Patterns of eating disorder eating

Hi!

I was just wondering if any other ED recoverers have this problem and how they over come it.

I am used to only eating a certain amount of foods, only eating at certain times, and only allowing myself a certain number of times to eat in the day. My day revolves around these times. Its a routine. I want to break free from it. I am scared though (for irrational reasons!). Its like I love food so much (funny eh), that I concentrate on it so much.

At the moment, I am eating well-3 meals and 2/3 snacks. But I am very rigid about it. I want to eat three meals and snacks of my leisure. I dont want my day to revolve around my food anymore. However, I feel out of control when I do break this routine and get confused about when to eat etc.., so I run back to the routine. But its a real problem and I want to go through it and get over it.

So any advice on how to EAT MEALS AND SNACKS FREELY. Does it just take practice?Practice of eating good meals at different times. Practice of eating different amounts and types of food?Do I need to fill my life with things so I am not focusing on food?

Any advice or similiar experiences or "routines" of eating that inhibit life.

calorifically - what are you taking in?

I used to be exactly like this in the years following my eating disorder and recovery. I still sometimes prefer to have my routine and set times/foods for eating but I've gotten sooooo much better about being flexible and not needing to have such strict control over when/what I eat. Really I think it just takes time and practice--I didn't do anything special to help break away from this issue but try to live a normal life an get out there and do things and spend time with friends and family, which inevitably meant encountering situations where I wasn't able to eat on a strict schedule. At first it was really hard but each time it got easier and easier, and now I'm as close as I've ever been to "free eating" since my ed.

This sounds a lot like the situation I'm currently in right now. :-/

Taking in around 2500 a day-i dont count strictly.but i do count carbs, protein, veg, dairy, fats etc. I try to get in all groups. I just hate thinking about food and having it run my day. I want to be able to live my life, do what I want, eat when I need and want to and what I need and want to, and then get on with my life. I also dont want to feel out of control for doing this and be able to maintain (well gain in my case) weight while doing this.

I tried it today and ED is screaming at me. Im sitting down typing rather than exercising, im not that hungry for dinner but I know Ill eat it anyway, im going to wait for my sis to come home before i eat, so we can have dinner together. Jeez this is hard.

From my experience with my ed - which was similar to yours (life became only food, thinking, planning all the time) you need to A: eat more.... i know you are eating the gain amount.. but only barely. the reason you are thinking so much about food is because thats the way the body is programmed to work after starvation. all the time when will the next meal be here, what will it be. the number one job of the body will be to restore health and it will drive you nuts til it does.

i remember i couldnt concentrate on books when i was starving. but i would skim my eyes over the page of a novel and if there was one mention of  anything food related, my brain would snap it up and i would be able to concentrate that bit. when i was eating 2500 i was still fixated on food.

you actually need to eat a calorific amount the makes the urgency for food less. try eating 3000. basically you are trying to make yourself sick of food.... NOT MAKE YOURSELF SICK. but its a bit like when you hear a song you love. if you listen to it over and over, your desire to hear it will disappear fast!

try eating what you want to eat. not wat you "should" eat.... this feeling will pass. but you have to be fair to your body. make sure you give it enough to gain and repair

and if you are gaining you shouldnt be exercising. or else start eating 3000-3500

I have this issue as well. I don't need to gain weight anymore, but I still hate thinking about food, so I eat the same thing everyday at pretty much the same time. I think it's about learning how to trust food again and get into a routine before diving in and being fully relaxed about it. Best of luck!

I would suggest googling "intuitive eating"--It provides you with an alternative to compulsive calorie counting.  I'd suggest it to anyone, really.  They have some really good principles to live by.

Oh my god. So many of you described very similar things to what I went through!

So many people fixate on HOW they should eat, despite the fact that all they want to do is NOT think about food and do the OPPOSITE to what their bodies tell them to!

Fidget and Lena123 give some great advice - Fidget makes a good point about making yourself get “ sick” of food.

And LOL - FIDGET - I can totally relate to not being able to focus on reading, and to skim pages but to immediately focus on anything food related.

For example, I love dark chocolate. I also love cashew balls and other healthy/ calorie dense “ treat” type foods. So, I learnt to first RECOGNIZE when I feel like eating a particular food, and eat it when I want it.

Even when I LET myself have a treat, at first I would plan it, for instance, I would buy dark chocolate to have while desperate house wives was on at night: however, by the time the show was on, I never felt like chocolate and thinking and planning to HAVE the chocolate only caused me to think about good more then I needed to - and my body rebelled against having to think about food too much!

So I have recently learnt to just have what I feel like when my body tells me it wants it. It is actually really hard to do at first. Learning to actually know what you body feels like is the first thing; actually giving your body what it wants is another step!

As you start to eat more, and as you start to experience the foods you want when you feel like them you should start to lose the desire to plan things.

The general rigidness and inability to very your routine is simply a habit you need to break. You take this day by day, by challenging your self one step at a time, and in a realistic way; it is not realistic for most people to be able to go from HAVING to follow a routine and be in control, to just eating what they want then they want it, and to not obsess or think too much about food. That is UNREALTSIC!

Set your self small, realistic goals. For example, try to figure out what it is that you enjoy doing. Reading/ reading magazines? Surfing the net on a particular subject (other then food! LOL)

Your first goal could be to try to figure out ways to occupy yourself and keep yourself busy in ways that you enjoy. As you become better at this, you could add another goal, such as to have ONE meal a day based on when you feel hungry, and then once you feel hungry, you can try to have the meal you feel like. Than you can go back to your normal routine.

Your problem is VERY COMMON - SO MANY people who have experience eating disorders obsess about food and their lives revolve around it.

It is inevitable that you will continue to think about food - any one who has experienced an eating disorder has been preoccupied with food - you cannot change your past therefore you are naturally going to continue to think about food a lot.

One last tip; try to not focus on how you wish you could STOP thinking about food. Instead, I find it helps to ACCEPT that I will think about food more then I want to, and to just continue my day finding things I enjoy doing and actively doing NON food things.

Thinking about NOT thinking about food does not help. Lol.

I am happy to say that you CAN break free of this cycle - I did it so you can do it too, if you take small steps.

yeah personaltrainer gives good advice there. i was the same. even when i planned to allow myself something i loved - the spontanaiety (sp?) of food was gone.

i actually felt such grief when i realised that. i always thought if i just got my cals up everything would normalise. but it didnt. and i felt such sadness that i had lost the relationship with food and all that relationship entails, Christmas for example, family, friends. all these wonderful things which often include food, were now a preplanned chore. not to be enjoyed at all. and it broke my heart.

so really, do your best at having what you want WHEN you want it. and the feeling will pass. but you'll have to work at it

Another tip I have - don’t act defeated, like your dealing with an unfair situation that is worse then other people’s lives.

Often, people in your position start to resent other people who can just eat when their hungry and not think about food as much as we do. Remember, that every one has their own problems, and our lives can be just as wonderful as theirs! We are at no disadvantage. Every one has their own problems that affect their lives and make their lives suck just as much when we battle our issues with food.

Acting like your life cannot be as fulfilling as other peoples lives because of your food obsession can make you lack motivation to be proactive and work on fixing your problems.

I also want to retorate one important point; it is great to learn to allow your self treats. I am only just learning to do this in a way that works!

I have found that people like us DEFINITLY automatically rebel against most plans! Some people CAN make a plan to eat a specific treat and then stick to it and feel fine, however, these people do not have the food obsession we do. Therefore, for us, I have a really good tip that has worked for me in regards to planning food:

I have all my favorite things in the house. For example, I eat a lot of raw food, so a grilled cheese sandwich is a real treat for me, so is raw organic chocolate, nut balls and things I do not normally eat in large amounts. (okay, apart from the chocolate lol!)

After spending many months trying to work out how to just eat what I want when I want it - I have just brought all the foods I know I love, and given myself permission to have them when I feel like them.

Having ALL the favorite foods has worked. Only having one or two favorite things that I would “ plan” to have did not work.

So, have a variety of your favorite things so you have enough choice to chose something random that you do not plan to have.

Good luck!

I used to exhibit the same behavior as you. I would only eat certain/specific things for breakfast & lunch, I basically alternated between a few choices (school was partly the cause of this, since there's only so much you can bring to school for lunch that will hold together and not spoil). but then I started "branching out", so to speak.

I used to plan very strictly and make myself stick to it. but now I make a rough plan (a suggestion by my nutritionist), and I'm much more open to change. For example, if I planned to eat a granola bar, but I'd rather have a banana with nutella, then I'll eat the banana instead without feeling like I "messed up" or ruined my plan.

Also, I do seem to have a slight routine when eating, but it's not purposely. I just tend to get hungry at the same times daily. My best advice would be to LISTEN TO YOUR BODY. If it's hungry, don't ignore or dismiss it, and listen to your wants (as well as health needs, obviously). Don't eat something just because you feel like you should. I'd say, if you're planning out your meals & snacks, you should take a day off from that (I don't mean to not keep track of your calories, but instead of having a pre-set plan you'll be able to choose what you want to eat when you want it, and it'll be more intuitive).

Really, communicating & listening to your own body is a universal rule in both weight loss and gain, and it's what people seem to struggle the most with.

Yep, it's the same here, it's like a plan my day according to my meals, not plan my meals according to my day.. It's like I "look forward" to eating, but then I hate overeating and stuff, and I'm always worried about overstepping my kcals...

I would also LOVE to break this pattern, but yeh you're not alone, and it is a part of an ED.

It just takes time.  I was the same way with food.  What I would eat and when I would eat were almost rituals. EVERYTHING i did was planned so as not to interrupt my meal times or what food i would eat.  I would freak out if I had a meeting at work that would cut into one of the times or I knew something was going to interfere with when or what I ate.  I felt like a slave.  I did finally get over it after a few months of making small changes.  Trying to change it all at once was too much.  I just slowly altered times and meals until they just happened whenever, not at a specified time.

OMG I felt so weird and alone when I thought this way, it feels good to know that other people have also dealt with these feelings and managed to improve things

But OMG - the whole planning my day according to my meals is freaky to hear coming from other people!

I would constantly think about how my day would impact on my meals/meal times/ food/ etc. AGH it was torture! The very thing that you both to waste your time thinking about is the thing that is destroying you - SO frustrating to go through.

I am happy to say that although I accept I cannot forget and occasionally battle days like that - things are constantly improving so it is definitely possible for things to get much better!

Honestly though, it was just crazy how I would plan my life around when I would bl00dy eat!

Oh gosh! im not alone!! its so annoying to be around people who are happy having a conversation with someone they bump into on the way to lunch whilst i am panicking over maybe eating lunch 10 minutes later, or being angry at someone for calling me when im about to have breakfast!. The food will always be there, the conversatio or the person you bump into-wont!. Nothing bad will happen from eating a little later or earlier. Im only settling into these facts now as I read this thread and write this reply.

Its different though when Im alone. When I dont have any plans, its harder to see the reality of life being more important than food plans then. Practice is what I need. Ill make it happen! Still nice to know Im not alone-makes me feel less silly!

Oh god - I could get SO ANGRY if some one rang me when I was about to eat a meal or snack - I looked really forward to eating, which was also due to the lack of other things in my life, so I tended to really look forward to meals, to the point where I was not able to wait until I was truly hungry; I was not “ NOT” hungry, but my body had not reached the point where it would tell me it needed the food. I just waited a couple of hours and if I was feeling especially bored or uncomfortable with a particular feeling, then I could just want to eat.

When I was about to eat I got an anxious and exited feeling because I truly looked forward to eating and if some one rang I was always irritable, telling them that I could not talk because is as eating; frankly, I want to enjoy my food and I couldn’t give a poo about them at that moment. I wanted to eat, not talk about stupid things lol.

I am not really like that now - if I am that hungry I just start eating regardless if I am around people of if some one calls.