Please help, anyone else with this problem?!

When I read this- and I´m probably way off!!- I think bulimia. Have you seen a doctor about this?

I agree with leahartmann.
I do understand - I was like you at your age (old enough to be your mother now). You need to work on your happiness, not your weight right now.

Perhaps you could print out your story and show your GP (that's easier than talking to start off with). You are very hard on yourself, feeling low and need support.

Good luck

Completely agree, as a recovering Bulimic, it just sounds too damn familiar. Please seek professional help now.

You need to look at this as a lifestyle change, not a diet, otherwise you will probably do what you are doing now at lot. As for the people mentioning bulimia, I know nothing of it so I'd listen to their warnings and see a doctor

Oh and for those that don't know what a pasty is, it's a pastry (savoury) filled with all sorts of stuff, eg. ham and cheese, beans and beef.

I completely understand how you feel. I think you should get help, it sounds like the beginning of some kind of eating disorder. But please do keep in mind, that it IS possible to overcome. Good luck!!

Let me start by saying, no you are not alone - I spent 14 years of my life on a diet/binge cycle. I started at 18 - wanted to lose 10 lbs - I put back on a stone. I lost the stone and put back on two. I lost 2 and put back on 3. Eventually, I was swinging 5 stones (70lbs). At 32 I promised myself never to 'diet' again. Dieting is when you restrict your food intake and deny yourself stuff and feel 'guilty' and 'bad' about yourself. If you want to lose weight and keep it off forever then it should be, as someone else has already said, a lifestyle change. I am now 51 and have pretty much successfully maintained my health and weight for the past 8 years through eating a healthy diet and exercising to balance it.

However, to address your cry for help, there are two aspects here. One is that you are not 'weak' or 'lacking in willpower' when this happens to you. There are some very powerful chemical reactions happening in your body to make this happen.

I can explain this by sharing the following post I've written about why you crave sugar after eating sugary foods (the following draws from the book 'Younger Next Year'):

The chemicals our bodies use to digest food are powerful and dangerous. They are designed to absorb and digest the things you eat, like meat. As you are made of meat too, they have to be carefully controlled, otherwise you would begin to digest yourself. So you just need to produce just as much acid and insulin as you need to digest the food you eat. Your body needs some kind of mechanism to signal to you how much digestive juices to release and that signal is sugar in the blood. The rise in sugar after a meal indicates how much you've eaten and releases the appropriate digestive juices.

However, it is important to understand that our body was designed to cope with a diet low in sugar, as the foods we ate when our systems were developing millenia ago were mainly fruits, nuts, meats, seeds, none of which contained much sugar. So a small rise in sugar indicates to your body the end of a prettty big meal. But this carefully balanced response can't cope with a modern diet and the amount of sugar we eat.To give you an example - there's as much free sugar in one single can of cola as there is in 5 lbs of venison.

So your body gets confused. The signal you send with a can of cola is that you've just eaten the equivalent of 5lbs of venison or 10,000 calories worth of food. The body goes nuts, rushing out insulin and other digestive chemicals in response. That's the problem with starchy and sugary food - you call for ten times more digestive power than you actually need.

So what happens - your body hyper absorbs every last calorie from the food you ate, because you obviously just killed a huge animal, and it stores that as fat. But now because you have all this excess digestion power your blood sugar plummets and it makes you very hungry again, and you usually end up eating a lot. If you eat more sugary food then it sets the whole thing off again.

Your body interprets blood sugar swings as your body being under stress. Adrenaline and cortisol are released when you are under stress. As the blood sugar rises, insulin is produced, as it falls, adrenaline and cortisol are released. Adrenaline and cortisol trigger the need to have something quick to boost your blood sugar up, and often something high in sugar. This whole cycle ends up as a blood sugar roller coaster, which can lead to insulin resistance and diabetes.

So sugar and refined starch (white flour, starchy foods) are definitely something to be avoided as much as possible (entirely if you can manage it). Mashed potatoes, white flour, refined products like bicuits and cakes, all of these rush into your system and are digested very quickly and affect your blood sugar.

So that is the reason why you were pushed to eat more sugary food after you'd started.

The second issue is your self castigation and eating so much that you make yourself sick. That does smack of bulimia and if it continues then I'd definitely suggest you go and see your doctor.

its all about being in control of your self ...I used to stuff any food available in my mouth then I decided enough was enough ! I want to lose weight & I will do it.... so I started a page on Facebook for the friends I'd made through dieting & we support each other no matter what diet they choose to lose weight by...Its a closed & confidential site so what goes on there stays there....
The main thing is the support we all give to each other & any problem is discussed be it about weight or family.... we are all there for one another..... if you are interested in joining let me know...... they'll give you lots of advice because they have all been there !

I totally relate to this; you have basically described my life, losing sight of what a "normal" diet looks like. Instead either being really really "good" and denying yourself all the foods you enjoy because you feel you should, or hurtling off the wagon and eating all the "bad" stuff you can lay your hands on, almost in a panic. It's that "hung for a sheep as a lamb" mentality; "well I've blown it now so I may as well get my money's worth for the rest of the day". I know it is entirely illogical but I do it anyway. I can't have 1 biscuit; I end up having 10.

I disagree with those saying bulima though. Unless I missed something you said you often eat til you feel sick but made no mention of actually purging. This is important. In all the years I have been exhibiting these behaviours I have often thought " I could make this go away" but I have NEVER done it and NEVER will. The reason for this is that I believe in suffering the consequences for my behaviour and have always taken the line that I've eaten it, I have to deal with it. And I do.

I agree with those who say you appear to have unrealistic goals. To be maintaining a UK size 8-10 and then lose a stone and a half sounds to me like you you are seeking out an unrealistic goal weight that your body is fighting against. You must be realistic. Ask yourself this question: if you could go back to the person you were and the weight you were before you lost that weight and were told you could stay like that for the rest of your life and never have to worry about food or dieting ever ever again, would you take the deal? I know I would.

Whilst I don't think this is bulimia as such, it is certainly very disordered behaviour. I concur with the poster who recommended a book based on CBT. I have found the book "I can make you thin" by Paul McKenna can really help re-establish a healthier relationship with food - it really is very good.

I am a work in progress but if I could return to the 18 year old me and nip this behaviour in the bud then I certainly would. Good luck

I have found the book "I can make you thin" by Paul McKenna can really help re-establish a healthier relationship with food - it really is very good.

I have this- though it tends to focus on portion sizes rather than eating for nutrition. Plus I can't listen to the CD because Paul MCKenna's american-tinged accent and smarmy tone of voice really creeps me out.