Hi Sammy, and welcome. You sound very self-aware, and I'm glad you're reaching out for help. Are there any resources available to you at your college for help as well?

I am not sure if there are. Thank you for responding.

tell us about the things that seem to trigger you, Sammy. Once you get a handle on that, you're well on the path to being able to beat this.

I feel you . ITS NOT ABOUT THE FOOD OR THE WEIGHT. Its because of us. We lack self-esteem because of some events in our lifes. I know how it feels to be depressed and have anxiety. I believe eating disorders have ruined many chapters in my life and i believe there are conditions deadly. It started with anorexia in my case and it made me destroy my body but actually i have ruined the way i see the world. My thoughts regarding life are wrong and misplaced.

So I found out what my triggers are. It is a stress response to certain things. I realized it just this week that as soon as certain things start happening I eat for the neuro response. Ive done a lot of research on this, because well, I am now overweight and never used to be and I have never been so depressed or unhappy with my body image before. I eat when Im not hungry which I dont logically understand except when i do it its okay. I realize with this stress that food neourlogically gives some pleasure and happiness which I dont get at all, so im assuming why its become an addiction. I used to be atheltic during high school and the first part of college. Then some things in my personal life started happening at home. Thats when it all started. I started eating too much ( which hurt the wallet which I also regret) and it was always and emotional response. Every time I stopped and lost a few pounds I gained it all back and more. I gained about 70 pounds in two years. And as of right now I have lost 10 from strict dieting. I am starting to feel urges to binge, but I need some help. I cant get help anywhere else. I have 60 more pounds to lose, I guess losing 10 is something, but id like to see more progress losing weight and trying to never binge again. My stress triggers will not go away, but when they do happen what should my response be? Please help with some advice, because if I can replace this trigger response, then I should be fine. Im just too young to understand.

Sammy, you're one hell of a lot smarter and more intuitive than most people, no matter what age they are. You have already figured out things that take some people decades. (Um, like me.)

Losing ten is amazing. You want to lose sixty more, I get that. I'm literally 60 pounds over my goal weight right now. but the truth is that you only really need to lose one - the next one. And then the one after that. I know it's semantics, but sometimes it's easier to focus on one at a time.

I've read that if you lose weight fast, the urge to binge is stronger because it's such an adjustment for your body. Be kind to yourself, and don't expect more than your body can safely handle.

I have found some ways to circumvent my triggers. But remember that my answer may not be your answer. I hope some other people will chime in here with some suggestions too, and maybe among all of us, you'll find something helpful.

I learned that I had to make some big changes, that small ones were just masking the problem. For instance, I tried replacing the 3 pm snack-food-binge with a healthier snack at the same time. But - for me - that didn't work, because I was still telling my body that it needed to be fed every two or three hours all day. And what it needed to learn was that it would not actually starve and die if it didn't get fed between noon and six pm. I know that many people swear by four or five small meals a day. But it's too easy for me to just eat all the time if I think like that. I'm trying, now, to eat three times a day and be busy the rest of the time.

I had tried substituting seltzer water for the diet Coke I was drinking non stop all day. (I am convinced now that the diet Coke messed with my metabolism, and my ability to feel full.) But that just taught me to keep drinking soda. I had to make a clean break from it.

I thought about the places in my house that were automatically associated with food, especially with bad choices: the comfy chair, the computer, and the car, and scrubbed them all up and made them look nicer and then declared them food-free zones.

I started a ridiculously wordy journal (here on this site) and just started writing All The Things. I was amazed at the truth that was coming out of the keyboard. Sometimes I didn't even know something until my fingers typed it.

I looked for ways to get that 'rush', that neurological pleasure, in other ways. You've nailed it with your comments about that. I think our addict brains just don't release dopamine or whatever the way other people's do, and so we turn to food for that rush. I had to be very careful here - I didn't want to turn to alcohol or shopping or something else that could turn bad on me, you know?

Give yourself some slack on the whole body image thing while you work on this. You've grown up in a culture that shoves a certain image of what women should look like down our throats. but when you look at women who are changing the world, they come in all sizes and shapes.

You are an extraordinary person of great value, and you are going to take this incredible insightfulness you have and do something great with it. Be kind to yourself and know that you're on the right track.

Thanks katie for all your wisdom, I take it to heart. I never had coffee/soda until I came to college, and for late night studies I fell to caffeine to stay up, and thats extra calories, and messes with your metabolism. I wouldnt say Im an addict to coffee/soda since its not every day or all the time, but I have given it up and hope to only have it on a social basis ( which is almost never). Ive started to take more study breaks, and go back to a usual workout routine before I gained the weight ( I used to be active). Im not in my old shape, but Im starting to get there, and Ill keep posting my progress. I felt like binging right now, but I decided to write a post instead. Small changes are going to work, and ill work at day by day and see if I get back to my normal weight, which is a goal. I used to be 135 pounds, then I gained weight to 205. Right now Im about 195. So 10 down safely, and 60 more to go. Thanks!

You wrote that you were thinking about binging but decided to write a post instead. I've found that it's helped me to have a list (it's actually on an index card in my pocket) of things I can do when I feel like making a bad food choice. I'm learning that if i distract myself for awhile I can often get past it. I read somewhere that it takes fifteen minutes to do so, but for me it's much longer. I think your exercising is going to help, too. You said that you were involved in sports in high school - I know that athletics in college can be an enormous time-suck, but do you have other options on campus, besides competitive sports? Maybe even post a note on a bulletin board looking for a few people to walk with regularly? It doesn't need to be a weight-loss focus, you can pitch it more as a mental-health-break general-fitness thing.

So yesterday was a minor setback, after I wrote a post I may have eaten more than I should have out of stress. And I had no idea stress is the ultimate response. I didnt eat as much as I usually did, but it wasnt a normal amount either, so thats good and bad. I fully realize what I did which makes me more guilty feeling. Katie you are the best right now, because its all I have in this struggle. My university has a recreation center/gym so I have been making a routine to go there on a usual basis. (I am also recovering from four hand surgeries which is part of the stress because the recovery has left me without the use of two hands for long time) Im starting to get back into strength training to repair my two wrists, and hopefully that will help to contribute to the weight loss as well. I was up the entire night because I felt so guilty after I ate a large amount of food, I literally only ate for emotions, I wasnt even hungry, this brain science is very intriguing. I guess I should be thankful that its only food and not alcholol or drugs. What I need help with now, is a response to what to do when a stress trigger happens, I dont always have a pocket to carry an index card in, but I am open to many suggesstions that would work for me, because sometimes I am in class etc..... Thank you.

Sammy, I want you to picture a sailboat out on open water.

I've only been in one once, but what I remember so clearly is that the darn things rarely actually go in a straight line. You fiddle with the sail until it catches the wind, and then you're moving, but you realize you're not quite going where you want to, so you fiddle with things some more, and it changes course slightly. Then it ends up going slightly too far in the other direction, so you make another adjustment and correct the course. Eventually, you actually get where you're going, because you've stayed focused and every time you notice things aren't going quite right, you make a small change, and wait a bit, and see how that goes.

But very, very rarely are you actually going completely in the right direction. It's always just a tiny bit off, because while you can work with the wind, you can't completely control it.

We're all sailboats, Sammy.

You know what your goal is - like most of us, you probably have a big goals and some small ones to hit along the way. You have a general idea of some things you need to do to get there.

But - like every one of us here - you don't have it entirely figured out perfectly. You're not an experienced sailor yet. So there's going to be setbacks. The thing is, you're still going in the right basic direction, And every time you make an adjustment, you get better at it.

We'd rather be bicycles or cars or something that you can just point in one direction and it will go straight there. But we're not. We're sailboats.

Forgive yourself for your screwups the same way you'd forgive someone you love who's doing their best but who messes up sometimes. Stopping the guilt part of this is a huge, huge part of recovery. That guilt, and the things that go with it, like staying up all night, will eventually mess with your body and your head and keep the spiral going in the wrong direction entirely. You have to keep yourself healthy. This is a hard enough fight without having to deal with fatigue or illness.

The thing that's amazing about you is that you already understand that you're eating for emotional reasons. It takes some of us years and years to admit that. You are so far ahead of the game already. You're going to have more setbacks, but I think you're going to find that with increased awareness, each one will take you less and less off course, and you'll be able to make the corrections sooner. You're also learning which things work for you.

Just work on today, for right now - work on making a small adjustment to get your sailboat on course, and pay attention and see how that works for you. Let's get some more things on your list for stress triggers. Go for a short walk - even up and down the hall in your residence. Watch silly videos on Facebook for five minutes. After your hands heal, maybe something repetitive like knitting would be good both for physical therapy and for keeping your hands too busy to eat. Put a song you love on with earphones and tell yourself this is YOUR song for trigger situations. (I use Sara Bareilles' "Brave") Get up and dance. Organize a drawer or part of your closet. Go on-line 'shopping' for clothes in the size you're going to be in a couple of months (but don't actually buy anything). Do twenty jumping jacks. Find a friend and French-braid each others' hair to keep your hands busy and just have a short break. Play Tetris for ten minutes. Write a short poem or paragraph about your intentions and memorize it and say it to yourself in times of stress.

Most of my ideas won't work for anyone other than me, but maybe they'll help you think of some of your own. Remember, you don't need to lose sixty pounds or solve this trigger thing forever just yet - you need to head off the next trigger moment, and you need to lose the next pound. One at a time. You've got this.

Thank you, your wisdom is very appreciated. Ill keep you up to date on progress.

Hi Katie, I had a little setback. I binged for the first time in a week. It was so emotional and I cried afterwards. Im currently setting some effort to finding something to do the moment I get a temptation. Im about to embark on a water fast for five days tomorrow. The success of these fasts is that it helps detoxify the body of toxins and bad stuff, and in a state of ketosis should burn some fat. Im only doing a 5 day water fast, but that should let me lose a little weight, and start my clean eating after. My stomach will shrink after 5 days no eating, so when I do eat again, it should help me make better choices in food, and not eat as much. This will help start my diet/workout plan. I will update my weight. Today I gained one of my pounds back that I had lost. I was 196 today, and we will see what happens after 5 days of fasting. About half the weight will be gained back since its just water, but about half lost should be fat. My research shows that a water fast is a great way to start a diet because it drops blood sugar, lowers blood pressure, shrinks stomach, increases insulin sensitvity, decreases diabietic risk, decreases inflammation in body, and lowers cholesterol and heart issues. So for anyone out there struggling with weight loss or binging or obesity, I reccomend the water fast for about 5 days, I embark tomorrow on it, and will update on progress. Im here to help others as well as get help myself.

Be careful, Sammy. You want to teach yourself to eat in a sustainable healthy way, and a water fast won't do that. Your liver gets rid of toxins in your body naturally. If it didn't, you'd be in liver failure and you'd be dead or hospitalized. Toxins are being flushed through your body all the time.

Make sure your research includes sites like the Mayo Clinic and Johns Hopkins that have research to back up their claims. There aren't many medical professionals that are on board with the idea of 'detoxifying'. Maybe just try a day and see how you feel? You don't want to go from one extreme to another.

Or look into something like Whole 30 or Paleo, and try a few days without carbs and see how that feels.

Either way, keep checking in here so we know you're okay.

I know water fasts are controversial, but its takes 2 days to get into ketosis, then the body is completely running on ketones. This would reboot the immune system since my body wont be digesting anything. The one thing I have on my side is being young, I know if I feel bad I can stop at any time.

Fast is something that works very well, there's a lot of information out there, and
if you do it properly it's not dangerous at all. But I tried and it's not for me now, I'm far from being healthy, and the fasting periods... made me binge after. I'm thinking in doing it in the future, just not now, I'm not prepared. Just want to say, I'm new too, and you're not alone, and we will make it, we will be healthy. Big hug!