Emotional binge eaters

My story is very different. When I feel bad or mad, for whatever reason, I quit eating or exercising. I just shut down. And gain weight. When I’m happy, I eat. And lose weight.

My triggers are stress, boredom and emotional and physical pain, and anxiety.

Logging definitely helps me understand the behavior. For anxiety, I use tools I learned in counseling. For stress and boredom going on a walk outside has been great for coping. Emotional pain- mindfulness, radical acceptance and self-compassion work. I have not found something to help with physical pain. I used to have knee pain and ate sugar to cope constantly when I wasn't even hungry. The knee pain was resolved years ago so I don't deal with a lot of pain now. I hurt my foot a few weeks ago and my craving to binge on sugar was intense. I think mindfulness could help in theory, fortunately I don't deal with a lot of physical pain now so I haven't had to find a solution.

I’m a stress eater. It’s such a hard habit to break! I still feel a strong urge to turn to food when I’m stressed. I’ve worked on finding other coping mechanisms. Journaling, knitting, running, a hot bath, mindless television (Bob’s Burgers is my de-stress and laugh show). Even with all those options that I know help, I still really want to turn to food a lot of the time. Which is part of why I log everything before I eat it. Seeing that it will put me way over my goal does help me make better choices.

Work in progress. But what has helped me the most, is what I call my me first thought process. I am a good person, I deserve to be happy, I will do what it takes to get there. Kind of a mantra I talk to myself lots.

I have really learned by reading so many posts, that logging is a huge help. And also if I know what I am going to have for breakfast for say 7 days in a row, I pre-log for week. Often I pre-log breakfast and snacks, which keep me from going off the rails. The other thing I learned from reading posts, is at times I bank maybe 75 calories a day for 3 or 4 days so if there is an event coming up. I can eat a bit more and not have that crappy guilt feeling. So instead of being so caught up on every day total. I look more to how did I do this week in total.

pjwrt wrote: »

Tension/anxiety will push me to overeating comfort foods. I mean, back in the fat ol' days, a box of Entenmanns would make the discomfort go away. Donuts are a no-go now.

Last night was the first time in a year that I emotionally overate, plus had a whole Mexican apple cup dealie--all homemade, by the way. The original anxiety was forgotten because it got replaced with the anxiety overeating gives me.

Today, I forewent the customary large Sunday breakfast and rode the chopper an hour and then the bicycle for an hour to amend my backsliding ways.

Next time, I'll just resolve the anxiety before picking up a skillet.

My trigger is same as yours😩 anxiety and stress make me eat so much and even if I feel full I cannot stop eating 😕

Danp wrote: »

I used to refer to myself as an emotional eater but I don't any more.

I kinda realised that I was using this as a convenient excuse to eat. It was a way of absolving myself of responsibility for my behaviour. It wasn't my fault I was eating, I'm just an emotional eater. It's beyond my control so I can't be blamed.

That changed the day I realised that I could only fix things for which I accepted responsibility. If I was going to take control I also had to take responsibility. From that day on I accepted no excuses from myself, nothing was not my fault and therefore nothing was beyond my ability to fix.

It was scary, but ultimately very empowering and liberating.

Your experience makes sense, I think for others - you can recognize your pattern of overeating is being influenced by emotion and still take responsibility. For me recognizing I'm an emotional eater means the fix wasn't in my nutrition alone but also working on my emotional well-being- counseling, emotionally healthy habits, etc. For some people finding the right combination of protein, fat, fiber, and enjoyment is enough to stop them from wanting to overeat. Or maybe it's just the habit of logging and willpower to stick to it. For me it's the nutrition plus processing my stress, doing my counseling work, getting walks, etc. We do have control over our emotions- although some of us need extra help with out emotional health and there's no shame in needing help. (edit to add: by saying we have control over out emotions I mean we have a choice to work on our mental health and emotional well-being. In some cases of severe depression, etc. functioning and ability are more limited. You don't know until you've walked in someone else's shoes! No judgement here.)

candylilacs wrote: »

Just binge. Just enjoy it. Don't beat yourself over it. And get on the wagon again.

Stupid advice. (sorry, but).
I can do this every day for 2 weeks or more!

I admit I have a sugar addiction; it's my go-to crutch whenever I feel depressed, anxious, stressed, bored, angry, you name it. There are some foods I've refused to eat anymore such as pasta and pizza because I know I have no self control. I haven't been buying ice cream or packages of cookies, etc., because I'll eat the whole thing. I'm having a hard time limiting my peanut butter consumption. It's my favorite food. I guess if you're a binge eater like I am, limiting any food can be difficult. I've been a yo-yo dieter all my life, from a chubby child to obese adult and even appearing sickly underweight at certain times. I'm now at 145 and am working on staying that way; would like to be 135-140 eventually and active. Having retired a few months ago has been an adjustment but am trying to make walking my friend. Plus I think keep the diary on this site will help keep me accountable. I do need to get a hobby. Or two.

https://3dmusclejourney.com/binge-eating-causing-can-overcome/

I'm an emotional eater in recovery and it's going GREAT! I binged and emotional ate my whole life - ate when I was happy, sad, stressed, bored, you name it. No BS story about ”something just snapped one day and I got over it”, that has happened many many times. So what is different this time? I've made changes in ALL areas of my life. Stopped social media entirely. Start each day with thinking of 3 things I'm grateful for instead of browsing Facebook. I've armed myself with a stack of good books to read. I've promised the dog to walk her every day rain hail or shine and have been keeping that promise.

It's about finding something to replace emotional eating with - changing your mindset and what feels good. For me - it means cutting out the junk entirely for a time. I just can't trust myself to have only ”one” donut. I knew eating crap and binging wasn't making me feel good, so I forced myself to eat well and excercise and how good and strong I feel the next day after making these good choices. SLEEP also plays a huge part, if I dont sleep well I want to eat junk so I make good quality sleep and enough of it a priority.

Overcoming emotional eating is a challenge every day, but it DOES get easier to do. I've been at this now for only 6 weeks, but before in my life I've only been able to stay away from a binge for less than 7 days, so I'm very proud of myself and know it's working. Overall I feel so much better and seeing my healthier figure, steady weight loss in the mirror every morning is what motivates me to keep going.

You can do it! Believe in yourself and what you're capable of.

I took up running and knitting to help with my emotional eating. Running helps relieve stress and kitting gives me something to do with my hands other than snack while watching tv.

I’m not perfect, I still slip up and binge eat after a really stressful or upsetting day sometimes but it’s a lot less frequent than it used to be and I’m also better at forgiving myself for those slip ups.