emotional eating

[Hopalong]

Would anyone like to talk about it?
I've been gaining weight (12-15 pounds in a year and a half.)
I eat more when I'm stressed. Junk/sweet stuff. Alone (I avoid dining with NMom, that's misery).
CRAVE sweets. Unplug the phone, plug into the tube.

Last time I was at just-right weight, had a boyfriend. Gradually put on 10 the year after.
The last 5 in the last 6 months, exactly the time since I found out I'd be unemployed this summer.
(More bingey gaining since that. More stuff-myself. The earlier 10 lbs. was gradual, and didn't bother me.)

I'm still at a healthy weight, at the edge of normal for my height. But I'm not liking how I feel.

I'm not sure how this connects up with voicelessness except when I don't know where to turn from stress...maybe I'm literally silencing myself by eating. (Can't scream while one's eating and I don't cry often.)

Would value any insights from anyone who'd like to share. (I don't need diet or nutrition or exercise info though...thanks.)

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o@ @o            Hops

[gratitude28]

Hi Hops,
I don't WANT to talk about this, but I also need to face it and deal with it. I was actually at a decent weight about three years ago. I was satisfied. Then I drank like a fish for about a year and a half (I crawled into the bottle as they say due to some stresses) and got to my new figure, which is not so hot!!!I have never eaten normally. As a kid, my parents' idea of diet was some crazy thing from week to week and always "cheating." I never liked the way I looked , and when I see old pictures, I was really pretty. Even now, I look not so far back and I was pretty, but I am NEVER happy. I alternately starved myself or ate weird stuff. I was bulimic (my mother found out and said, "Well, are you stuill doing it?" I told her, "No, but I wouldn't tell you if I were." and she let it drop... to hard to deal with an imperfect kid). My sister, who is a Doctor now and has been at Weight Watchers fo ryears and is OBSESSIVE about everything that goes into her mouth, has been bulimic and abused laxatives. My mother knows all this but closes her eyes- better to have a thin, pretty daughter. So now I KNOW everything there is to know about a healthful diet, but rarely follow it. I am trying to exercise more now. I am so tired of not feeling comfortable with myself. I haven't had a drink in well over two years, but my body is just not going back to any sort of normal look...
Thanks for bringin up the topic. It's time I talked about this honestly.
So, what do you think is the way to go now? Do you have any plans?
Love, Beth

[Plucky]

Hi Hoppy,
I kind of do the same thing.  I crave sweets, although I normally eat very healthily.  I binge.  I feel guilty.  Rinse and repeat.
My mother used to give us sweets as a rare treat.  We would binge in order to get what we could when we could.  Thus the binge behaviour.
I literally feel sick when I've had too much.  I sometimes have to lie down.
My only solution has been to completely remove the addictive items from my diet.  And substitute other things that can comfort me.  It has never been a permanent solution but at least it has saved my health to some extent!
Other things, such as tactile things, books, crafts, etc.  For a few days it is hell, then the craving goes away.
And it is a good project to focus on when you are stressed out.  You can obsess about it and it is all good!

I was able to get off of caffeine and change to a nonsugar sweetener for my tea.  For a time I ate more sugar to help me kick the coffee.  Now if I could just get off the sugar binges!

It did help to identify that it was my mother who hooked me.  Then I was fine trying to eradicate it from my system.
Decide on the real issue - is it your looks or your health or the feeling that you are out of control?  Then you will know what to address first.
Good luck
Plucky

[Hopalong]

Thank you, Beth. It is brave and open of you to share this.
My D was bulimic for about a year, it terrified me.
I am so glad you let go of that!
Your mother reminds me of something...when I quit smoking years ago I transferred immediately
to nicotine gum, which I still chew today. I am completely happy about it, except for the cost.
What strikes me odd is how sooooo many people, once they notice and ask me about the gum,
say, "Oh but isn't it AWFUL to be addicted to the gum!

Well, ya, addiction is never a good thing. However, for 20 years I practically smoked underwater, I was so desperately addicted. I could literally feel my lungs rotting and am positive I would have eventually died from it. I tried over and over and over, for 20 years, to quit. Finally, hypnosis followed immediately by the gum (no withdrawal) got me there. I have never been so grateful for anything in my life.
So all I can say to them is, I figure it's not quite as bad as lung cancer. But still, some are frowning away at my gum-junkie self. So I say, my heart is fine and my lungs are pink now, and my life expectancy is normal. Isn't that good? (Tut-tut, I etc.) So I just give it up.

About your mom...seems thin and dead is better than overweight and alive?

I have no specific plan to tackle the weight but am glad I posted the topic. I know that once I start talking about things here, I'm more conscious. And that's what I want...to be more conscious.

Hi Plucky, thanks to you too for sharing this about yourself. I wonder if I learned my bingeing the same way. I dont' think so though...I know my parents were very obsessive about food, in a proper-meals kind of way...and I loathed mealtime because all the family tension was seething at the table, while we were all "would you please pass the this or that, thank you"--I'm digging my nails into my knees underneath the table. 

Hmmm. Thank you, this is a new thought! Not original, likely...but. I just realized or focused on the fact that my bingeing is SOLITARY. I don't usually overeat around other people. I do this alone, in my room, with TV (numbing TV). Tuned out of my body and trying to soothe, comfort, escape. I don't want to be conscious, and I know I use food to avoid it and have some sensual pleasure too.

Great start. I will look forward to learning from anyone else on this, too.

Hops

[gratitude28]

Hops,
Congrats on quitting smoking!!!! That is marvellous. Heck, you should be able to openly chew on cuds if it keeps your lungs and body healthy
I think the fact that we do these things in a solitary manner is the main issue. We are hurting ourselves needlessly. On the other hand, I believe wholly in the lovely phrase, "Progress, not perfection!!!"
Love, Beth

[ANewSheriff]

Hops,

You just wrote the past nine months for me.  I lost eighteen pounds during the stress of situation I was involved in.  As I moved through the year, I gained back a certain ten and (I just checked my watch) am only minutes away from almost making the final achievement of gaining back all 18. Food is most certainly my drug of choice these days.  Like you, I am stil within my range, but l know I would feel better without my backside needing its own zipcode. 

Truthfully, I am just sitting with this at the moment.  It has been a lot of change and I am unwilling to try and tackle more at the moment.  I am moving quite a bit more with the warm weather.  I bet you are, too. 

In the whole scheme of things this is not so bad, eh?

ANewSheriff

[Anansi]

I've read everyone's entry on this thread so far.  Thank you for sharing.  I honour all of you!  This topic is close to home for me as the only source of nurturing I've ever known was food and I'm dying up here cause normal (organic) food is disappearing fast.  After my "mother" did what she to me, I was seduced with rock sugar, etc. As a kid I couldn't stop drinking cocacola.  (Please no one start on a thread on teeth!)
Craving food = craving mother
Craving sugar = craving sweetness (nurturing)
There is one Canadian author (Marion Woodman) who has written a lot of great stuff on eating disorders.  Her most famous book is:  Addiction to Perfection, and her first book deals specifically with eating disorders: 

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0919123031/sr=8-32/qid=1148530449/ref=sr_1_32/102-7813420-6595305?%5Fencoding=UTF8

but if you start reading her, I recommend reading Addiction to Perfection first. 

Today I went to little Chinese buffet and in light joking manner I said to the cashier (who was also my tea waitress), as I was paying, "here's your money" and in my head, I also heard "mommy" "Here's your mommy."  Or did I wish she were my mommy? 

According to Woodman, material comes from matter which comes from mother.  Any addiction to anything is an addiction to mother.
A man is not a man if he has any addictions.  But how can I cut the cord when I've never had one to begin with?  Oh, this Beth is right, this topic is too painful! 

Anansi

"We can all live like nomads, where I no mad at you and you no mad at me" - Steve Bhaerman

[Anansi]

"I can't see myself!" - Jacmac

Dear Jacmac, I hear you!  I feel the same way.  It's a terror!! looking at my denseglass eyes, I never see anything in my eyes.  I wish I could help you and me and anyone see themselves.  Now I know why men look in the mirror more than women do (when given the chance/freedom). 

By your writing and posting here Jacmac, I see you beauty!

Jacmac, those introjected voices in your head (my head):

Hi parental voices:  you say these things and that's your business
Hi inner child of the past:  Hey, that belief comes from those voices
Adult:  What do I want?

I know I'm preaching here.  Is it ok if I preach a little here and there.  Give me time to get off my high horse, slowly.

Anansi

[ANewSheriff]

Jac,

I say these same kinds of things, too.  And, like you, I know better.  It is like there are two people living in this body - one that wants to survive and thrive and one that is nothing but a bully.  The survivor chooses an apple for dessert while the bully says, "Why not just polish off the rest of that cake, Fatty?  You really cannot get any worse." 

I suppose I should feel lucky to have just the two of them here.  I know people who say they have committees that live in their heads. 

Did you hear that?  The bully just said, "Well, Fatso.  The invitation was sent out for others, but nobody else can fit in!"  (Giggle)

Anansi,

I'll listen to some preachin' tonight.  Nothing wrong with a feel good, hand-raising revival on a Thursday...

ANewSheriff     

[Anansi]

Thanks ANewSheriff
Thank you for validating me.  And thank you for forgiving me (English language thread)
To the best of my ability, I see you ANewSheriff.
Anansi