How To Bounce Back From A Binge Eating Episode: 5 Women Share Their Stories

Unfortunately, binge eating can be a side effect of dieting. You tell yourself that you will only have one cookie and before you know it, you’ve polished off the entire tray. Mistakes happen on any weight loss journey, it is important not to get too down. Don’t let a tiny slip turn into a complete free-fall. Allow yourself room to indulge in your favourite treats from time to time. And when you feel like you can’t get a grip on things, remember these ladies and be inspired by the lessons and advice they have to share!

1. Identify the physical symptoms

Emily Ho, 34, found that identifying the way she feels physically after binging has been a major factor in helping her maintain her 100 pound weight loss. She does not shame herself for what she has eaten but instead thinks about how her body will feel. “Paying attention to how my body feels afterward is a strong indicator that kicks in faster for me than shame or reflecting on the amounts I’ve eaten,” says Ho. Knowing that she will feel lethargic and bloated helps her to avoid binging in the future. She’s also got a great idea for thwarting cravings. When a craving strikes that she just can’t get away from, she distracts herself: “I’ll look up a new recipe to try that I can get excited about as an alternative,” she says.

 2. Ditch the junk food and move on

“The mental game around weight loss is the hardest part of it all,” says Mary Thompson of Memphis, TN. When she started her weight loss journey, she quickly identified that she had a sweet tooth. She’s learned, since losing 60 pounds, to keep all sweets, like candies, cakes and sugary cereals, out of the house!

She may be able to rid her house of sweets, but she can’t rid the world of them. So when she does slip up, she doesn’t allow it to turn into a full on binge. “It’s easy to get into an all or nothing mentality, where overeating at one meal leads you down a path of thinking you’ve failed, and you continue to binge and eat poorly,” she says. Her philosophy is to accept the binge happened and move on.

3. Go back to basics

Jackie Nagle believes that it is not the binge that defines the weight loss journey but one’s response to the binge. Nagle, from Sewell, NJ has lost 80 pounds. Over the last year, she’s put some of those losses back on but she’s returned to the basic principles that got her that weight loss in the first place: avoiding convenience stores; ditching restaurants that sell her favourites like Reuben sandwiches and French fries; and sticking to the perimeter of grocery stores, far, far away from the junk food aisles. “If you want to lose weight, you have to stay away from the source at first,” says Nagle.

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4. Be honest with your tracking

One of the things that helped Katie Foster lose 115 pounds was being completely honest with herself. She knows she has a difficult time controlling portion sizes, especially when it comes to her favourites like ice cream, graham crackers and cookies. Her solution is to not keep these things in the house.

But, this doesn’t mean that she is perfect. The Newport, MI native is still subject to the occasional craving or overindulgence. But when she does have one too many, she’s honest about it. “I track my food, even when I overindulge,” she says, “and by logging it, I don’t feel quite so guilty.”

5. Remember why you started

Chelsea Bridenstine of St. Louis Park, MN did all the right things to achieve her 75 pound weight loss. She drank lots of water, snacked intelligently and made time for 1 hour of exercise every day. But, she also knew that depriving herself was just not going to work — especially when it came to chocolate. She has a plan for those times when she does over do it. She reminds herself of her motivations. “Why am I doing this? What are my goals? How will I feel at my goal weight?” she says. “Being reminded daily about things that motivate me—fitting into clothes better; buying new, smaller clothes; not feeling tired when I walk up stairs—gives me that boost of confidence that one binge isn’t going to take power over me or derail me from my ultimate goals.”

Very valuable and sage advice from these ladies!

What do you think? Was there a tip in there that spoke to you?

For more tips on how to eat well while not going overboard, check out the BodyRock Meal Plan!

Source: Shape

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