Tag Archive for: urges to binge

What makes binge eating recovery work

What Makes Recovery “Work”? Part III (You Don’t Need to Work so Hard)

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This is the 3rd and final post in my blog series, “What Makes Recovery Work?”.  In Part I, I talked about expectations surrounding what it means for a recovery method to work.  In Part II, I discussed the work you personally need to do in recovery, which is to dismiss each urge to binge (and also eat enough food).  Now in Part III, I want to talk about eliminating unnecessary work in recovery.

When I was in therapy for binge eating, it felt like I had a lifelong journey of work ahead of me in order to stop the harmful behavior and then to maintain my recovery.  But, since then, I’ve seen that it’s not necessary to work so hard to put aside the binge eating habit.

I know you aren’t afraid of doing work; I know you aren’t expecting recovery to be effortless; and I know you are willing to do what it takes to stop your binge eating. Working hard is certainly not a bad thing, but if right now, you feel that your hard work hasn’t gotten you closer to freedom from binge eating, you may be doing work that isn’t actually targeting the binge eating problem.

Commonly, in traditional eating disorder therapy, the work that is required has to do with managing emotions, healing pain from your past, and learning to cope better with daily stress. This is meaningful work that can help improve your life, but if it isn’t helping you avoid acting on the binge urges, it’s not helping with the binge eating specifically.

It can be baffling when you feel you are doing all of the hard work that therapy requires and you are still binge eating.  If you find yourself in this situation, you may understandably start to look for something else to work on, and then something else after that.  This can lead to a constant state of trying to find another problem to solve, or something else within yourself to fix, hoping it will eventually put an end to your binge eating.

You may also be working on improving and fixing the way you are eating, thinking that will get rid of the binge episodes.  You may be trying to create the perfect meal plan, or trying to adhere to strict eating guidelines, so you may be working hard every day measuring, counting, and weighing your food intake.  Additionally, you could be going through a lot of trouble to avoid certain foods that you believe are problematic or addicting, or you may be trying to research nutrition and take all of the right supplements.

Although improving your eating in ways that feel good to you is a positive thing, and although it’s certainly important to make sure you eat adequately, it’s possible you are putting a lot of unnecessary time and energy into your eating plan, without it making much of a difference in your binge eating.  It can feel like a never-ending quest when you are always looking for something else to fix or change about your diet, hoping that will put a stop to the binges.

If you think a lot of hard work is required for recovery, it only makes sense that you would keep looking for something else to solve or fix, whether that’s in your life, your relationships, your personality, your emotions, or the way you are eating. It’s admirable, and shows determination and resilience.  But, I know how frustrating it feels when it seems like no matter what you work on, you still end up binge eating.

What if working harder in recovery is not the answer?

It is my belief that no matter how much you improve your life, your emotional state, your relationships, your ability to cope, or the way you are eating, binge urges will still inevitably come up.  Even if you work very hard in all of those areas, you’ll still be left with the fundamental work of recovery: not acting on the binge urges.

To stop acting on the binge urges, what if less work is actually more effective?

I had a conversation with Dr. Amy Johnson on my podcast last week, and part of what we talked about was how just seeing your binge eating habit differently can allow change to occur without the struggle or without needing to work so hard. When you have a fundamental shift in the way you view your urges and respond to them, it suddenly seems unnecessary to sort out and deal with all of your other problems or have a perfect eating plan in order to stop binge eating.

So, instead of thinking “what other problems and difficult emotions can I work on in recovery?”, you can change your mindset and think, “how can I work on developing a new perspective about the urges and respond to them differently?”

Ending binge eating doesn’t need to feel like intense, complicated, or tedious work. The work can simply be you deeply seeing that the urges do not express your true wants and needs, and then learning to connect with your own power to avoid acting on them.

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If you want help in increasing your ability not to act on binge urges, and you are new to the Brain over Binge approach, you can get started with my free eBook.

If you want extra help in making recovery work for you, the Brain over Binge Course is composed of over 125 audios to guide you and encourage you, including one audio you can listen to when you are having an urge to binge—to help you avoid acting on it. You can get access to the complete course for only $18.99 per month.  

What works in binge eating recovery

What Makes Recovery “Work”? Part II (The Work You Need to Do)

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In last month’s blog post What Makes Recovery “Work?”, I talked about how an effective recovery method or strategy is not defined by its ability to take away your binge urges, but by its ability to help you stop acting on them.  So, when you try an approach to recovery and hope that it will “work,” try not to have the expectation that it will take away your binge urges, but instead that it will help you better manage them and better avoid acting on them.

Last month’s post got me thinking more deeply about this topic, and I decided to write a Part II and a Part III post, addressing different angles of the idea of recovery “working,” as well as the “work” you do in recovery.  Today, in Part II, I want to talk about the work that you personally put in to overcoming binge eating.

If you expect that talking to a therapist or coach, or reading a book, or joining a support group or online program will “work” by taking the urges away, then it can automatically put you in a more passive role, where you may be expecting recovery to just happen–ie: the urges to disappear.  When the urges don’t disappear, it’s possible for you to assume that the therapist, support group, book…etc. didn’t work, without fully considering the work you need to put in to have success.

That’s not to say when recovery doesn’t work, it’s your fault.  Not at all.  There are many factors at play, and different approaches are better suited for different people. But, once you know that no recovery method will make your urges suddenly disappear, you can see clearly that there is work for you to do.

I’m not talking about work in a “nose to the grindstone” or “tough it out” sort of way.  But, when you use recovery methods and resources as ways to help you stop acting on your urges, it automatically puts you in a more empowered, active role in recovery.  You fully realize the work you need to do: avoid acting on every binge urge, until the binge urges stop coming.  When you deeply know that is the work of recovery, your focus can shift to finding and applying what works to help you do that.

No matter what strategy for recovery you are using, you are the only one who can choose (or learn to choose) not to act on binge urges.  Even if you have a lot of support, there will be moments when it’s just you and the urge. Recovery strategies and support can certainly help prepare you for those moments, but during binge urges is when you do the brain-changing work of recovery.

To think of having to avoid acting on every urge to binge may feel overwhelming to you right now, but once you can shift your perspective and achieve some separation from your urges, it will start to feel more natural to avoid acting on them. It won’t always feel comfortable, but even the most meaningful work can be unpleasant at times.

While writing this, I looked up the definition of work, which is this:  An activity involving mental or physical effort done in order to achieve a purpose or result.  Not acting on your binge urges day after day definitely fits that description.  It does require mental effort and requires you to stay connected to your higher brain, and it is certainly aimed at a result that you absolutely want: to be free of binge eating.

At times, it may feel easier not to do the work of dismissing urges. It sometimes may feel easier to slip back into old habits, just as it often feels easier to get back in bed in the morning instead of going to work at your job or care for your family. But, I’m sure that you rarely get back in bed, because your sense of responsibility is too strong.  The work of your recovery deserves the same sense of responsibility from you.  That doesn’t mean you will do it perfectly, and never slip, but if you keep trying day after day, you will find what works for you.

Go to What Makes Recovery “Work”? Part III

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If you want help in increasing your ability not to act on binge urges, and you are new to the Brain over Binge approach, you can get started with my free eBook.

If you want extra help in making recovery work for you, the Brain over Binge Course is composed of over 125 audios to guide you and encourage you, including one audio you can listen to when you are having an urge to binge—to help you avoid acting on it. You can get access to the complete course for only $18.99 per month (no commitment required).  

What works to end binge eating

What Makes Recovery “Work”?

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I know a life free of binge eating is completely possible for you, but if you are like many binge eaters who I’ve spoken to over the years, you may have a hard time believing that right now.  You may have searched for years for a cure, for something to “work,” for it all to just click so that you will no longer binge.  You may feel exhausted and frustrated by the search.

You may be someone who has already read my books, and you could be thinking that the method I used “worked” for me rather quickly, so it should be the same for you.  You may believe that if the concepts from my books do not work right away, then you need to look for a new approach that will work.  It is certainly possible that another approach may be a better fit, but if you are someone who has jumped around from one approach to another, I want you to take a minute to think about what you believe makes a recovery method “work.”

If you are holding the common belief that a recovery method only works if it gets rid of your binge urges right away, or at least very quickly, this could create some problems for you in recovery.  If ‘getting rid of the urges right away’  was the measure of a successful recovery method, then the Brain over Binge approach actually didn’t work for me either.

Seeing my binge urges as meaningless, powerless, and harmless neurological junk from my lower brain didn’t make those urges go away right away, or even all that quickly. The new mindset I had changed how I perceived my urges, and it rather dramatically made me feel my own ability not to act on them.  But, the urges were still there for a while.

I had to avoid acting on every binge urge until they did completely go away – about 9 months from the time I adopted my new approach.  Not once during those 9 months did I think “this isn’t working.” The reason for this was that I defined success not by whether or not I had urges, but by my ability not to act on them.

In the beginning of recovery, the binge urges came frequently…and I wasn’t perfect.  There were two times when I did act on the urge. The first time, I heard those familiar, lower brain reasons why I should binge, I felt the familiar craving, and I mistakenly thought it was the real “me” who wanted to binge, and I acted on it.  The second time I binged, I had much more awareness of what I was doing, but ultimately, I did still act on the urge.

When I acted on those two urges, I didn’t proceed to throw out the principles that I’d learned, because they didn’t “work.” I realized that in those specific instances, I had not applied what I’d learned, and I had simply followed the urges.  I did not think that I’d failed or that I needed a new approach.  I recognized that I had the power to avoid acting on the very next urge and to keep my recovery going.

During those 9 months of having urges but not acting on them, I never wished the urges away or took their presence to mean something was wrong.  I believe this was a big component of what allowed the approach to be effective.

My own recovery and my experience helping others has led me to believe this:

What makes recovery “work” is not what works to take your urges away.  It’s what works to help you not act on them.

No matter what approach you use, the crux of recovery comes when you have a thought, feeling, or impulse encouraging you to binge, but you don’t.

When you are able to do that over and over, your brain changes, the urges gradually do go away, and your binge eating habit is erased.

Go to What Makes Recovery Work, Part II

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If you want help in increasing your ability not to act on binge urges, and you are new to the Brain over Binge approach, you can get started with my free eBook.

If you want extra help in making recovery work for you, the Brain over Binge Course is composed of over 125 audios to guide you and encourage you, including one audio you can listen to when you are having an urge to binge—to help you avoid acting on it. You can get access to the complete course for only $18.99 per month.