4 Ways to Gain Control Over Your Binge Eating!

Even the best of us break down from time to time and succumb to our craving for that slice of cake or that bag of chips. This sort of sabotage of your weight loss and fitness plan, though, can be overcome if you simply plan ahead. The guidelines issued here should be useful to you in overcoming foolish eating behavior that sets back your fitness and weight loss program:

Write it Down

Did you know that at the Center for Behavioral Medicine in Chicago they discovered that if you simply keep a written record of what you eat every day you'll have a tendency to control what you eat better. Frankly, most people don't want to suffer the shame and guilt of writing down all that junk food they would normally eat.

Getting yourself an accountability partner is a great way to enhance the effectiveness of this approach. Find a friend or co-worker that is also trying to lose some weight e-mail them every day what you eat. Not only will the responsibility of reporting to someone else help you stop binge eating, but their advice can help you notice certain eating patterns you are going through.

Immunize Yourself from the Desire for Seconds

Rich, sweet pastries, fried foods and sweet adult beverages - it's so easy to binge on these foods. Nobody's suggesting that you can never eat any of the foods you love, but they can't be a regular part of your diet.

Don't try to avoid these foods all the time, but try to keep eating them under control by eating a low-calorie healthy food like an apple first, to help you feel more full. This will help you stop eating your favorite dessert after just a single helping.

Give Yourself a Time-out

Emotional issues such as boredom, anxiety and stress are frequently the underlying cause of overeating. This sort of emotional eating really isn't all that uncommon. This approach, by giving yourself a "time out" before sitting down to eat, is an excellent way to bring binge eating under control.

Simply stop and wait for five minutes the next time you're in a situation where you might make an irresponsible eating situation, like in front of the door to any fast-food restaurant, or a pizza joint. There are plenty of alte
ate activities you can find to do for those few moments - it's not necessary that you actually stand there for five minutes. Take a walk, talk to a friend on the phone, read a book, anything that will change your focus. If you no longer feel the urge to eat after 5 minutes, you've just saved yourself from emotional eating. Good job!

Relax!

A great deal of overeating is the result of emotional situations, especially stress. It's a fact - when confronted with stress, many people automatically reach for food, usually junk food. Stress can be relieved, and responses to stress can be managed. Plus, studies show that a stress-related chemical called cortisol actually causes our bodies to store more fat.

There are many ways to relieve stress. Most reading, for instance, can be quite relaxing, and there's a host of physical activities, like fishing and hiking, that can also help relieve stress. If you find yourself walking to the kitchen just to grab "a small snack" or "something sweet," its already over. Eating as a response to stress is a common enough problem, but once you determine to lose weight and get fit, you've got to change that particular response to something a little less hazardous to your plans. There are other things you can do as alte
ative to eating as a response to stress, of course - you're not bound by the suggestions here. The important thing is that you're comfortable, and that whatever you do, it relieves the stress you're experiencing.

If you're like most people, you put a lot of effort into your weight loss and fitness program, and consistent overeating can really jeopardize that. The 4 tips presented here will help you to overcome binge eating, which in turn will help you to see some results of your fitness and weight loss program!