You may be overweight or
thin or in-between but you think about food so much that it has become
very uncomfortable for you. Compulsive eaters eat for emotional reasons,
and do not pay attention to true hunger and satiety signals.
Maybe you
can successfully diet but the weight always comes back. Do you want to
put an end to those compulsive feelings forever? That is the better goal
than focusing on weight loss. The goal is first to end the compulsion
and later, or for some individuals now, you will melt down to your
natural body size.
If you have been struggling with food issues you have been keeping your
mind very busy. Your obsession with food and diet fills a psychological
need. It is time to deal with your feelings, with the emotional issues
that are holding you back. When you work through your emotional issues,
you will no longer need the food or body obsession or the extra pounds
to serve as a buffer between yourself and the world.
It may be useful to start asking yourself the following questions:
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Why is food so important to me?
-
What does
food mean to me?
-
What is
food a substitute for?
In order to put an end to your compulsive eating it may be helpful to
consider the following ideas.
Stop dieting. Diets do not help you to
learn about hunger and satiety cues.
Your body is self-regulating. If
you listen carefully to your stomach hunger signals and to your blood
sugar level signals, you will know when to eat and when to stop eating.
Pay close attention to how certain foods and food combinations make you
feel physically and mentally.
Do not get hung up on the typical American
routine of breakfast, lunch and dinner. Instead pay very close attention
to when your most hungry times are occurring.
Experiment with eating at
the times that please you, instead of the times that fit in with the
schedules of others. You will build confidence by paying close attention
to what your body needs and by tending to those needs.
Try not to get
hung up on what you feel you “should” or “should not" be eating right
now. For now just work on mastering eating only when having true stomach
hunger and
stopping when sensations of fullness begin.
Think back to all the times
you over ate (or ate when you did not have true stomach hunger) last
year. Okay, now convert all that food to calories. Now convert the
calories to pounds. Okay! So, think about it. If for the next 365 days
you ate only when feeling true stomach hunger and stopped when
sensations of fullness began, you might lose however many pounds that
you gained in the last 365 days.
Do you see the change in lifestyle? Do
you see how much more comfortable you might feel walking around in a
body that was not constantly stuffed with food?
The more times that you walk away from food when you are not hungry, the
more your confidence builds. Each time you binge or eat when you were
not physically hungry, think of this time as a learning experience. Be
gentle with yourself. Ask yourself some questions.
Avoid self- criticism. Self- criticism will only keep the vicious cycle
of compulsive eating going.
You developed the habit of compulsive eating as a type of survival
skill. Compulsive eating helped you to get through something but it has
back- fired on you. Every time you feel a desire to eat now when you do
not have stomach hunger, ask yourself “What is going on with me?” and
remind yourself” “This is a chance to change.”
Common Traits of Those Struggling with Compulsive Eating