Was it because I was thinking about binge eating?
Or was it just that the “perfect storm” was approaching and there was nothing I could do about it?
On Saturday, I listed the life ingredients that can cause me to binge. So why didn’t I mention that I was feeling several of those things, and that I was going to have to negotiate a social event and then 2 days alone? In other words, why didn’t I admit that the clouds were building and I needed a plan to avoid doing what I was obviously going to do?
I woke up on Saturday morning feeling grumpy and twitchy. No amount of exercise or healthy food made me feel better. I kept fast-forwarding through the next couple of weeks and allowing myself to stress about the “to do” list. I also allowed myself to turn “what I want” into “what I must do”. That’s not a good mind-set for me.
That night we had friends over and I just wanted to have fun. Nothing at all in any way wrong with that, but I wasn’t admitting to myself that I couldn’t imagine reigning myself in again.
I woke up the next morning with a bit of a hangover and a weird impatience for the husband to leave on his business trip and let me get on with my work. Ha! I DID have plans for work but there was that almost-but-not-quite-subconscious alter-ego making plans for what I was going to eat once he was out of the house.
And eat is what I did. It wasn’t particularily junky food and some of it was even planned. But it was pretty non-stop and way way too much for any woman of my size and stature. And, of course, there was baking.
This morning, I woke up feeling vaguely ill and it took me a long time to get out of bed to face the day (and myself).
What were my choices?
- I could do it again because I have another day alone, but I’m relieved to say that didn’t appeal at all.
- I could put it behind me and relish the clean slate – zero the journal and act as though today was the first day of the week.
But I wasn’t sure that was quite right either. I’ve definitely moved on from blowing a whole week/month/year but now I need to move myself along a little further. It’s GOOD that I’m willing to draw a line under negative eating behaviour and move on. But it’s better to look back and FACE IT before I wipe it off.
That’s the difference. I’ve been moving on without looking back, without learning from my rather spectacular crash and burn episodes. So I went back to my journal and wrote down everything I could remember eating in the past 48 hours. And I remember a lot – partly because much of it was planned so it was only the significant “extras” that I needed to remember.
The total?
- Sunday: 2600 calories
- Monday: 2500 calories
That’s interesting because I would have thought I’d eaten much more yesterday. At least, my mindset was much less healthy while I was eating yesterday so it felt like a binge rather than just eating too much with friends.
An the outcome of this exercise? Well – basically, the “worst” I can do isn’t all that bad. My ultimate disaster – the shameful binge – is actually just a couple of days of overeating. I reset my Nutracheck goal for this week to “maintenance” and all of a sudden it’s all completely retrievable. I will keep running and walking and eating sensibly and I’ll leave it a couple of days to weigh myself.
But it’s all ok. It is.
I may have just disarmed the binge. I’ll keep you posted.
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