The Vicious Cycle of Binge Eating
I haven't spoken much about my tendency to binge-eat in the past. It's an awful vicious cycle - for the last 10 months or so I've been in a bit of a rut, I gained a little fat back, then I get disappointed in myself, then I eat to numb my emotions, as nothing seems to calm me the same way as food does and the cycle continues. 10 Month later I'm just 12lbs from my initial start weight of 2016, but I refuse to give up like I have in the past.
It looks something like this:
I have continued to log, albeit not 100% accurately but I have logged the good and bad days for the best part of 3 years now. I have educated myself on the simplicity of weight loss and fully understand what I NEED to do to lose weight, what I struggle with is not using food as a way of numbing emotional responses to stress/anger/sadness or filling boredom.
In the last few weeks that's where I've been trying to focus my efforts, it's going to be a work in progress and I don't think I will ever truly stop binge eating but I do think I can get myself to a point where I can manage it better and find other tools to cope with stress and emotions.
At the moment I am focusing on self-help options such as meditation, hypnosis and journalling. I've also opened up a bit more about it to those who are close to me which also does feel a little like it has lightened the load. I don't know if what I am trying will work but I think I prefer a solution where I rely on myself rather than coping methods that rely on others.
So what I want to concentrate on a couple of things over the next couple of weeks:
Being more active in the evenings - runs/walks/housework/etc.
Eating all meals at home at the dining table without any distractions, instead of sitting on the sofa watching TV.
Taking my time to eat.
Mantra "Food is Fuel, not Medication".
Meal prepping and shopping smarter.
Using meditation more when I come up against stressful situations.
I need to combat these emotions in order to be successful in maintaining my loss and living a healthier life, mental health is just as important, if not more important than eating healthy and exercising, because it can adversely motivation to do the things that keep us healthy, this has become increasingly obvious to me over the last few months. So I hope to find new ways of coping and combine it with the knowledge I've gained about nutrition and fitness over the last couple of years and be my happiest, healthiest self.