I'm realizing how I'm not a carb addict...i'm a food addict! Had a total binge session yesterday with "allowable" foods--ate about 3000 calories within 2 hours.

Got up today feeling horrible. One of those days where I feel fatter than usual and don't feel like doing anything.

There we go.
Join the club!!! I am exactly like that.
I also thought it was carb addicts but I realise that I can easily pass up those fancy cakes and eat loads of meat, etc....

I am also a food addicts. I am sooo happy I meet someone from my planet...

What can be done for people like us? Have overeaters been able to conquer their problems with Atkins?

Generally the cause of compulsive overeating is not the food. It's also what goes on in your head - behaviour, conditioning, addiction, how you think about yourself and your relationship to food and other people.

Low-carbing is a great tool, but it's not the whole answer to compulsive overeating. You have to work on all the rest of your "stuff" too and learn to live without overeating whenever something sets you off.

Karen

Karen,

What are some of the other "tools" that I can use to work through the "stuff" that makes me compulsively over eat?

I think stress is a huge factor in my life.
And dealing with unpleasant people and the feelings that come with that.

OA has been recommended, but I have problems with that.

Any other suggestions would be helpful.

MJ

Hello!

What is OA?.....

I bvelieve that sports is definitely a good solution. YOu do not have to do loads to feel the effect on your brain (positive ones!!!!)

If you have a choice between something like running or gym and aerobics style exercise, go for the latter. When you are at the gym, you do not really let go, you have time to yourself and you keep on thinking about stuff.

Aerobics style classes, you have to follow someone and jump around... you can really let go. I do not particularly like aerobics, but any activities where you are with other people (who you do not necessarily know) will do it for me.
Movies also take your mind of things.... for a short while though....

The lasty one (u mayu find it stupid) I find that thinking about what my next low carb meal is going to be can take my mind of some pression I feel or the stress of work.!!!!! the truth!

Whatever it takes for you to stop using food as a drug. Counselling, self-help books like those of Geneen Roth, accepting the process of growth and the pain and joy that comes with it, choosing not to eat to make the pain go away and letting yourself feel what your feeling. I do recommend OA. If anything you can commit to abstinence from compulsive overeating and get support with the OA program. You take what you need from the meetings, leaving the rest behind.

Whatever you do, you have to be completely willing to let go of compulsive overeating.

Karen

Thanks for the information, I'm going to check out some of the self help books. I really want to work through this because i've been moving from one "addiction" to another in order to not feel. I'm done being an addict.

Yeah, that seems to be how it happens. It's like food is the last frontier to be tackled. It would be different if we didn't have to eat to stay alive 'cause gawd knows we don't need alcohol or drugs to live a wonderful life. But we do need to eat.

Karen

That also makes it the hardest to overcome.

Yeah,

I belong in this group too. I'm a total addict. Mostly I'm just addicted to MORE!

Tomorrow night I will be taking a birthday cake at my 12 step group celebrating 6 continous years of sobriety. No booze and no pills. (Yeah me!)

However, the addict part of me does not die, nor rarely sleeps. In my first year of sobriety I gained 85 pounds! Yes, count them, 85.

I was able to lose them in my third year by joining yet another 12 step group called "Food Addicts in Recovery Anonymous." It worked for me at that time, and I am so grateful to my food sponsor for the work she did with me. Like previously mentioned, it is about surrender. complete surrender.

If you would like to talk about this more, let me know. There is a "set of spiritual tools" that I cannot live without.

Jane

Are the spiritual tools the same ones used in oa or aa? I don't understand total surrender?

Yes! They are based on the AA 12-Steps. Here's the website.

Surrender is not a negative thing in the 12-Step context. What it means is realizing that you cannot control anything. People, things and your own behavior. And, that you are willing to give up the control that has made your life miserable.

Help is asked for humbly from whatever you choose as your higher power. It can be anything you choose it to be: a tree, and image and feeling of strength, the God of your or another religion, or the group itself which is what many atheists choose as their higher power. Whatever you feel comfortable with and trust as your guide. You take all the things that have made you sick and insane and give them up to the higher power and let the higher power guide you in making the choices to sanity. That's surrender

There is a process to getting there. One of them is just being willing to be willing.

It all starts at the first step: We admitted we were powerless over food—that our lives had become unmanageable.

That's the whole key. We may try to control it, but always seem to be back at where we started, where our lives are controlled by food. How many times have we tried to fight back and never won? How many times have we wanted an end to our suffering?

Karen

The whole 12 step process was so bizarre to me at the beginning. Nothing but paradox.

"Surrender to Win" and "Victory in Defeat are two of my favorite slogans

It wasn't until I was completely hopeless that I had any hope at all!

Try to avoid "contempt prior to investigation", it is guarenteed to keep a person in "everlasting ignorance".

Jane

"Surrender to Win" I really like that Idea, and I totally understand "It wasn't until I was completely hopeless that I had any hope at all!" I went through depression and it wasn't until I was completely hopeless that I found the help and hope to recover. I'm not there yet when it comes to food, and I don't want to get that hopeless again ever. Do you have to hit rock bottom to overcome cumpulsive overeating? I am willing to surrender now!