Break up and diet: Help me before I undo all my good work!

A lot of people on this site tell their stories that they were once slim, then they settled down, got married, had children and a combination of those meant that they slowly, but surly, became overweight. My story is a little different - I've been overweight my whole life. Well that's not strictly true, I was a healthy weight up until I was about 6, then I started getting a little chubby. I'm an only child so I think that where other people would get their meals and snacks split with siblings, I would just get the whole lot, like I would be allowed to eat a whole bottle of orange juice on the way home from school instead of being told to 'share that with your sister' like my best friend had to. My parents are also very fond of restaurants and we'd dine out on rich foods maybe 3-4 times a week for 3 course dinners, sometimes even more. I never ate unhealthily (I've never had a microwave meal in my life) just too much. I've always been a very happy person, lots of great friends and a loving family but I would get quite upset at my weight, but at that time little 14 year old me had no concept of calories, energy or portions so I continued to eat the only way I knew how and I continued gaining weight.

It all changed however, on 1st December 2010 at 18:18 (yes! I remember the exact time) I stood on the scales and I was just under 13 stone - the last time I checked I'd been 12 stones. Being only 5'2 this made me well in the obese range at only 18 years of age and that, for me, was heartbreaking. For the first time in my life I went into a complete emotional meltdown. I couldn't understand how something that made me so secretly sad was something I couldn't change about myself. Why was I doing this to myself? Why couldn't I get the strength together to change it? I stepped on the scales again and seen the needle pointing just under the 13 mark and a steely determination came over me: I was going to do this. Little did I know then that this would be the start of 7 months that would change my life drastically. I was high on both hope and excitement because I was determined that I was going to do this. As they say "Eyes down on the prize and don’t stop until you get there”

The first few months had their challenging moments but after a while it felt just like a way of life. I counted every calorie I ate and made sure I stuck to my daily limit. 3 course dinners where limited to once a week. I joined the gym. I ate healthily. Of course there was moments of sheer temptation, but the joy of seeing the dial on the scales going down was better than any 7 seconds of gluttony scoffing down a muffin could offer. As I seen my body change with the weight loss, it was like I'd almost been given a new body. I started getting a waist, collar bones and then hip bones! It was sometimes difficult to accept the new me - I'd never ever been slim and suddenly the body I was living in had taken on a whole new form. I needed to get to know her, find out what clothes suit her, what hairstyles suit her shape. It hit me one morning when I looked at my reflection in the bathroom and I started crying, not tears of sadness about how large I was, but tears of joy. I'd done it. I'd lost 70lb I still don't really know this person in the mirror yet, but all I can say is that I was god damn proud of her.

Then disaster struck two weeks ago. I broke up with my boyfriend, during exam times. The stress of both events drove me over the edge and I turned (horrifically) to food for comfort. Despite never binging on my way down, I now can't seem to stop. It's like a competition with myself... almost competition to see how much I can undo all my good work. The scales say I've gained 14lb. I know most of that will be water weight, but honestly, I'm sure almost 75% of it will be true weight. I've been eating around 2500-3000 calories a day from my previous 1200. I'm at the point where I have a party tomorrow and I'm contemplating not going because everyone is going to comment on my weight gain. "Weren't you skinny like 2 weeks ago?" I'm at a true loss of what to do. I don't want to go back to that person I was 70lb ago, so why can't I stop binging? Many thanks for all your time