To beg you for help on stopping binging

[Reallyfatandmiserable]

I’ve tried it all. Dieting, not dieting, hypnotherapy, not having food in the house, eating well. Last night after I ate FOUR cadburys chocolate yoghurts in a row I wondered if I could burn off the sweet taste buds in my tongue so that I just fucking stop. I’m addicted to sugar. It’s disgusting. I eat an obscene amount of it every day, I waste money on it, I’m ashamed every time I go into one of my local shops and wonder what they think of me. I have had blood tests and all of fine. I take magnesium tablets and it doesn’t change. I try adding cinnamon and it doesn’t work. I have a good diet most of the time, but I binge on chocolate every single day. I have told my GP and nothing. I contacted BEAT and they were useless. I told my counsellor and she mostly dismisses it.

I can’t do this any more. It’s ruining my life. I have ADHD and I presume this might be a response to that. I’ve been doing it since I was a child but it is out of control.

And PLEASE don’t just say things like ‘yo just stop eating it’. If you’ve never had a severe addiction then you don’t understand. And this is like an addiction. Smokers don’t quit smoking after being told to just stop, it doesn’t work like that, I wish to god it did. It’s an eating disorder I guess. I can’t cope.

Please, if you quit sugar, how did you do it? I can’t carry on like this.

I haven't read the thread, so apologies if I am repeating advice, but the ONLY thing that has helped me with a 30 year binge eating habit is cutting out sugar and UPF.

I would binge terribly on UP crisps and crackers and then binge on biscuits and chocolate as a sort of 'pudding'. Always late at night, always when everyone else was in bed.

It became my coping mechanism when life got difficult and I would binge a good few days a week, despite feeling disgusted with myself and also physically very uncomfortable.

At the start of the year after reading a couple of books - Why we Eat too much and Spoonfed - I realised that UPF were at the root of this, the reason why I couldn't stop once I started.

I now only have plain crisps in the house for the DC, which don't lead to a binge, oatcakes which are similarly OK and plain biscuits. Also dried fruit if I need something sweet

It is still a work in progress and I haven't lost any weight, however if I stop binging that will be a massive step forward for me.

Good luck @Reallyfatandmiserable it really is a miserable way to live, but understanding that it is not simply lack of will power which causes this but rather the addictive nature of UPF will help you feel more in control of the situation

Hi OP. I've suffered from binge eating since childhood. I'm 51 now...and ended up morbidly obese and miserable. Over the years I think I've tried everything possible to beat it. Including:
Calorie counting / restriction / nutrient & macro tracking (multiple times)
Therapy
Hypnosis / Hypnotherapy (twice)
Mindful eating
Keto / low carb
Eliminating sugar completely
Fasting
Overeaters Anonymous
Every single book ever recommended on Mumsnet (including Brain over Binge which was helpful for a while)
Exercising to try and control mood / bingeing
Ozempic
etc, etc, etc.
Some of these worked on a temporary basis, some were actually very damaging mentally and physically, but in the end I always ended up bingeing again, often worse than ever before. I absolutely know the anguish you describe.

This is my experience, and I hope this will help you. There are two things that I can recommend.

1 - Gillian Riley - eating less programme that a previous poster referenced. I did this in person and on-line and it definitely helped me for a good period of time. Interestingly her methods are rooted in her days as a stopping smoking practitioner....However I did have to keep coming back to this, and over time I fell back into old habits, but less so.
2 - Eliminating ultra processed foods from my diet. This has been my game changer. For the first time ever that urge to binge is completely gone for me. Every single other thing I ever tried involved supressing, managing or trying to 'accept' the urges. But no matter what I did, they were always there. I was just sometimes more in control of what I did with them than at other times. But I read the Ultra Processed People book (which again interestingly references the Allen Carr Stop Smoking book) and understood how Ultra Processed foods are designed to be addictive. It's the whole business model of the biggest industry on the planet - how to get us to eat more of their products. So the smell, colour, flavour, mouthfeel, texture etc. of your chocolate yoghurt will all be designed to be addictive and simply put, moreish. I gradually eliminated these foods, educated myself on what to look for and just avoided it. And the urge to binge has completely disappeared. I'm not supressing it, or distracting myself, or managing it. It's gone. Now I can't promise you it will be gone forever, but it's been gone for months and months now. I highly recommend the book, and I've linked below to some of the Zoe podcasts that you might find interesting. I wish you all the best. I hope you can find some peace with it all.
https://open.spotify.com/episode/3Tg5DnNWj7k00LgK1T8G3F
https://open.spotify.com/episode/5VSvk8JFw0Y15KZdDAupNr

@Bundlebee seems we have had similar experiences. Thank you for posting. I would love everyone to be aware of this combination as a way out of binge eating.

This isn't how sertraline works. Fluoxetine can increase extracellular dopamine (in rats), and theres some evidence that sertraline weakly inhibits dopamine reuptake (thereby leaving it in the extracellular space) but this is debated. No clinical trial of SSRIs demonstrates a positive impact on ADHD symptoms. The GP shouldn't be prescribing them to treat ADHD.

Go back to the GP. Tell them you want ADHD meds, not depression meds (unless you are clinically depressed also). Demand better treatment, the GP at best doesn't understand how SSRIs work, or how ADHD works. At worst is fobbing you off.

I could have written this and I totally get where you are coming from. I also have ADHD and struggle with sugar. The reason that we are like this is because our brains seek out dopamine . We do not produce as much as we should so we look for it from outside sources i. e sugar . The sugar is a quick fix but you reallt need to look for another way of getting dopamine. What do you like to do? something that makes you happy ? You need to find that and then do it every day. That will give you the dopamine hit that your body craves. Also do you find it worse if you have had a stressful day ? I find it worse when I have spent the day holding it together and masking my symptoms. I then crave a hit of dopamine which can be in the form of sugar is I don't go for a walk or exercise. I read recently that those with ADHD need at least an hours exercise per day to help with our symptoms

I suspect that you're having difficulty getting appropriate help because you're not very overweight so they're not taking you seriously.

Can I please ask if you give up upfs what does this include, does it include rice for example?

This is one of the most useful threads I've ever read on binge eating. Have been making notes!

Well you clearly don't have bing eating disorder. Well done.

No ordinary rice and pasta that you cook at home is not UPF. Look at the ingredients, if there's a long list and / or it contains anything you wouldn't have in your cupboard at home then it's indicative that it's an ultra processed food.

Apologies - I tried to quote @Sorrytomoan but failed!!!

I've ASD not ADHD. Don't do if you don't like the idea. This is something I've used and worked for me.

Stick a hairband on your wrist and ping it everytime you think about sweet food. Then carry on as you would have - eat the chocolate. When later you think about going for another one ping again and then do what you'd normally do.

You aren't trying to punish yourself just giving your brain a small negative stimuli to the thought of sugar.

I used a hairband with a metal bit as that provided the right level of 'sting' for me. But it's not about doing damage to your wrist and if you develop a bruise after a few days/week switch to the other wrist. Definitely don't try and repeatedly ping your wrist to make the thought go away, you just do it once then carry on. Its not meant to work overnight.

thank you everyone who has responded, sorry I haven’t managed to get back to everyone yet.

Oddly I feel like posting this and having a huge breakdown has had a tiny effect on me as I went into Tesco earlier and I didn’t get any chocolate. I’m going to try out a few of the ideas on here like the hair and snapping and counting and such starting now and look into the deeper stuff like better counselling and medication long term. I’m really hoping for change.

Sending you lots of compassion because I'm aware how debilitating and awful this can be and how there's so little support (and often also so little understanding available). I found the books the f*ck it diet, brain over binge and looking into other resources on intuitive eating incredibly healing and helpful. Completely healing in fact - now totally binge free after a horrid journey with eating disorders in various forms. Never could have imagined I would be. Hoping you can be kind to yourself with all this - it can be so difficult to deal with.

Just my personal experience by the way - hoping you can find something that works for you. Hugs x

I also used to have a huge sugar addiction. And it was a genuine addition because the more I ate, the more I needed. And I'd start hiding from people what I was eating and gobbling huge bags of sweets just to get my fix.

You have to see it for what it is. Like heroin. You can't just have a little bit of heroin. The only way to beat it is to get rid of it entirely. It's so weird but then you just don't crave it any more - it's the sugar making you crave more sugar. You won't feel like you're missing out once you've beat the habit. But you really can't just have a little bit!

The book that helped me was The Easy Way to Quit Sugar by Allen Carr. It's quite patronising and repetitive - but obviously it worked on me. I'm a year in now - I am at the stage where I can have sugar occasionally but i'm very conscious about how it immediately makes me want more.

You can genuinely do this. But view it as the drug that it is and go all in.

Would giving up sugar include fruit and stuff like white bread?

I never gave up fruit. I allowed myself natural sugars (but not fruit juice). But for the first 6-7 months I gave up bread, pasta, potatoes and rice to help me get over the addiction! I can have those now (but I do eat a lot less of them)

I've always really struggled to give up carbs! And restriction leads to bingeing for me!

I tried the Noom app and it completely changed my attitude to binge eating. I was very skeptical and refused to pay anything for the trial. Except even within that short time it really got me thinking differently. It was like it knew why I ate what I ate when I ate it. Was a huge convert. Not only lost the stone I wanted to but an extra 3/4 stone as well (still healthy weight range) not because I was dieting or starving myself but because I was eating healthily and only what my body told me it needed (yes sounds like complete nonsense but I truly listened and it stopped me binging). When I was premenstrual I still craved chocolate. So I had it because that's what my body said it needed. But I didn't overthetop binge. I just had maybe 6-8 chunks and that was enough. A life changing system for me to deal with my sugar addiction.

The beauty of Noom is you don't need to give up anything. It's a healthy eating way of life rather than a diet.

Sorry to hear you are struggling
Have you heard of Christopher Fairburns book? It's quite a dull read in places but I found it extremely helpful, especially the food diaries. I used to binge 6 nights out of 7 and honestly never thought I would be able to stop but following the advice in this book I have been able to get it down to maybe 2 binges a month, for nearly a year now.
The first step is to stop beating your self up, it sounds obvious but the more you make your self feel bad the more you will want to binge! You can get the book for under a fiver on Amazon, it might be worth a go. Its also availble free in my online library, maybe yours will have it too. Good luck with it x

sorry OP I don’t really have advice but your post has struck a chord with me; I have the urge to binge every single day. I prob only do it about once every couple of weeks and I go completely mental on that day eating anything and everything in sight including loads and loads of chocolate, sweets and cakes. I hate myself for doing and don’t know how to stop.
On ‘controlled’ days im extremely strict about what I eat - no UPF, no snacks, only carbs at breakfast, lean protein and plenty of fruit and veg. But, if I have one thing I shouldn’t it sets me off on a binge spiral eg one biscuit leads to the whole packet. So I don’t have anything like that.
I’m not overweight, I exercise lots and nobody knows about this disgusting secret because I hide the binging from everyone I even have a secret stash of chocs and sweets.
Im going read some of the literature recommended by others to see if it helps

Can you try semaglutide? It really worked for me. After 3 months on it (and 2 months off it) I can now control what I eat.

Ask for a referral to an eating disorder service for your binge-eating disorder. Your weight is irrelevant. You have a behavioural disorder and need help.

If you have this, then tell the GP you have BED.

Description of Binge Eating Disorder (BED) in ICD-11To align with the DSM classification of BED, ICD-11 also includes the condition as an eating disorder. Binge eating disorder is characterized by frequent, recurrent episodes of binge eating (ie. once a week or more over a period of several months). A binge eating episode is a distinct period of time during which the individual experiences a subjective loss of control over eating, eating notably more or differently than usual, and feels unable to stop eating or limit the type or amount of food eaten. Binge eating is experienced as very distressing and is often accompanied by negative emotions such as guilt or disgust. However, unlike in Bulimia Nervosa, binge eating episodes are not regularly followed by inappropriate compensatory behaviors aimed at preventing weight gain (ie. self-induced vomiting, misuse of laxatives or enemas, strenuous exercise)

Here are the NICE guidelines re what can be offered.

https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng69/ifp/chapter/Binge-eating-disorder#guided-self-help

Treating the ADHD could also help but if you don’t have the funds to go private, you could be waiting years for assessment and treatment.