
Main meal. Juice to drink with it.
Make sure you count the calories, measure how much juice you are drinking, then you will be fine. This will fill you up! I promise. It helped me a lot today, and I feel great already. Happier, for instance. ^.-

portlandsundevil

Ugh, I've been the same way lately! I have a couple suggestions:

1) Invest in a slow cooker! You don't really have to know how to cook to throw some things in a pot and set the timer. There are tons and tons of great recipes on the internet (and Pinterest!)

2) They aren't great for you, but I've found that frozen meals can do in a pinch when I'm really craving fast food. They should be used sparingly because of all the sodium, but can help you with portion control too.

8Bee

I agree with most of what has already been said. Now the can't cook part.... get a crockpot and a george-foreman grill and you will be amazed what wonderful healthy and low calorie meals you can make and you don't have to be able to cook to do this

wolverine66

3. Eat in this order.

Vegetables or fruit first. Water to drink with it.
Main meal. Juice to drink with it.
Make sure you count the calories, measure how much juice you are drinking, then you will be fine. This will fill you up! I promise. It helped me a lot today, and I feel great already. Happier, for instance. ^.-

i was going to say this. simply inserting a salad or veggies at the beginning of meals helped me tremendously. I didn't change what else i ate (at first). just added a large salad. and then i didn't eat as much of anything else, but i wasn't limiting myself either.

i think that's a solid place to start.

hoyalawya2003

Go to the library and check out this book: "The Beck Diet Solution." It isn't a diet--it uses cognitive behavioral therapy to help you change your relationship to food. It takes hard work, but you can reprogram the way you behave. I also second the overeaters' anonymous suggestion.

NancyNiles

I have the exact same problem and although I fail to follow my own advice frequently, at least I have, over time, been able to identify the cause and solution.

When I plan out my day either in the morning, or the night before, and I enter everything I can eat within my allotted calories, I stick to it better. I do better when I know what I can eat and how much.

Things get hard when I fail to plan and end up hungry with nothing prepared or portioned out. If I let it go until I'm hungry, I don't want to start cooking, I want to start eating. So I say "screw it" and go out and grab something. Usually fast food because, well, it's fast. Which also means it's bad for me.

Rarely do I want to run out and get a salad. But.... if the salad was already made and sitting in my fridge, then it's fast AND easy. I just have to make it when I'm NOT hungry. Which gets back to the planning part.

I plan better when I'm not hungry, so I try to do it the day before. I plan tomorrow's food today, so I never end up being stuck.

That said, while I know what situations lead to picking junk, and I know how to solve it... I haven't found a solution to being lazy yet. Cooking takes effort and has to be done before I'm hungry, so if I don't make it that far after work, I end up picking up junk on the way home. So the planning has to be strategic (meaning, planning my afternoon snack to be very filling, i.e. fiber, and late enough to last until I get home AND cook supper).

Lastly, I know you're getting a lot of advice about eating on a college income. But unfortunately you're going to have to choose between cheap, easy, yummy & healthy. I shoot for at least three, settle for two. Fact is, convenience foods (prepackaged salads, per-portioned snacks) are expensive. Portioning your own foods is time-consuming. Raw veggies on the go aren't usually very yummy unless you are accustomed to eating that way (fat food to celery sticks sucks!), and while fruits are easy, cheap and yummy, they are often calorie dense. So even though they are healthy, you can't realistically just eat fruit all day.

Losing weight on a budget is a balancing act. I wish that balancing act burned calories! lol

Take it easy on yourself. You didn't gain it overnight, you won't lose it overnight. The best advice I read here was to sub out stuff a little at a time. Start easy, pick something you can change right now that won't stress you out. Stress leads to bad choices and overeating (ask me how I know!). For me, it was whole grains. I couldn't give up bread, no matter how many people preached to me about carbs and gluten. I couldn't do it. It stressed me out. So I switched to whole wheat. I also switched my coffee creamer to fat free half-n-half. I didn't give it up, I just subbed it.

Baby steps.

You'll get there. You just have to find what works for you. Try mine. Try planning ahead. Try fixing food a day before. See if that's it. If not, move on to the next idea. Prioritize and plan.

There is no magic pill. No magic solution. No magic food or supplement. Healthy diet and exercise have been the only answers since the dawn of time. The diet industry makes BILLIONS off our desire to find the easy way out, but if any of them worked, no one would be fat anymore. So do NOT believe that crap. The only thing you will lose is time and money.

Good luck!

SarcasmIsMyLoveLanguage

This is a tough one.

1. don't expect changes overnight. It takes three weeks to form new habits. If you can get past the first three weeks, you may find it easier to stick to a healthier lifestyle.
2. although I love to cook, I don't necessarily agree with the notion that you should learn, as it may be an insurmountable stumbling block for you. Get yourself a slow cooker. Find healthy slow cooker recipes (there should be lots on here), take an evening and make up a bunch of meals and toss them in the freezer in big ziplock bags. When you run out the door in the morning, dump one of the bags into the slow cooker, turn it on, "set it and forget it". Dinner will be ready when you get home, and you'll have leftovers for a few days.
3. salad, salad, salad. Learn to love the salad. There are many ways to make a salad interesting.
4. don't buy crappy food when you go grocery shopping. Select only healthy alternatives, and make sure your fridge is always stocked with washed/ cut fruit and veggies. Hopefully if healthy food is easily accessible, you can resist the urge to eat out most of the time.

And most importantly IMHO, is to log everything, at least until you get the hang of eating healthy. Once you start logging your calories in MFP, you will quickly see where you can make improvements. It's a bit of a nuisance to input every single morsel, but it is worth it.

RunningMyPugandPapi

Does your college have therapists available for students? Often, they'll provide therapy at a low cost for students.

Firestar98

My biggest issue is I will eat any snack food that is in my house. My solution was to stop having snack food in the house. This is probably pretty difficult to do while in college, as you likely are in a dorm or have roommates. In that case don't buy yourself any snacks, and make sure you don't eat other people's snacks. This should go a long way towards reducing your overall consumption.

bkthandler

Stop waiting for tomorrow.

I was always bad about the same thing…I would wake up late…not have time to grab a healthy breakfast so I would grab donuts and chocolate milk. So I would do the same thing with lunch because the day was already shot…and so on and so on.

Here is something someone wrote once on a forum and I have tried to embrace it…if you were distracted driving into work this am and blew thru a stop sign (and no one got hurt) you wouldn’t ignore all traffic signals for the rest of the day would you?

Think of every time you are hungry as an opportunity to do something better for yourself and sometimes that something better might just be ice cream.

MFP has been great for me this time (over 2 months and counting) because the overwhelming attitude is eat what works for you within your parameters. Yes, there are foods I honestly have no control over (Reece cups for instance) but I am trying to be realistic about what I can eat and how much I am eating. I have started days off with Ho-Ho’s and chocolate milk and still ended them under my calorie count.