I will eat a whole packet of biscuits, is that normal? Food nosie

[ByNimbleOrca]

If there are sweets or something in the fridge I really like, I will eat them all in one sitting.

Packs of six pack crisps don't last more than two days, I can't stop eating biscuits and even savory food I will pick at it.

Is this normal or does everyone have to control themselves?

its funny because also these days people are far more accepting of others living different lives to their own and generally less rude about perceived imperfections.

maybe you’re just old fashioned? Living in the 90s but you haven’t realised. Wakey wakey boomer!

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The concept of “Wrong” is meaningless in this context.

A massive insulin spike means nothing important to a healthy person. This is orthorexic drama llama bullying. Stop making women feel bad for eating biscuits."
No @AquaPeer that is making excuses for why we have an obesity epidemic in this country.

Don’t be daft. An epidemic doesn’t need excuses. It is what it is.

I know what you mean OP. Visiting a friend, I opened one of the kitchen cupboards and found a selection of bars, Crunches, Mars, Twix etc.she is, and always has been, a slender creature. "Oh, those? I buy one every week and put them away in case I fancy one later and don't have to trek off just to buy one". No self control required, apparently. It would be impossible for a stash like that to exist in my house, I'd eat one, then the rest till they were gone. Someone sent me a text in the week, apparently research has found Labrador dogs -notorious overeaters - and overweight people have a similar gene that predisposes to overeating. I suspect I am half Labrador.

I agree. My mum says I was a greedy newborn so the doctor put me on a diet. Imagine that! Rationing breastfeeding.

I also had hyperemesis gravidarum, throughout my pregnancies.

I don't think it's sugar addiction for me - it's more that my body thinks food might be taken away at any time.

Despite the deprivation mindset and constant food noise I always was a low bmi until perimenopause.

Easy to judge others ("it's disgusting", "it's wrong") but you don't know what's in people's lives and in their past. Because of these attitudes therapy and effective help for overeating are difficult to come by. Remember that most people are trying their best most of the time.

I have done this, but I have also swung between both ends of a severe eating disorder for much of my life.

It took a long time to accept that it wasn't a failing of my willpower, it was a reaction to childhood trauma. I swung between intense guilt and being repulsed by myself, when I'd stop eating or would throw up after the little I had, to hoovering everything up like I was still little and there would be a chance there would be nothing left if I wasn't quick enough.

When I finally got therapy, the food noise just went away by itself after a few years. It cost £££ though, and so not everyone can have the luxury of the time or emotional head space to get over this.

I'm a healthy weight now, but I'd never judge a person for having this. It's very easy to pass it all off as just greed when it's usually an indicator of someone deeply suffering.

Yes, I totally understand! I can eat family bars of chocolate, entire trays if tiramisu, I go back and forth for ice cream. It’s an absolute nightmare, like something takes over and I’m in no control. It’s so much worse when I’m upset or stressed which is often as I am a full time carer for my ASD PDA child. My weight has soared and the only way to keep it off is extreme unhappiness by strict dieting and extreme food noise all day. My friend suggested Mounjaro and I was v nervous but I’m on day 2 and I just had an incredible insight yesterday into what life is like with no food noise. I hear you xxx

You’re judgemental, ignorant and lack empathy. Sadly very common these days.

What an irrelevant comment. Being accepting of others living different lives doesn’t change the fact that eating an entire packet of biscuits in one sitting is greedy and lacks self discipline.
I dont’t care if all you millennials/gen z ers want to be fat and unhealthy and then congratulate each other for being so strong and independent. But op asked if it was normal. And the answer is yes, these days it has been normalised. Sadly.

Highly processed junk food is designed to be addictive so people keep buying. Try reading the " Pleasure Trap" You only have to look at obesity epidemic to see you're not alone in this addiction.

Jesus Christ what a rude comment. 🤦‍♀️

@Sowhatistheendgame can you imagine having to exercise self control every waking moment of your life? While your brain is full of churning thoughts about what you could eat, what’s in the house, what your next meal is, what have you eaten so far…

Just endless distraction from the business of the day. Either you engage with it and get little else done as you are fully engaged in arguing with the food noise, or you let it go and get on with your day eating as and when you can without arguing about it- and put on weight.

Either it’s a full time job exercising self control, or you eat too much and put on weight. The middle ground is cycles of bingeing and restriction.

People who are considering going to turkey and their stomach surgically removed at a steep price, or their jaws wired shut (old school) are not simply lacking self control.

I’d eat a whole packet of Garibaldis in one day, which is why I only buy them about once a year.

As somebody who has nursed a dc through anorexia, the Kate Moss quote makes me feel sick.
But to address the OP's question - I used to have the same issue but since menopause it has gone away and I can happily eat one or two biscuits the forget them. Makes me wonder if hormones are a factor.

Sugar/fat addiction, food noise, compulsive eating... of course some people have real eating problems but most have jumped on the bandwagon to avoid being called greedy.

I think it's hard to comment on food noise because we all only know our own experience. I am naturally slim and definitely experience it, so I am resentful of people suggesting things are easy for me, but then I don't know how hard it may be for some people.

For me personally there is something around habit and unconscious thoughts on what is 'normal'. This applies to portions of everything really.

I eat crisps regularly but to me, a packet is a portion. I could easily eat 3 bags but I 'know' this is excessive so I don't. Occasionally I might eat 2. I would never contemplate eating 6 bags because in my mind this would be a complete no...I wouldn't even consider this given that a bag is a portion. I don't mean this in a judgy way at all OP...just trying to explain how it 'works' for me. Interestingly I could easily, and would want to, eat one of those big bags to myself, which is much more than a couple of individual packs. But I would generally restrict to half of it because a full one just feels wrong. I think psychologically though it feels more acceptable than individual bags because it's not portioned in the same way.

I don't buy biscuits regularly but I wouldn't want or feel the need to eat an entire packet of digestives so clearly things are easier for me than for you. I would want to eat half and would probably restrict myself to a third of a pack, which would take effort. I think it depends though. Having a couple of biscuits with a cup of tea at a friend's house is a portion for me and would feel enough and in my mind is the 'right' portion. Having a pack of biscuits available for a night on my own is a different thing but in my mind, 2 is still a portion, which is why I restrict it, even though I still eat way more than 2.

A portion of sausages for me is 2 sausages. That's what I had growing up. It would never have occurred to me that others think 4 sausages is a portion before I saw it on here. Same with more than 2 wheatabix, or eating 10 fish fingers!

Edited - reading this back it sounds like I don't have food noise. I would add that I'm always hungry. I couldn't and wouldn't ever miss a meal and am genuinely constantly looking forward to food. But mine is different...I will eat my sandwich at 11am and stagger my crisps and fruit a bit around a long lunchtime to mitigate that feeling, then eat dinner early...I wouldn't eat multiple packs of something in one go (if that makes sense).

I do. But then I don't have stuff like that in the house, so on the odd occasion I do buy it, I hoover the whole lot up in one go!

I can absolutely imagine that. It’s not easy. Life is not easy. Every day can be a struggle. But I don’t condone giving up and trying to normalise something that’s obviously unhealthy.

I used to binge eat processed crap like that. An entire six pack of crisps, a packet of biscuits, a multipack 4 pack of chocolate bars, etc. It’s an addiction. I hit a whopping 24 stones in weight in my mid 20s and felt awful, diagnosed with diabetes etc. It’s no way to live a life and will cause health problems.

I tried diets etc and would lose weight but it always came back, and more, because ai always reverted to binge eating the processed crap.

I finally found a “fix” which was not to buy it in the first place. I didn’t need to buy biscuits, so my self control was in the supermarket not to buy the stuff. Same with multipacks of crisps and chocolate bars. You’re only in the supermarket once or twice a week so you only need self control for a few minutes each week not to buy the crap. If it’s not in your kitchen, you don’t need self control the rest of the time!

In tandem with being a lot more active, I lost half my weight and reversed the diabetes. Not buying the crap in the first place really was the answer for me. Now I have better self control, so can buy things again and I won’t stuff myself with them, but I still don’t buy multipacks nor big packets of biscuits as a precaution. I’ll buy single chocolate bars and crisps, and the smallest packs of biscuits so that my intake will be limited when I get an urge. If I only buy one small pack of biscuits and that’s all I have in the house, if my self control fails, I’m limited to how many I can have as I know I have to leave some in the packet for visitors. If I’d bought two packs, I wouldn’t feel the need to leave some as there’d be another packet!

Better to have self control not to buy the crap in the first place rather than have it sat on the kitchen shelf and relying on self control to leave it there.

...takes cocaine and smokes like a chimney

I think this comes down to personality too. I’m an all or nothing person, so if I start eating crisps or chocolate or biscuits, I find it almost impossible to stop until it’s all gone.

I’ve worked really hard over the years to limit my intake, a bit like the poster who said their weight is important to them - I can relate due to an unhealthy obsession created by my mother.

We all have our vices. I guess yours matters if it is making you feel unhappy. If that is the case, you need to stop buying it. The less you have the less you want, in my experience.

Binge eating is a recognised eating disorder so I am baffled why anyone is getting pedantic about NOT wanting to binge eat is another form of an eating disorder?

No I don’t want to be overweight (I used to be) so I have to moderate what I eat. I used to binge eat. I am happier and healthier when I don’t binge eat. I don’t have an ED and I’m not promoting one by telling people binge eating or restricted eating is normal. Moderating intake is not a miserable existence if it’s extending your life span

The OP has literally asked is what she is doing with her eating is normal. People are answering with what their own normal is and then other posters are attacking them for being pious or liars or greedy.

This. The orthorexics on the thread would do well to reflect on all the things they’ve missed out on in life by obsessively self controlling. All the other things that could’ve been achieved and experienced in that time.

this is not a healthy mindset and who can say it’s better to have a healthy body than a healthy mind?

The aim is to have both; and those people don’t spend time thinking about greed and judging others, and manage to treat themselves to a packet of biscuits if they want them without spiralling into some UPF/ diabetes/ obesity anxiety.

What an appalling thing to say. Hope it made you feel better.