Where is the line between dieting and obsessive behaviour

I have questioned this before as well. I'm definitely over the line and into the obsessive mark - I literally count my food as I eat it and essentially have the MFP database stored in my head...everyone always has fun asking me what the macros are in certain food items to see how accurate I am. I can eye out grams of shredded cheese and ounces of cooked meat almost to a T every time. It's bad.

I think that the line between dieting and obsessive behavior is marked when someone has difficulty going out to eat, to social events or taking a "bite" of something in fear of not being able to log it, or going over macros for the day. I've been there. It's not fun.

when you can NOT not do it.
when it makes you miserable. not "i wish i could eat that brownie" but rather if "if i eat that brownie, my weight loss is ruined and i'm a disgusting person"

Stress is the line. Disrupting overall good life balance is the line. Exactly which things are on which side of the line is very subjective, though.

I can count and log and track pretty meticulously, and feel no stress doing it. In fact, doing it reduces my stress by making things transparent and manageable. But if I need to estimate, or skip a day of logging because I'm too busy to parse out an estimate for what I ate at that potluck dinner get-together, I don't stress about that, either.

I weigh myself daily, and think it's interesting when my weight goes up "for no reason". I recognize that it'll soon drop again. It's an interesting puzzle to consider the potential causes, so I can learn more. It's not stressful.

I love being active, but if I miss a workout day for some reason, it doesn't freak me out; I know I can just eat a little less that day and that my fitness doesn't disappear in a day (or even a few).

If I felt like I could never eat in a restaurant, or offended and drove away my friends by taking my own food with me when they invite me over for dinner (or by cross-examining them about ingredients and portions), that would be disrupting my life balance.

If I felt like I needed to work out so much that it was causing friction with my family, or neglect of my job, or driving away friends because I had zero time for them, or even cutting too much into things that feed my intellect, creativity, and other good stuff, then I'd be disrupting my life balance.

If I felt like I needed to eat only "healthy" foods, and never "bad" foods, or that I could never eat birthday cake again, or spent most of my calories on foods I don't find tasty and enjoyable, that would be disrupting good life balance.

It's not the behaviors per se that make something "over the line". It's how those behaviors make us feel, what our attitudes toward them are (something we have some control over, BTW), and how those behaviors fit into a happy, satisfying, effective, productive life.

I think when you start being afraid to eat and restrict your diet to very few foods, when you punish yourself or feel despair if you can't stick to your resrrictive plan, when you feel like you are a bad person if you eat xyz or if you don't exrecise a certain amount it is unhealthy. If you start obsessing about a certain body part and calling your body gross or disgusting you are probably not being healthy. A healthy diet and exercise plan should be sustainable, realistic for your life, enjoyable, not cause you to feel like a failure or disgusting or afraid.

cwolfman13 wrote: »

When it's anxiety inducing, it's crossed the line. When you punish yourself with unplanned exercise because you had a cookie, I'd say that crosses the line. When you flip out because life happened and you missed your workout, I'd say that crosses the line. When you have something that is maybe not the healthiest thing in the world and you live in unwarranted guilt, that crosses the line.

Pretty much this. As others said, it's about your anxiety level around the activities and your ability or inability to adapt when you need to.

I'm so glad someone asked this! I was going to post something similar until my connection timed out.

I feel that tracking calories using apps is a VERY slippery slope. And though I am using MFP I give myself "grace" by simply not telling the app everything. Like yesterday I had a banana (among other things) and I didn't log it. And I just had to be okay with that. It was like a willful decision to lie to the app. But somehow in that act of resistance it allows me to mentally still be free enough that I don't feel like I'm getting obsessed.

88olds wrote: »

That’s up to you to decide for you.

A Trainer at the gym is a competitive bikini model.
She works out every day and counts macros, every single bite. Seems to enjoy it. Seems like very few people would be happy doing that.

I think you could say the same thing about a lot of people pushing the excellence envelope. Musicians, artists, even scientists. No body’s business but their own.

Are they secretly miserable? No body’s business but theirs.

I have competed in the past and still train and track macros to suit my goals - I don't think that's obsessed, that's having a goal and working towards it. You have to put the work in to get results..... But it doesn't need to be obsessive. I've prepped and lived whilst being obsessive in a way that took over my life and affected me mentally. I've also prepped (just as successfully) in a way that wasn't detrimental to my mental health. I don't find the logging and tracking obsessive or unhealthy, but the mentality and thoughts behind it are what change for me.

For me, the line crosses into obsession a day or two after I start logging my food. I don't know why, but probably some kind of psychological "fail-safe" where I rebel against it, in case it works. It has taken me a while to realise it (or, I have realised it before, that I tend to binge a day or two after starting logging) but it has taken me until now to admit it and just accept the fact that at this stage of my life, I will have to focus on simply eating healthy and moving my body and not count calories; come what may.

In that sense, my obsession comes through how much I obsess over the numbers, what I have logged, what I can eat within the calories left, what happens when I have more calories left over than planned (more eating) and just all around crazy and unhealthy focus on the logging; not the journey or my health.