Just as the title says, I don’t know how to stop my binges. I am just wondering what has worked for other people. What hours did you do for your fasts? How did you manage your hunger and stop binging?
The only thing that stops me from binge eating is quitting processed foods cold turkey and vastly decreasing my daily carb load. Usually a week of extreme low carb-high fat eating and my cravings + hunger vanish.
Edit: to add, I’ve got a terrible issue with binge eating, so this isn’t just “I like to eat candy when I should be eating carrots.” It’s more of a “I eat until I feel like I’m going to explode and can barely breathe, then I really start the binge.” 🙂
Zero carbohydrates to stop insulin & glucose spikes & higher levels. Carnivore was easiest but also did mixed meals with non starchy vegetables, eating the vegetables last. Healthy fats, 18/6 or OMAD. Eating stopped 5 hours or more before sleep. No sugar, no fruit, no processed foods, no carbs no snacks. Corrected health, built higher BMR, lost fat, no more slavery to food addiction. Four years in now.
What works best for me is following advice from Stephan Guyenet’s “The Hungry Brain” - don’t keep anything in your house except whole unshelled raw nuts, whole fruit, and ingredients to make meals (from scratch - nothing ready-to-eat)
The idea is that most hunger stems from being bored. Doing this forces you to either:
Another note: if you live super close to a store and think you’re likely to just go buy something tasty, you can buy a time-based lock box on amazon for ~$50 and lock your money up for the night. I do this sometimes
Finally, try be fully present when eating. No TV and not while working. By slowing down and really paying attention to your meal, you eat less and realize when you’ve had enough sooner. Thich Nhat Hanh’s completely free Plum Village app has a great series of mindful eating meditations meant to be listened to during meals.
Edit:
To summarize, regarding binge eating these tips can be boiled down to a single concept: changing the unconscious thoughts and associations surrounding your relationship with food. For me, and I suspect many others, combining TV and junk food is like mixing alcohol & nicotine. With either alone, I can regulate well. Both together and I could kill a pack of smokes and a 12 pack in a few hours. Try to figure out what causes you to begin eating uncontrollably, and then try to disassociate the two from each other by being fully present and eating foods that are less rewarding to the brain (sugar and especially high fat/high carb combos). For your brain, blander is better
16:8. It’s hard but I found just always thinking ahead helps - such as planning out your meals for the day and sticking to it. If you work in the office, bring your own lunch. If you WFH, just don’t buy any unhealthy food and instead buy fruit to munch on. If you do get really hungry, I found distracting yourself helps, like I go for a walk or play video games.
Lastly, I gain a bit of fortitude during really tempting moments by thinking to myself “if I eat/drink this chocolate/softdrink/unhealthy food I’ll feel better now but shit in the long term.”.
Get an app. Get a free app like Fastic. Set up your fasting period (say 16:8) with start time, say 8pm, end at noon. Then let it control you. Surrender yourself to The App. That stopped my binge eating. I used to consume more calories after dinner than I did for dinner. Not now. The App tells me I’m fasting. I obey it.
Things that have helped me:
Starting the daily timer as soon as dinner is done.
Drinking tea. After dinner when the “GIMME SOME CANDY!” Hits, the tea gives me the feeling of consuming things, while not actually consuming things. It has its own ritual that replaces the snack ritual.
Edit to add:
Start slowly. Sometimes I have trouble still binge eating during a 4-6 hour eating window. I have to start with a snack and then pace myself. Usually some nuts and cheese.
Cut the carbs. It’s hard as hell at first.
BINGE THE FUCK OUT OF SOME SALAD! Make a nice no carb viagrette (apple cider vinegar, mustard, garlic, olive oil, salt and pepper), and just smash some veggies. A giant 4qt bowl of veggies is less than half the calories of a bag of chips. Think about that. I basically DO NOT regulate my salad intake. I make some dope ass salads, too.
Just limiting my eating window helps me. When I get a powerful craving I don’t think ‘I can’t have that’ I think ‘oh, I can have that tomorrow or in a few hours when my eating window opens’.
So there is no restriction, just a delay. And by the time I can eat, I almost never crave that thing any longer. I usually want something healthy and high in protein.
It’s crazy how just limiting the times I eat has almost completely eradicated my cravings, reduced the volume of food I can consume and made me prefer healthy whole foods.
I think if you stick with a limited eating window for a week the same thing will happen for you.
I barely even think about food anymore. And it’s liberating.
Good luck!
I struggle with bingeing and maybe this sound silly, but I know a lot of people here have also found motivation from it, but my fasting app is crucial. I use the free version of Zero—again a lot and f people here do—and I do 20:4. I push that start button and it’s like locking me in a cell for twenty hours. I love my streak and after about 60 days I’m already fretting about what I’m going to do on my week-long business trip in January. Am I willing to give up my streak? Yes, it’s just an app, and yes, no one but me will know, but that little red circle is shockingly powerful.
So that’s the twenty hours. What about the other four? Those can be really tough. Here are a couple of things that help me, n=1 and YMMV.😉 I have a cute little bento style lunch box. I pack myself a filling, nutritious and cute snack of foods that I LOVE (and are healthy.) The beginning of my eating window generally coincides with the kid run, so I eat slowly, by myself, in the car, enjoy every bite and have no more food within easy distance. By the time I get home, my tardy full signals are … signaling, and I have another small, hot meal before I push the button on my app again.
This works most of the time. We’re not perfect, sometimes the binge monster gets us. But if I find myself stuffing my face, I eat one more really delicious thing, and then cut my eating window short. I feel like it’s easier to stop after giving myself one more delicious thing, and then I don’t end on a note if shame. (The shame us the worst!) The point is just to stop.
I use to binge eat. My doctor recommended a good multi vitamin. Then I discovered my binge eating was related to anxiety. I started taking OTC CBDs, check r/CBD. I decided to get a medical marijuana card. I take a low dose CBD pill daily that does not cause impairment issues.
I have a severe history of binge eating and have tried many things and diets. The only thing that’s helped me is the book Bright Line Eating. It isn’t for everyone, but it takes an addiction recovery approach to binging and overeating. Even if you don’t choose to follow the plan, the book has profoundly insightful points.
Personally, I found my binges reduce dramatically when I drop the ‘diet mentality’. Once I start paying attention to how certain foods make me feel versus what I want to eat (and listen to my body) the binges subside. Hope that helps
Read some comments. Good advice (I used to do IF) but my issue is that restriction usually leads to a big binge fest. IF says you can’t eat outside your window for example. Even if you’re getting ready for bed and you’re starving.
This restriction of IF is what drove me away from it. I May shed pounds when I do consistent IF in theory, but in practice I sometimes can’t ignore the feelings of starvation. And I end up binge eating way more to compensate.
Dieticians recommend eating at night if you’re starving because one trigger to binge eating is too much restraint.
Anyway, some things that work for me (and some of this is relearned behaviors from learning about intuitive eating) is to have sweets and whatever it is you binge on at your house. And eat it. But you just don’t eat the whole bag, or pint. And maybe you do at first. But accept that. Tell yourself each time “I’ll eat this lot now, but I know that I should continue trying to eat less of this in one sitting.”
VERY SLOWLY what starts to happen is that you eventually grab 2-4 jumbo cookies instead of 9. I don’t think the goal is to never eat what you crave. That’s bad too IMO. the goal is to have a healthy relationship with all kinds of foods, because there is no “bad” food; food does not have morality.
The second thing is to cook more at home if you aren’t already. It’s much better to eat a double cheeseburger that you cook yourself than a double qtr pounder. I’m eating out less - or if I do, it’s more intentional meals, typically with a friend or something, instead of passing by the nearest drive through.
If you’re starving, you will give in each time. At least that’s my case. Hope this braindump helps
For me it helps to have my eating window early or mid-day. I usually don’t eat after 2 but sometimes that stretches a little later if things come up. I limit my access to foods I used to binge on. Chips, icecream, cookies or candy I just don’t have any at home. I have been going back annd forth between OMAD and 2MAD recently eating roughly the same amount of calories. I feel more hunger later in the day when I eat 2MAD. I think it helps me to feel full during a meal.
My method is to load up on carbs. My body goes long hours with rice/pasta/potatoes in me. So I made sure after my .8 grams of protein are calculated, I keep my fats at 75g as per recommended. And the rest is carbs.
But also the best way to curb your hunger on IF is to ease into it. Start with a 10hr fast for a week, then 12, then 14 etc. your stomach will shrink accordingly. If you jump into it, you will deal with hunger.
I used to have a huge problem with it. Now I have barely any appetite. This whole time it was caused by certain medications and supplements I was taking. I went from not being able to control eating or get myself to bed until the early morning hours to counting calories and going to bed early and getting up early. I noticed subtle shifts in my control depending on what I was taking. Obviously not saying you have that issue because I’m not a doctor nor do I know you, but if someone could have told me that something so simple would make such a difference, I would have changed it ages ago.
The only things that managed my almost extreme eating urges was eating strictly nutritionally dense whole foods and doing 20+hrs of fasting every day. I’ve never down below 20hrs fasting (I mostly do OMAD), but I’m sure 16:8 works too, what you eat is probably more important.
That being said, the first few days suck. It’s extremely hard to break out of the habit/urge. I recently came from a 4 day vacation where I threw diet and fasting out the window and when I came back I went right into OMAD and healthy eating which is what I normally do, but boy was it hard! But I’ve done this before and I know the process. The hard truth is, you just kinda gotta suck it up and have discipline until the urges stop. And trust me, they absolutely will stop. But not if you continue binging and especially fast/unhealthy/addictive food.
The baseline I’ve observed from personal experience several times is that urges subside after only 3-4 days of healthy eating and fasting. This might be a higher number if i’s your first time doing it, though.
So, let’s say it’s gonna be 7 days for you. Those will probably be 7 days of hell, but ultimately it’ll break you out of the cycle and trust me it will be SO worth it!
Another point, try to not have processed foods available to you in your home if you can help it. This has mostly worked for me because I literally don’t have any unhealthy food to binge on. The times when my discipline hasn’t been strong enough, I end up eating eggs, tomatoes, sunflower seeds, etc. Healthy stuff that satisfies my eating urge, but won’t prevent me from breaking the cycle.
Another point is to eat stuff you really like! My meals are always something I reeeally look forward to because it’s delicious stuff I love. Nutritionally dense whole foods can definitely be delicious, you just gotta do some research, try new things and see what works best for you. For instance, nothing in this world will make me eat salad, despite how healthy they are :) Mentioning it because too many people think eating healthy = salads. Absolutely not. So many options out there.
Best of luck!
I had a bit of an issue with this at first. I found eating a large and filling lunch was the best way to keep from binging later. Mostly because I wasn’t hungry.
However, I also did a fat fast before I started on IF. You can google what that means. It really helps to get your hunger under control.
Sugar, carbs, dairy and alcohol make it hard to fast for me I actually have to work at fasting. With just eating meat and veg, I can barely eat enough because I just don’t want o eat.
Try food with high statity oat meal/water melon/cucumbers/pickles/eggs/potatoes. 100 gm of oatmeal splited 50 morning 50 night is just 120 cal . When you drink water you will be full because the oat absorb water.
I drink hot water. Got a little instapot at work and I heat up water and sip on that. Today I was fixing my one meal and nearly tasted my food to see if the spices were to my liking. I didn’t do it. I have found that if I take a bite of anything before I should, I’ll buckle and eat a bunch right then.
As others have said, cutting down carbs and increasing protein worked for me. I keep my window at 18:6 or 20:4 and one day a week I do a 36 to 40 hour fast. That 36-40 hour fast was by far the turning point that virtually stopped my desire to binge eat.
I have very poor self control, discipline and follow through but somehow this has been sustainable for me for several months now. It may not be everyone’s IF choice but it works well for me. As I’m sure you’ve seen as well, the mantra ‘delay don’t deny’ has helped a lot too. I still eat almost anything I want inside my windows but I find what I ‘want’ has shifted a lot.
Cocaine, cigarettes and brandy. On a more serious note crack does it. On a more serious note watch what you eat, carbs tend to produce more hunger, while protein and fat usually don’t trigger that response.