Hi lovely readers,
Today on the blog we have a special guest post from Ari who is a nutrition coach who works primarily with clients who suffer from disordered eating patterns. He also works as a dietetic technician at a residential eating disorder treatment center. He has also published a fantastic book 100 Days of Food Freedom: A Day-by-Day Journey to Self-Discover, Freedom from Dieting, and Recovery From Your Eating Disorder. You can check him and his book out here
If you have any comments or questions let us know at the bottom and Ari and I will be happy to answer 🙂 Lots of love, please enjoy this special guest post from Ari.
“Today I’d like to invite you into a much deeper look into what just 5 minutes of delayed binge-eating looks like. This is going to be an article unlike most others, and if you struggle at all with seemingly permanent binge-eating patterns, this could be what it takes to reorient your thought processes and get into a recovery-oriented mindset. But first, what are we talking about when we say “delayed bingeing”?
When we “delay” a binge, we are literally giving the brain messages and
feedback loops time to process, and we are bringing mindful awareness to these sensations as we let them unfold. This way, rather than jumping from one distraction to the next and simply hoping this binge does not overtake us, we are taking an actionable step towards postponing the behavior.
This is vital for us to grasp. As I had to learn in my own recovery from Binge-Eating Disorder, the problem is not the bingeing. The problem is the mindlessness of the situation (and it’s worth noting the word “problem” in this sense carries no implications of moral wrongdoing, but rather just serves to identify where things go awry and problematic behaviors start popping up). The problem is that we allow these thought patterns and behavior chains to roll on without interruption, and when we do this, the natural endpoint is a binge session.
So, we use delayed bingeing (whether it be executed in a formal treatment
setting or on your own) to get in touch with the feelings present during an urge to binge. This allows us to regain control over our symptoms and ultimately reclaim Food Freedom.
But what does delayed bingeing actually look like and, as an extension of that, how can you start employing it today? First and foremost, it’s important to mention that this is an exercise to undertake at your own risk. If you don’t believe this will be helpful for you, either due to immense fear of your inability to control the situation or else reason to believe this is targeting the wrong aspects of your recovery, please reach out and I’d be happy to help you process this.
If this does strike you as a potentially important procedure, consider
implementing it first on a weekly basis. You can scale it up from there, depending on its initial efficacy, but it’s important to start at a small and manageable level. After all, this should only be one small piece of a larger recovery plan.
A deep look
To begin, we’ll want to enter the area where bingeing would normally occur. For some, this is the kitchen, but for others, it could be a college dorm common room with a vending machine in it or maybe a convenience store. Granted, if it’s somewhere public and others could potentially spectate, that might not lend itself to the most mindful of exposures, but the priority is to emulate your typical binge environment. You need not necessarily get the food out just yet (the idea with delayed bingeing is to give yourself the option to binge or not binge, and getting the food ready presupposes that you will binge).
Minute 1
Start by focusing on the breath. Breathe in on a count of 4, hold for a count of 1, and then release on a count of 5. Do this until it becomes more automatically rhythmic.
It can help to focus in on a certain anatomical area where the breath feels most apparent. This could be at the level of the stomach, chest, shoulder, or even the nostrils. Find somewhere where it feels apparent and can easily be cued into. When your thoughts start running away from you (i.e. you become distracted), don’t fret. Just bring yourself back to the breath and carry on from where you left off. Remember that any sort of mindfulness endeavor is as much about the returning to the breath as it is
about the mindful awareness itself.
Minute 2
You can now move to thinking about the hunger or binge urges that are present. Notice the difference between these two. Notice whether any true hunger is even present at all.
This is an important step, as the whole idea of this delayed binge is to consider its validity and which part of you is asking to engage in the behavior. Is it your stomach rumbling and asking for food? Or is it a series of inappropriately wired neural connections that have grown to believe rapidly consuming food is the most efficient way to numb and deal with overwhelming emotions? Often, it’s the latter.
Minute 3
By Minute 3, the goal is to start thinking about how harmless this is. You’ve now delayed the binge a full two minutes, and nothing bad is happening. You’re ostensibly not in physical pain (at least, not from this) and your mood and emotions are responding accordingly. This is an extremely important realization to cement: the idea that this comes in waves and you are safe to wait. The binge is not an inevitability.
Importantly, this is not to invalidate the emotional turmoil you might be
experiencing right now. I recall nights where the urge to binge was so strong that killing myself seemed a more appropriate response, so that I could finally escape the pain and fear associated with these urges. Sometimes the urges would feel like my soul was leaving my body, and I needed to binge. So, the idea here is not to discount what you’re feeling but rather to properly contextualize it. Understand that the urges might
feel scary beyond belief, but they are not going to hurt you. You are safe right now.
Minute 4
Now shift to some loving kindness (metta) meditation. You are going to grant yourself love and radical self-compassion. As Dr. Kristin Neff teaches in Self-Compassion, there are three elements we want to focus on here: self-kindness, mindfulness, and common humanity. For self-kindness, use statements of compassion to emphasize self-care, such as “I’ve been doing an awesome job so far, and I’m staying super calm and in control.”
For mindfulness, return to some deep breaths and use a statement or two of objective mindful awareness, such as “I’m feeling a little bit of impatience but also some pride” (of course, keep this true to what you’re actually feeling). And then, finally, for common humanity, we just want some statement that reminds you of the greater picture, like “Binge-eating is a neurological condition that affects millions. Others are going through
this struggle too; I’m not alone.”
Minute 5
To finish the delayed bingeing, by Minute 5, we will implement the two-step process I refer to as “peaceful transitions” in 100 Days of Food Freedom. First, institute a state of “free mind” but letting your mind run rampant. For the next 20-30 seconds, your mind is free to be as “anti-meditation” as it wants, freely ruminating on thoughts, getting distracted without returning to the breath, etc. Then, return to the breath again and maintain a soft gaze (especially important if your eyes were closed prior to this), allowing yourself to peacefully transition back into normal life. This is also where you’ll decide whether to act on the urges or not.
Remember that, if you do choose to act on them, there’s nothing wrong with that. You’ve now taken a full 5 minutes to consider where these urges are coming from and whether you truly want to eat or not. This is a significantly more informed decision now than it would have been 5 minutes ago.
Conclusion
The final decision, as this delayed bingeing protocol ends, is whether to eat. This is something you get to decide, which is the most important point of it all. Nobody gets to tell you when to eat or stop eating. The decision comes from within, and these 5 detailed minutes of mindfulness and self-evaluation serve to help you make a completely informed decision here. The final question to ask yourself before determining whether or not to grab for food now is: Am I hungry for this?
Delayed bingeing allows for anyone struggling with binge-eating to reclaim some control, if only momentary, and realize the binge is not an inevitability. Binge-eating is often very different than “normal eating,” not only in the speed of consumption and lack of fullness cues, but also in the sense that it is primarily nudged on by psychological thought patterns that have led us astray. For example, maybe the thought is that “this current feeling is uncomfortable and the only way you can fix it is with your binge foods.”
Rarely is the thought something as grounded in reality as “an ice cream would be nice right now.” As such, taking the time to become intimately connected to these thoughts and truly sift through them to discover their underlying motivations is more important than you might ever realize.
Remember that this strategy can always be used when you need it, rendering it one of the most accessible therapeutic strategies in recovery. The binge is not an inevitability.
Your life is your story. Make it amazing.”
I hope you have enjoyed this guest post from Ari and found something useful in there for you. I personally have used this principle before bingeing many times in my recovery and it has helped me immensely.
See you next time xx