Restaurants

beccabmoran

Hi guys. Yesterday was a scary day for me. I don't think I binged (I had a couple of unplanned snacks of nuts, fruit, etc. - please let me know if that was a binge and I'm just fooling myself...my logs are public), but I was definitely grazing more than usual. Then we went out to a restaurant with friends where there were lots of small plates. I had my own food (chickpea salad and vegetables) and then I just found myself grazing here and there. It was a little scary because of how unconscious it was. Everyone else was doing it...but everyone else doesn't have binge-eating disorder. I didn't track everything (like the few fries I sampled, for instance).

Anyway, I was just wondering if anyone else has been in this position before and how they have handled it.

girlviernes

Definitely not a binge. It is definitely challenging being in a restaurant - there are lots of things about it that make it easy to eat without noticing what you are eating as much as usual. However, I think we really need to figure out how to eat at restaurants and have some things that aren't "perfect." Binge eating is about not enough food, but also a lot about what our mind tells us about foods and eating being "good" or "bad" and thinking about things in black-and-white ways.

crepes_

I believe a binge is more psychological than anything. I define a binge as being a point that I reach, mentally, where I need to eat. I don't necessarily want to eat, and it's not that the food is appetizing, but that I feel like I need to finish that and then search for something else. Where it doesn't matter what I'm eating or if I like it or not, just that the act is being done. Going over calories at a restaurant and grazing when not hungry while out with friend is going to happen. It's challenging, but it's not a serious psychological issue. To help with this, I try to increase the amount of sips I take from my water glass. While everyone else is going for another chip, I just take another sip. I'm still participating in the conversation, still enjoy things with them, but instead of having more chips, I'm just sipping more water.