Breaking The Habit Of Binge Eating
Can Be Achieved! 

Successfully breaking the habit of emotional eating or binge eating can be helped by learning to recognise 'behaviour chains' in our day-to-day lives - and then identifying opportunities to break those chains!

Habits can develop over time when we subconsciously learn to behave in a certain way in response to particular circumstances.

But if a habit is something we have learned - it means that we can also learn to behave in a different way instead!

And choosing to respond in different ways means we are well on the way to breaking the habit.

For example:

Toni is writing in her diary at the end of a day that ended up in her binge eating again, when she notices how one thing led onto another. She notices several clear ‘steps’:

Earlier that day, Toni's boyfriend said something condescending to her that made her feel really angry and insulted

But she didn't say anything about it to him. Anger makes her feel anxious and scared, and for some reason she doesn't feel 'allowed' to express how she is really feeling.

Which makes her feel bad about herself

Because she became so quiet and looked miserable, her boyfriend then accused her of sulking and left to go home

Now on her own, all the feelings of hurt rose up inside her, and instinctively Toni started binge eating - which she has done so often before when feeling upset, depressed or hurt 

On looking back at this chain of events, Toni realises that she actually had an opportunity to do something different at every step, which would help her in breaking the habit of emotional eating.

For instance:

• ...she could have told her boyfriend that what he said to her made her feel very hurt and angry, and why...
  
  
• ...or, perhaps she could have left the room to do something else for a while and talked with him later, after they had both calmed down a bit...
  
  
• ...she could have recognised that her negative thoughts about herself were completely unwaranted...
  
  
• ...when her boyfriend left, perhaps she could have done something different straight away - phoned a friend - gone for a walk – anything else that would have been a more self caring way of dealing with the way she was feeling…

Any of the above ideas could have led to a different outcome, helping Toni in her efforts at breaking the habit of using food to deal with her difficult or frightening emotions.

Okay – this is all SOOOO much easier to say than do, but the point is, by recognising such behavioural chains that lead us binge eating or other habitual behaviour, we have the OPPORTUNITY to plan ahead – to decide that next time X or Y happens, I’ll do this or that differently…and see what happens.

If it doesn't work – next time, try something else different instead!

Using a journal or food and mood diary is really useful in being able to do this – to look back and see what exactly was going on for us at that time - and to be able to write down possible alternatives that we could try in the future.

Eating disorders need to be tackled from all sides – psychologically, emotionally, nutritionally, and behaviourally.

And learning to notice such behavioural chains, and realising that we often DO have options as to how we react to different situations, can help enormously in breaking the habit of emotional eating.