Friday Confessional: I'm a Binge Eater

Originally I had planned for today's confession to be moderately embarrassing, but I've interrupted your regularly-scheduled ode to [insert really amusing obsession of your choice; I'm not giving it away for free, people!] with a revelation that is a little more timely, given that this is National Eating Disorders Awareness Week here in the US. As a heads up, the following post could potentially trigger someone suffering, or recovering, from an eating disorder. Please take care of yourselves first, and if you think that you might have a problem, do not be afraid to seek help. I am not a health care professional and have no training on eating disorders, and this story is strictly my own.

So, as I sit here working, skinny jeans carving into my hips sharply enough to cause the kind of delirium one expects from, say, snorting nitrous oxide, only way less fun, I do solemnly confess:

I have gained 7 pounds over the past 3 2.5 weeks....

[And I ain't talkin' bout water weight, neither.]

You see, I suffer from a little problem we'll call binge eating, though I don't really talk about it much save for my "safe place", i.e. my former boss great friend and life mentor, and my online community of fellow weight watchers losers pals, and even then, it's usually because I'm giving them some context for the advice I'm doling out like candy -- I've been there; it sucks. 

Usually, I'm pretty good about taking stock of my mental state and catching myself before I plunge into the abyss of a full-blown binge. I've read dozens of articles and books on the subject, and I've experimented with all of the "classic" means of putting a stop to them once and for all: non-food rewards, structured weight loss goals, calorie counting, looking at my weight loss efforts as a "lifestyle change" rather than the dreaded D-word, journaling, eating intuitively -- you name it; I've done it. In fact, TCE was originally spelled "The Cait-IE Experiment", because I wanted a place to document my attempts at eating intuitively, a la Geneen Roth et al.. 

[Source]

I won't say that any of them were failures, because it's impossible to fail at something so focused on learning to NOT consider yourself a failure. Learning to overcome any kind of addiction is a life-long process -- and I've been addicted to both binging and calorie counting for a very long time. I will never, ever forget the moment about a year and a half ago that I realized I was only at the very beginning of a long road. I had been counting calories for about two years, and had successfully taken off about 30 pounds since I graduated from college. I had finally found a great boyfriend (my Andrew!), whom I loved, but was having a lot of turbulence on the friend and family front and work was stressing me to the max. My relationship was keeping me grounded, along with the only other stability I had: my calorie goal. 

One Sunday, I was over at Andrew's for the Pats game. Per our ritual, we had visited our hidden-gem, local pizza joint, which at the time offered $5, 18" cheese pizzas and the packie ("liquor store" to you non-New Englanders out there). Since Andrew wanted to have a few friends over, we picked up 3 pies, a 30+12 of Bud Light, chips and dip. Though I knew his local friends well, I had limited exposure to his friends from home, and I was slightly apprehensive because when we first met, A was that guy, the one who all his friends talked about with fond memories of his ridiculous antics, including, but not limited to, delivering a rousing Memorial Day speech to a crowd of minions from a dilapidated fire escape. His nickname from the cocktail waitress at the local dive was "The Wildcard." His carefree, "if they don't like me, eff 'em" attitude was one of the reasons I fell in love with him. Of course, his friends found this hilarious, and were constantly egging him on.

You see why I was worried.

Right before kickoff, one of his best friends showed up. We all talked and laughed and ate through the first half, then ran out at halftime for some 5hr energies (this was, of course, back when I didn't find the thought of ingesting mystery chemicals that don't even taste good totally, utterly horrifying). As we got back to the house, his friend made some comment, probably off-hand, about girls and football. I happen to know a fair amount about the sport (three brothers and a Big East ACC-alum dad will do that to you), but I let it slide. The comments just kept coming, though, and my self-confidence and composure ticked down right along with the game clock. 

Don't get me wrong; mixing beer with emotions, especially stress and social anxiety (another blog post for another day) + meeting new people/uncomfortable situations is something that I know better than to do. I didn't that day, though. Which is why, when Andrew didn't come immediately to my defense, and when he was sitting on the couch laughing along at the tv and pounding beers while his friend niggled at my nerves (to his credit, and the reason we are still together, he was NOT a participant), something snapped. I left them to their own devices and did something I hadn't done in a long time -- I headed to the dark kitchen, grabbed one of the pizzas and blacked out.

No, not that kind of black out; this had nothing to do with alcohol. It was an emotional blackout, the kind where you are so distraught, so completely, frantically confused, that as your mind speeds along at a million miles a second, doubting everything you have come to know not only about your relationships, but about yourself, all you can think about is making yourself so full that the physical discomfort overtakes the pain in your heart. Crouched in the darkened corner of the pantry, I felt so empty that I stuffed myself with pizza to fill myself back up. And by the time I realized what I was doing, it was less about the fight with A than it was about the fight with myself. Why did I feel the need to harm myself to feel better? How could I let myself get to a point of such total self-destruction? Couldn't I just learn to beat these demons, once and for all?

When I "came to", as they say, I was still there, crouched in a dark corner, tears streaming down my face, surrounded by crumbs and bits of sauce. I looked at the clock and assessed the damage -- in the span of 4 minutes, I had shoved 6.5 slices of pizza down my throat. I felt sick, guilty and stupid for once again letting my emotions get the best of me. And I vowed, like so many other times before, that it would be the last time.

Finally, an opening in the forest.

Binge eating is often written off by those who don't struggle with it as a "lack of self-control", or just another step in the cycle of bulimia. I'm here to tell you that it's not. Binge eating is a very real disorder, and it doesn't need to be followed by a purge to be considered one. It's an addiction unto itself. But it CAN be beaten, with the right combination of strategies on a very personal level. 

That big binge was not, of course, the last time that I ate when I wasn't hungry -- it wasn't even the most food that I've managed to consume in a single sitting, not by a long shot. It also wasn't the last time I ate as a form of punishment for some weakness or perceived flaw that I saw in myself. 

But it WAS the last time that I mindlessly allowed myself to be a bystander. It was the last time that I completely gave myself away to the binge, without setting some sort of standard by which the binge would be conducted. Am I completely healthy and binge-free now? Hell no! But I now give myself some parameters. I try to take stock of the situation before it starts -- what am I feeling? Am I hurt? Angry? Tired? Bored? I know that I tend to binge when I am feeling overwhelmed, and like everything else in my life is spiraling out of control. So I look out for those moments. And when I feel one coming on, I ask myself if there is anything else I can do that will make me feel better. The "Evil Voice" in my head says, "Of COURSE there is, you know food isn't going to do anything to make you feel better; you're going to feel stuffed and gross and you'll gain weight to boot. BUT YOU WANT IT AND DESERVE TO FEEL MISERABLE, FATTY!". I hate that voice.

More and more often, though, there is a second voice, who speaks louder than Evil Self, aka negative "Fat Talk." For awhile, this voice was silenced; I was in the depths of my food issues. Then, I stumbled upon the Healthy Living blogosphere, and the raw honesty and insights of others who have beaten their own monsters (especially Angela at Oh She Glows). Slowly, but surely, that "other" voice started to speak, and before long, it was in a downright screaming match with the Evil One. Eventually, I learned the most important aspect of breaking free of the binge cycle -- forgiveness. I'm only human, and I make mistakes. When I binge, it's because there is something wrong, and my brain is dealing with it the only way it knows how. It isn't trying to hurt me; it's trying to help me cope. I can only take it one day, one hour, and one moment at a time. I try my best. And then, after a little while, that Positive Voice started to overpower the Negative.

I still have negative bouts from time to time, but I make it a priority to look at myself in the mirror and turn those horrible statements into positive ones. "UGH my double chin is re-emerging!" becomes "My eyebrows have a really nice shape" and "My ass looks huge in that suit!" becomes "Check out how defined those curves are in the rear; spinning is working its magic!" And yes, I am the creepster saying these things out loud, in the mirror, to myself.

Sorry I'm not sorry.

 As I've said, my younger sister and her ridiculously adorable daughter came up here from Texas for the past two weeks. I have seen my sister four times in the past four years -- and this was the first time for longer than a weekend, and her first time up here since she's been 21 (she is now 23). It was only my second time seeing my beautiful little Princess, and I don't know about you, but there isn't much to do with a six-month old in freezing temperatures, save for eat and drink. We baptized the little one, and I'm now a certified Godmother! I spent a lot of time with my extended family, which was beyond welcome, since we all live close to one another but rarely take the time to visit. We're big, we're Irish, we're loud, and we love us some steak tips, potatoes and beer. As for working out? Why would I want to run on a treadmill of doom when I can crawl on the floor and make noises like a porpoise? That burns calories, right?

So after my sister left on Wednesday, and my pants felt a little tighter, I stepped on the scale, just to see the damage. 2.5 weeks. 7lbs. There you have it.

[Worth it.]

...But I mostly don't care.

  That's the real confession.  

Well, that was moderately terrifying. At least I get to check off some progress on a couple of my 2011 goals -- blogging more and doing things that scare me! So, tell me (if you want to), do you have an "Evil Voice?" How do you deal with it? How have you grown as a person the past few years?