How to overcome the urge to binge eat: 8 practical tips

Eating is an essential activity that provides us with great doses of pleasure, satisfaction and happiness, however, some people They can develop a negative relationship with food and everything that surrounds the field of daily eating throughout their lives. For example, this is seen in the tendency to binge eat on a regular basis.

This maladaptive way of relating to food sometimes leads to eating disorders, and these can be varied and manifest in different ways depending on the psychological problems that each person may present person. But even if the individual has not reached the point of developing these types of pathologies, this is a significant problem that should not be overlooked. Therefore, here we will see several tips on how to overcome the urge to binge eat in daily life.

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Tips to combat the urge to binge eat

Luckily for people who suffer from it, there are a series of tips and behavioral or psychological guidelines that we can continue to avoid these binges and overcome the desire, sometimes irrepressible to eat compulsively and without control.

1. Identify if there is an Eating Disorder

The first thing to overcome the desire to binge eat is to identify, assess and analyze if our problem has its origin in an eating disorder. That is, to establish if we should try to solve the problem for ourselves at first, or if we need help as soon as possible.

Eating disorders (TCA) are maladaptive pathologies that are reflected in a person's eating habits and They usually affect intensely both physically and psychologically, endangering the person's life in the most severe cases. serious.

That is why whether we believe we have an eating disorder or have been diagnosed with it, We must go to the consultation of a mental health professional as soon as possible to treat it in the shortest possible time.

• You may be interested in: "Keys to understanding eating disorders"

2. Avoid restrictive diets

Any qualified nutritionist will strongly recommend avoiding restrictive diets or diets miracle who claim that it is possible to lose weight in a short time and consuming little food for a short period of time time.

These diets tend to have a counterproductive effect on the body called the rebound effect., consisting of the fact that after having followed the diet, the person returns to their previous weight in a short time, even being able to overcome it, due to accumulated stress.

In order not to make misleading diets, it is highly recommended to consult a dietitian or nutritionist who will prepare a healthy, balanced, personalized diet based on science.

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3. Pre-cook what we eat

Another piece of advice that we can follow is to cook most of what we eat during the week, so we can organize our weekly diet in time and ensure that our diet is healthy and balanced.

The other reason why it is advisable to cook what we eat ahead of time is to have complete meals available while we are working so that we can overcome the temptation to eat less healthy processed food.

4. Practice Mindful Eating

Just as Mindfulness helps us to reconnect with our body and mind, the Mindful Eating It is a philosophy of life that serves to get in touch with and be aware of all the bodily and psychological processes in which eating behavior is involved.

In short, Mindful Eating helps us to pay attention in the here and now to our bodily sensations with food, both hunger and satiety and allows us to eat being aware of the process.

One of the main objectives of this technique is to carry out those healthy eating habits and learn to eat exactly what we need in the best possible way.

5. Apply self-observation

Self-observation applied to eating behavior consists of analyzing whether we eat out of hunger or if we do it to experience emotional hunger (eating without hunger due to cases of anxiety or unpleasant emotions).

Emotional hunger aims to fill an emotional void with food compulsively, and it is a problem that should be treated by a professional psychologist specializing in behavior food.

• You may be interested in: "How to make an emotions diary, step by step and with examples"

6. Apply a limit of calories to eat in the day

Applying a calorie limit to eat during the day can also help us enter into a dynamic to eat only what we need and not to exceed or fall into the temptation of giving ourselves Binge.

Likewise, this fixed daily calorie limit must be realistic with our needs, that is, it must not be too high or too low. On the other hand, it must be taken into account that in specific cases we should break those self-imposed rules, not take them so seriously so that they become an obsession, giving us some whim (for example, once every two weeks).

7. Review feeding routines

It is also convenient to do a personal review of eating routines that are unhealthy; for example, the habit of snacking on something between leaving work and dinner or eating late at night.

By reviewing these unhealthy habits we will be aware of them and we will be able to modify them for other healthier and more positive habits and not repeat mistakes over and over again by simple inertia.

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8. Avoid unhealthy foods

Avoiding foods with a lot of refined sugars will help us eat healthier and avoid the need to eat more due to the nutritional poverty of ultra-processed foods.

The truth is these foods are full of components that generate artificial hunger, with the consequent need to eat at all hours and the risk they pose to health.

Some of the main foods that we should avoid are industrial pastries, industrial chips, sugary foods or excessive chemicals, and carbonated drinks.