AAT: Binges vs. Overeating

In the "Reduce Binges to Mere Overeating" chapter Linda Craighead says:

"Psychologists typically define a BINGE as any episode in which you experience loss of control; an objective binge means the amount was also clearly large while a subjective binge meas the amount was not clearly large ... Unfortunately loss of control is itself, hard to define (and) means different things to different people ... (However) AAT avoids the (binge definition) problem ... by asking you to separate your ratings for physical fullness from your ratings of your psychological feelings. (The AAT Workbook includes forms for rating hunger, fullness and feelings about eating.) ... The goal is to first eliminate episodes in which you get stuffed, regardless of whether or not you feel loss of control."

WHY SOME EATING EPISODES FEEL PARTICULARLY DISTRESSING:

" ... distress comes from having two very strong but conflicting feelings at the same time. Psychologists call this AMBIVALENCE ... you have an intense desire to eat and you also feel strongly that you sould not be eating becaus of your concern about weight. You resolve this conflict (for the moment) by tuning out your conscious awareness of the thoughts that say "Don't eat!" or "Stop eating", so you are able to eat ... All variations of this tuning out of some of your feelings (are) the OH WHAT THE HECK response. As soon as you tune back in, you realize that you feel very distressed. You may experience this whole phenomenon as simply regret (after eating) or as having loss of control (during eating)."

AAT suggests that you ELIMINATE BINGES BY USING CONSCIOUS DECISIONS (CDs) to eat to counteract your tendency to dissociate (tune out) parts of your awareness". So you "give yourself conscious permission to eat the type of food you really want ... You don't just give yourself permission to get uncomfortably full or stuffed." You just need to be 'willing to give yourself conscious permission, a decision which "undermines any sense of loss of control ... At first you are likely to overeat to some extent, but gradually you will become more able to stop before you feel uncomfortable, then ultimately before you even feel completely full."

WHAT THE HECK BINGES: Often "people don't plan to binge ... (they) just overeat, for whatever reason and the overeating turns into a binge through the 'what the heck' response (which) resolves conflicted feelings ... (by) tuning out ... awareness of thoughts that say 'stop eating', so (they) can keep on eating."

EMOTIONAL EATING BINGES: Emotional eating can also turn into a binge, because "you wanted to eat to change something about the way you are feeling ... When you start eating for emotional reasons you (can choose to): (1) stop at moderate fullness, (2) keep eating past moderate fullness so you overeat, or (3) plan to binge. Someone who binges often uses food like other people use food, to make themselves feel better. " ... people who binge typically eat excessive amounts in their (usually not too successful) effort to change uncomfortable feelings.

PLANNED BINGES: For some people a binge goes beyond moderating the intensity of uncomfortable feelings, by creating an altered state of consciousness. Those people typically say they become numb or oblivious during a binge. So they plan binges in order to deliberately seek an altered state. Nevertheless, those binges still are 'emotional eating' binges because they alter the emotional state.

DEPRIVATION BINGES: are the most obviouis types of binge, where you want a specific food, but won't allow yourself to have it. Although you can push away the deprived feeling, it returns until you give in and most likely binge, rather than eat a normal portion. "If you are restricting a lot, especially restricting types of food, or you restricted a lot at some point in your past, a vague feeling of deprivation can be easily triggered whenever you don't allow yourself to have food (or something else) that you want." During a 'deprivation binge' you (not someone else) refuses to give yourself what you want. AAT advises that you reduce food-specific deprivation. "Eat what you want, because forbidding specific foods triggers more intense feelings of deprivation than limiting amounts ... Make conscious decision to choose antideprivation eating when food is available and a strong urge has been triggered ... When you choose anti-deprivation eating, you stay tuned into your stomach sensations, so you can notice (and stop at) moderate fullness intead of overeating or bingeing."

FRUSTRATION BINGES: occur when you don't have control over getting what you want. The main ingredient of a frustration binge is feeling powerless or hopeless, which make you "lose motivation to stay focussed on getting what you really want ... You reconize at some level tha a binge is not going to solve your real problemand even that it's likely to make your wieght problems worse ... you settle for what you can get, namely food."

LEFTOVER BINGES: seem "more like a bad habit that is left over from an earlier time when you did binge and follow a pattern ... You experience some sense of control over these binges in that you can put them off, but you can't seem to give them up altogether ... Leftover binges are due to emotions which differ from emotions that trigger other binges ... Once binge eating has been established as a way to cope with negative ffelings, even minor disappointments or vague felingsof idscontent can be enough to trigger a leftover binge." I can TOTALLY relate to 'leftover binges'. I can sucessfully abstain from bingeing for long periods, but, when I feel overwhelmed by negative emotions (including deprivation), I still binge.

SEPARATE PSYCHOLOGICAL ISSUES FROM EATING DECISIONS: Practice making eating decisions based on your stomch, which keeps you on the normal eating path regardless of how you feel emotionally. Challenge your thoughts when you try to use emotions or stress as an excuse to get off the normal eating path. It's possible to focus on eating and other issues at the same time, because normal eating does not require the same level of attention and effort as restricting or dieting do.

REDUCE THE POWER OF EMOTIONS: Although you can challenge thoughts and feelings that take you away from normal eating, you are allowed to decide to eat for emotional reasons. You just need to (consciously) acknowledge what you are doing and stop at moderate fullness. You don't have to know why you want to eat when you aren't hungry, but you need to use your stomach fullness as your stop signal, regardless of where you started eating. Not all eating problems are emotional, but when you eliminate other paths that lead to bingeing or overeating, you can see whether you need to address emotional issues.

Over the years I have binged less and less from emotional issues and more often from feelings of deprivation due to unnecessary food restriction. Because I already have 7 medical (food allergy) restrictions, the notion of 'antideprivation eating' of any food, for which I don't have a diagnosed allergy, helped me reduce bingeing from once a month to once every 3 months during the past year. I realize the binges which occurred every 3 months were entirely triggered by deprivation feelings when I decided to limit safe (non allergic) food, because they weren't as 'healthy' as other (but less appealing) foods. Nevertheless I can quickly return to the 'normal eating' path, when I resume 'antideprivation' eating of all my 'safe' foods.