Would you believe it if I were to tell you that approximately 1 million Australians live with an eating disorder?
It’s true.
Of all the different labels, terms and diagnoses we use to describe eating disorders binge eating disorder is the most common.
Around half of the 1 million Australians living with an eating disorder are people with binge eating disorder1.
What this lets you know is that if you binge eat or have ever binge eaten you are far from alone.
However, just because a whole lot of us are doing this does not make it normal… which means this stat is loudly and clearly communicating many things including something profound and that is that binge eating is a problem.
A problem not just for a few rare individuals but for a great many people (and I am willing to bet this number is much higher given that this figure is from 2012 and taking into account the amount of people often missed in such research).
The logical question to ask is why?
Why are so many of us binge eating?
And this is exactly what we will cover within this post.
In this post I am going to offer you insight into 3 of the top reasons people binge eat to help you identify if any of these are true for you.
The second question is what can you do now?
To answer this question, I am going to give my short take on how to break free of binge eating.
Keep in mind that as a Dietitian and Clinical Hypnotherapist as well as someone who lived with anorexia nervosa for a great chunk of my life my interests and energies lies in the “what now” more than the “why”.
My loyalties lie firmly in your freedom.
So, let’s dive in with the first of the 3 reasons you may binge eat:
#1: You’re not Eating Enough
The biggest cause of binge eating is simple, you’re not eating enough food to meet your energy and nutritional needs.
Now, before you tune out and say “but of course I’m eating enough food” hear me out.
If you feel out of control around food or find yourself binging on foods, you don’t otherwise eat addressing the issue of whether you are undereating is always the place to start.
As simple as it may sound to know what and how much to eat in reality it can actually become not that easy.
The utter plethora of messages we are bombarded with on any given day telling us eating the least amount of calories possible is a noble goal makes it tricky to truly appreciate just how much fuel it takes to fuel a human body to peak health let alone do this even if you want to.
How do I know if I am eating enough for my body? You know because you aren’t hungry all the time!
You know because you aren’t spending excessive valuable time, brain space and energy thinking about food, making food and eating food. No diet or “lifestyle change” can give you this because nothing outside of yourself can give you this feedback.
I know when I was sick with anorexia nervosa I would recount what I was eating to doctors, dietitians and psychologists and they would always without fail judge it as “too much” and any time I was to ashamedly act on this feedback it ensured in inevitable .
My body knew what it needed to eat and if anyone had encouraged my trust in that wow who knows I may have recovered 15 years earlier than I did. Hell, I may never have fallen sick in the first place.
Only you can judge how much food you need to eat, no one else. The caveat is that you may need assistance to honestly reconnect to this and go on to honour and own it.
#2 You’re Chasing a “State Change”
You’ve probably heard the term emotional eating, but have you ever wondered what it actually means?
From my point of view, we emotionally eat for the purpose of chasing or achieving a “state change” or a temporary change in emotions. This means we use eating food as a means of gaining a distraction from uncomfortable emotions we don’t know how to adequately and healthily deal with in another way. There is nothing insane, crazy or morally wrong with that at all.
We use many more things than food to change our states, including drugs, alcohol, sex, meditation and exercise none of which are inherently bad. In fact, until you have a better way of dealing with those emotions, they are great and there is no need to give them up.
However, they become limiting and harmful when we no longer want to engage in them because they are damaging our health more than helping and yet we find ourselves unable to stop.
The logical thing to do here is find other means by which you can get your emotional needs met. Which is easier said than done and hence one of the reasons I always encourage finding outside treatment not matter how bad you judge your eating issue to be because while you may have the rest of your life to figure out how to overcome it wouldn’t you simply rather live the rest of your life?
#3 Triggers or Habit
Sometimes the initial relief or purpose the binge eating served us is long gone.
There is not a hint of function for it in our current life and yet we continue to do it.
Why? Contrary to popular opinion it is not a lack of knowledge when it comes to understanding what to instead, willpower or even motivation but rather simply because it has become an ingrained habit.
You only have to understand a little about neurobiology and how human brains work to understand why this may be so. One of the features of a human brain is that they like to use as little energy on conscious deductive powers as possible. This means we often oversimplify things or take shortcuts.
What this means in practical every day terms is that associations between one thing and another can become set up. Once strongly established these associations go on to exist at an unconscious level, which is exactly why it can feel out of our control to stop binge eating because it’s already happened before we had an awareness. This is the definition of a compulsion, it’s not a conscious choice and we don’t have access to the totality of our prefrontal cortex and higher order functioning until after the fact.
A trigger can be as simple as walking in your front door and seeing a mess or driving past a neon sign of a takeaway store or even just a smell. All these cues or “triggers” and any number of other out of your conscious awareness things can lead to binge eating for no other reason than those things had become associated in your mind.
In session this one can often be the most frustrating for people to recognize and overcome because we like to understand, find root causes and logical reasons for why we do what we do. However, when you accept that there isn’t always one or at least not an easily identifiable one you open up the space for what to do now and this is where your healing lies.
How to Stop
Until you understand some of the reasons you may be binge eating and fully know that it is not personal, moral or a reflection of your lack of willpower or motivation to be healthy there is little you can do to change.
When you understand some of the reasons you may be binge eating the next logical step becomes using that information to create change in that area.
There are many ways of going about doing this but at the end of the day the ones which will last long term obviously hold the greatest value. What will last long-term and indeed lifelong is if you find another means of getting the need the binge eating is serving met in a healthy way that works as well as or better than the binging.
Your brain is willing to do things differently if you give it a better alternative and the safe space to try this out.
The way I have found that works fastest and is most reliable for people in breaking free of binge eating forever, not just in moments where their stress is low or willpower high is through the use of the unconscious or subconscious mind. Why? because this is where the “problem” exists. Think about it if you had the conscious solution you wouldn’t be binge eating would you? You don’t do it out of choice. In fact, I am sure you’ve decided many times to stop. In order to follow through on that decision to stop you must get the need the binge eating is meeting and because this is an unconscious need, get it changed there and everything changes. Naturally, automatically, forever.
If you are struggling with binge eating please seek help.
Preferably help from a licensed clinical and medical hypnotherapist who is also a health professional because the change needs to be made at an unconscious level, but you also want to work with someone who understands human biology.
While it may feel impossible now to go from where you are to where you want to be or you don’t even know where it is you want to be, I can guarantee it’s possible and not just possible but when you get the unconscious need met inevitable.
There are without hesitation people out there who can help you reignite the connection and compassion towards yourself to facilitate your creating a life completely free of binge eating.
A life in which you are completely free to be you.
Please don’t miss out on that life.
With my whole heart I hope you found this information useful and inspiring.
Become Great. Live Great.
Bonnie.
Reference
- The Butterfly Foundation. 2012. “Paying the Price; the economic and social impact of eating disorders”.
