Consuming my brain

When you get caught in an eating binge the whole world closes in around you. The only thing that matters is eating what is filling your mind. Stopping is not an option, being sensible and pulling yourself back does enter your head. The whole world is that cake or those biscuits or that pile of chocolate and consuming it. If you can wait long enough to make a coffee and sit down with a book then you feel like you have achieved so much. More often than not most of it gets consumed in the kitchen while waiting for the kettle to boil.

Sadly after the first few mouthfuls the taste is lost to the speed and need to consume. The more you eat the sicker and more bloated you feel. Deep down you know you should stop and occasionally you do. If you do stop the pull to go back and finish it wins and you go back to complete whatever mammoth thing you chose as your “treat.” Of course it is not a treat because it makes you feel bad. You feel sick, bloated, hot, angry and low.

Once you start to consume the food that you have chosen to indulge yourself with you turn into a single minded machine with a purpose to devour all of it until it has gone. There is no taste anymore just the desire to finish the food and hide the evidence. (Even when there is no one to hide it from.)

The best you can hope to in this situation is to come to your senses and to throw the rest away and get it out into the bin where it is out of reach and hidden away. Sometimes this happens and other times you eat it all and hide the wrapping in the bin, out of sight and unknown.

If someone tells you not to buy the food in the first place then they have no idea what goes on in your mind. The following is what you go through in your head in the shop:

·        It will be a treat.

·        I will make it last and have a little every day.

·        I will be strong this time and not eat it all in one go.

·        I shouldn’t put it on my credit card but it’s the last time.

·        As I am going to make it last I can buy the more economical, larger size.

·        I will be ok I can still get into that dress, slim for that night out, get the guy or look good for the new job because I am on a new eating plan from tomorrow.

You really should be shouting the following at yourself:

·        Don’t do it, you will eat it all and make yourself feel ill.

·        Don’t be stupid, you have no willpower so it won’t be a treat.

·        Don’t buy more, you will eat it all.

·        Don’t put it on the credit card, you then pay interest on your binge financially as well as emotionally and health wise.

·        You won’t get in that dress, you will feel bad for the first day of that new job, you will feel too ill to go out and no man will want a woman with a bad attitude to her health and eating. (it’s not an attractive trait)

I have tried sheer willpower, hypnotism with a hypnotist, using the Paul McKenna book, CD and app, books, websites and a therapist (which you only get on the NHS when you are showing bulimic tendencies) and incentives.

I know that following something like Slimming World or Weight Watchers is expensive and restrictive and, to be honest, the non-sugar part of my diet is generally healthy. I am also very bad at being told how or what to eat.

To be honest, sometimes nothing works, no can say anything that helps and you know you are the only person who can sort yourself out. It is your mind, your issue and you have to focus and sort it out. Of course that is easier said than done.

I have, however, conquered it before and will do again. Every piece of sugary food I don’t eat is one step closer to stopping. Each cake, bar of chocolate or packet of biscuits I put back on the shelf is a triumph. When I can have just one thing and walk away I do feel amazing. Watch this space.

NO, not that space, it’ full of sugar!