What stopped you binge eating?
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When I first decided to attack my binging (when it was at its worst) I did the following:
- Logged my binges. Seeing how many calories I was consuming on a regular basis was eye opening
- Took photos of myself - I noticed the weight gain and I realisd I didn't want to look like that anymore
- Got rid of all my 'trigger'/binge foods for quite a while - cereal, peanut butter, ice cream, almonds, pasta, biscuits, chips, etc.
- Because I usually binged when everyone else was asleep or not home, I decided to avoid the kitchen at binging time - e.g. at night I would finish dinner, get a cup of tea, lock myself in my room and watch tv shows/read until I felt sleepy
- In this period I didn't lose weight - I just aimed to eat like a 'normal' person and maintained (maybe lost a little bit unintentionally)
After I felt comfortable enough to avoid binges I was able to begin losing weight.
Of course I still go over my intake every now and then - when there's a special occassion and often when I'm drinking :P
But it's not the same as uncontrollable, emotional eating...0 -
May be too late for anyone to see this - but it's important information.
Posted by "GoKaleo" on Facebook:
It's important to make a clear distinction between "Sugar Addiction' and Binge Eating Disorder, because very often the protocols that are marketed as treatments for sugar addiction will actually make Binge Eating Disorder worse.
Some symptoms of BED:
-eating to excess, even when already full
-a feeling of loss of control over food intake, inability to stop eating
-a sense of guilt and shame over your eating
-never feeling satiated
-stockpiling food and eating it in secret
-feelings of stress and anxiety that are relieved by eating
Many people experience these symptoms specifically in relation to sugary foods, because sugar is vilified in our culture and is very often the target of restriction efforts. If you're experiencing these symptoms, it's important to make sure you're diagnosed accurately. Treating BED with a diet is not effective and is likely to make matters worse, not better. Most Sugar Addiction protocols involve restrictive diets, even if they're not called diets. There is NO SHAME in seeking treatment for disordered eating. It is courageous. And if you are a parent, it will model responsible, compassionate self care for your children.
More here, including resources for finding help: http://gokaleo.com/2013/07/01/sugar-addiction/0 -
I have recently found that regular exercise controls/ reduces my cravings. Like others I realised I didn't even like many of the foods I over ate, I was eating for the sake of it. My body can't handle unrefined carbs, they set me off eating loads of junk. I'm hoping that these realisations along with a lowcarb diet will keep me on track. Yes I will allow myself a refeed day every couple of weeks but hopefully it will be planned and managed and I will get back on track the next day.
I'm so glad to come across more and more people who have a similar problem, it confirms I'm not imagining things.;-)0 -
I quit all the binging foods altogether for a couple months, and drank protein shakes to help with the cravings (it was shakeology. I don't know if it's because it was that kind of shake or if any shakes would have worked). After that it was much easier to resist binges for some reason. I've had mini binges... but I still leave myself enough calories for dinner, so I don't know if it really counts? Ok, except on Halloween, I had two extra candy bars... But the rest of the time, I'm doing ok and not wanting to go over my goal because I REALLY want to lose weight really seems to do the trick. I guess I remind myself of the big picture (do I want to be thin or do I want to enjoy this food for the 10 seconds it will take to eat it?), and it helps.0
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Eating a diet high in nutrients, and getting rid of processed foods.0
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Medication. Went from constant obsession to thinking about it only a couple times a day and when I do eat I'm done with a lot less food.0
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Instead of eating I workout now, if I am feeling extra hungry I say well I will work out and then see how I feel and usually by then I have gotten the high that binge eating use to give me and I am not hungry. Just changing my behavior into a positive.0
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1)Hot sauce - It may not be useful to some, but it has helped me decrease my entree-binging drastically! Chili garlic sauce by Huy Fong is my favorite and sriracha comes second. I add enough to make me set the food down every couple of bites which luckily for me doesn't require very much. This also helps me drink more water -- not sure if this is common with other binge eaters, but I've been told I am chronically dehydrated.
2)Fruit and full meals - I have stopped buying sweets for the most part. I tell myself I must eat a healthy snack or my meal before eating rich sweets that are offered to me by family or friends and oftentimes my craving will subside with the time it takes me to eat the substitute.
3)Not hiding - I've been reminding myself that my private eating leads to my worst binges. If I am feeling overwhelmed with my temptation, I either go out to eat (time and money-allowing) or eat in the kitchen or outside my apartment complex. I've been in the habit of hiding my binges since I was a young child. I know that I put on better behavior for others, so I'm hoping with repetition I will get better alone over time as well.
4)Eating without distraction - I also tend to binge when I am not focusing on my eating. If I direct my focus on savoring the food for the small amount of time I am spending eating (relatively speaking), I enjoy my food much more and feel less stress about eating.
I can't say I've stopped binge eating entirely, but these have helped me control my eating more in the past couple months.
Best wishes!0 -
I haven't "cured it". I just don't keep those foods in the house or if i buy, I eat one or two servings and then throw it away
(or encourage hubby to eat) .... oh lord i threw away Ben & Jerry's and cookies and pastas and cake
If i don't allow myself to have the foods i love, once in a while, ill binge and eat the whole container.
I have found overtime, I've been able to keep a couple binge foods in the house with understanding they require portion control (like edys double churned lower fat ice cream).
Oh another trick, i buy the proportioned binge foods. Like ice cream sandwiches rather than 1/2 gallons.0 -
I would mindlessly eat. Like Id be halfway through a binge without even thinking about it. Id have terrible tummy cramps and be going to the toilet 4 times a day because of all the rubbish I ate and thats whats stopping me. I dont want that pain again, unable to sleep because my stomach hurts, waiting til my family go to bed to gorge on food as quickly as I could. I started to binge due to post natal depression and the stresses of handling 2 kids while my partner works day/night 12 hour shifts as a security gaurd. Id be on my own with 2 fighting boys and then Id binge to calm myself down at the end of the day.
I now have a half full bag of jelly babies in a drawer that im not touching and will not touch. I will let myself have a hot chocolate drink in the evening instead of chocolate nutella in porridge oats like I used to, and it helps alot. I also buy single portions intead of multipacks as I WILL eat all 6 packs of popcorn if I get a multi bag!0 -
When people say they binge on food, they usually mean carbohydrates. Hardly anyone binges on chicken breast.
You see, carbs beget carbs. Eating a sugary dessert or high carb food spikes your blood insulin level while the sugar is processed, but then you run out of sugar to process and still have high blood insulin levels. This insulin finds nothing for it to bond with, which causes your body to think that you are low on sugar (because in our ancestral environment there weren't such things as cupcakes), which makes you crave sugar so you go in search of something sweet. Basically it is millions of years of evolution insisting that you must be starving because your insulin levels are higher than the available sugars suggest and thereby messing up your diet plans.
It used to be that fat and sugar were rare and our ancestors had to work hard to get them, which burned more calories. Our bodies learned to crave them so that we would be willing to expend the effort to climb that tree and get the sweet fruit, or hunt down the heavier (larger) fat carrying animals. Things like cupcakes and Snickers bars are super-stimuli. They push all of our ancestral craving buttons, but offer none of the nutrition that fat and sugar used to represent (healthy meat and nutritious fruits). One cupcake can be upwards of 500 calories. Do you have any idea how much meat that is? How many apples or oranges?
I tell you all of this because knowing it has helped me to say no to those things. It doesn't fix the cravings, but it gives me a mental anchor to hold on to when those cravings try to pull me into the local bakery.
My suggestion would be to change your macro goals to be higher in protein (at least 1g per lb of bodyweight (2g per kg) and then make your fat and carbs at least a 50/50 split for the remainder of your calories.0 -
I just started IF, so I kinda went the other way...0
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I don't think I'm out of the woods. But what changed things for me were a number of steps.
1. I moved more towards intuitive eating and stopped worrying about the red numbers on my MFP balance sheet at the end of the day.
2. I stopped starving myself to compensate for a binge - I just workout more.
3. I decided that food was one of my few pleasures in life and I wasn't going to deny myself anymore - I would eat only what I liked and nothing more - I would stop forcing myself to eat 'diet' foods or low calorie foods that I didn't like just because.
4. I track macros but only loosely - I am often short on protein but as long as I hit an average of 100g/day I'm good.
5. Far from denying myself my 'trigger foods' I decided to stop punishing myself and welcome them into the house and eat as much of them as I wanted. This means sometimes having cereal and peanut butter for supper
but I'm a grown woman and can eat what I like *stamps feet*. It was a bit of an experiment/gamble - but once my body/brain realised that I wasn't going to deprive it anymore the overeating eased off a lot.
All this happened when I was in maintenance. So far I have gained 5-10lb from my low (goal) weight but my weight has stabilised and I'm happy eating all the junk I want without all the psychological torture I went through in the past. Sure I'd like to go back to having rock-hard abs but it isn't worth the aggro.0 -
I've stopped compensating for binges by starving myself for weeks afterwards. That slowly broke the cycle. I forced myself to let the binge go and feed myself properly which led to less binges over time. This was harder than it sounds like but worked over time. I'm hardly ever have a binge now, and when I do they aren't as bad and not laden with guilt. But yeah, the first step for me was not compulsively restricting calories after being 'bad'. It was terrifying at first but so worth it.0
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I agree about craving carbs. I loved to make a huge pot of pasta with sauce and meat and eat as much as possible. Pasta is my weakness so iv swapped it for cous cous and small amounts of pasta0
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When you speak of a binge, are you referring to for example 3 pieces of cake or eating the while cake at one time? Are you stopping in at the gas station daily just to get food with no nutritional value? Do you eat the whole pizza or just one more than you should?
People on the extreme end if binging might want to ask themselves if this is how they want to live and do they see themselves spirally down to even larger amounts of food?
Binging just isn't healthy and letting ourselves off the hook jeopardizes our physical health, mobility, self esteem, and mental health. Thinking about food constantly is not a good thing nor is it " normal."0 -
It was a process, I didn't just wake up one morning and decide to stop. I had my moments where I fell back. What I did, though, was track everything. If I binged, I would force myself to eat at a deficit until I got back to where I was supposed to be and made up for the binge. By doing this I really came to understand how binge eating isn't worth the sickness or guilt you feel afterwards, because on top of that you're undoing all of your progress. By tracking my calories I realized just because I overate a little, doesn't mean it's okay to go off all the way and eat everything "while I can," as I had once believed. A calorie is a calorie, and you'll have to either make up for it after that binge, or not eat it in that moment, and eat normal full-sized portions on other days. Delaying immediate gratification that will only last a few moments can make your entire week so much easier. One binge will lead to other binges, because of that guilt and restricting, so you just have to try your best to tough it out and say no. Saying no is the only thing that will stop binges, it's just about how you reason with yourself to get that far. Again, if you start binging, forgive yourself and stop. Right in the middle of the binge. It will make a difference, no matter how much it seems like it won't in the moment.
I don't restrict any "trigger" foods, rather I have tried to incorporate everything I want into my food plan so I can enjoy things without feeling like I'll never get them again. When I allow myself a treat, such as a Reese's cup, I'll try to save it for the end of the day, and eat it if I earn it from following my plan throughout the day. This has motivated me to stay on track, and by the end of the day it's easier for me to say no to another pack of Reese's since I have already done so good that day.
Last but not least, I found I was binging mostly in the kitchen, when I was putting off something, or simply bored. For that reason I try to avoid the kitchen once I'm done eating, and go into my room to work on homework or browse the internet instead.
I hope this helps, and I hope you find what works best for you!
I know you can do this, just be patient and have faith in yourself
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Geneen Roth - Google her and do some research! x0
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What I'm noticing works for me is quite simple....I want to be in shape more than anything and that is what stops me from binging. If I want something "bad", I will do something active and on occasion, I give in and indulge.0
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