The fact is that many people around the world (especially Americans) are obsessed with weight and spend more than $60 billion a year on diets and dietary products.
The media continually calls out to us: We have an epidemic of obesity! About two thirds of Americans are overweight or obese according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Many of the millions of heavy people suffer from an eating disorder which has the highest mortality rate of any diagnosis of mental health, including depression. Binge eating, the most common feeding disorder in the U.S., affects over 25 million people. Recently, a lot of press attention has been given to this diagnosis because the American Psychiatric Association recommends that it be considered a separate, distinct eating disorder, as are bulimia and anorexia.
Even though not all obese people are compulsive overeaters, experts believe that about 75 percent of overeating is emotional eating - using food to deal with emotions. Even though everybody turns to food for warmth on occasion, such as hot soup or hot chocolate on a cold winter night, or something nice to snack on after a battle with your husband, the compulsive overeater turns to food as the primary means of coping with daily tension, anxiety and other unpleasant feelings. We are in a hunger for emotion.
Some of us feed from an inner void, resulting in some of us becoming addicted to sugar and refined carbohydrates. Compulsive eating starts as an attempt to alleviate emotional pain, but it ends up making us feel even worse.
I have consulted with compulsive overeaters and binge eaters for more than 20 years as a licensed professional clinical counselor. I am also a (recovered) sugar junkie and have spent many years quenching emotions by shooting down my throat ice cream or cookies. Food was the glue which held me together.
Some overweight people just eat a little too much. Nevertheless, emotional eaters like me use food as a fix: I manipulated food just like an addict used booze, starving myself in an attempt to fill a void inside. However, there isn't enough food on the planet for many of us to fill the gaping void within our hearts. I know...... I was trying.
I spent my time bingeing during my compulsive overeating days; hoarding and hiding food; making food my best friend; eating sneaks; taking pills to suppress my appetite; going to diet doctors; gaining and losing a gazillion pounds; trying different fad diets; hating myself; making and breaking numerous self-promises; and feeling helpless and hopeless. I ate frozen food that smelled like cardboard; I finished the food off the plates of my children; I retrieved food that had been thrown away; I stole the candy of my students and consumed it myself. I have expressed a lot of dishonesty about food, masquerading in public as the supreme dietitian and witnessing out - of-control bingeing in private.
For decades my conduct around food has been a closely guarded secret. But no more. After years of psychotherapy, following the Twelve Steps, and doing concentrated personal-growth research, I gained insight and understanding as to why at an early age I became an emotional eater and why compulsive overeating became such a cause in my life.
Luckily I've recovered from my binge eating disorder and the tools I've been using are presented in this book. I am candidly sharing my journey so that others can profit from my experiences.
A good number of us have a general, rationale feeling of what to eat, and there is no lack of ideas regarding this matter.
