I have found that most people with food issues, no matter whether its bulimia, anorexia, binging, or anything in between, have the same personality trait in common: they need immediate gratification.
Ok, I can’t take credit for figuring that out on my own, my counselor shared that little pearl with me, but ever since he said it, its become very obvious to me, especially within myself.
Take food: those of us with eating issues always look at the “normies” and think how can they eat that and not think about it? Or not plan everything? or obsess? or count? I dont get how food isnt a big deal to them.
It’s because food isn’t filling a void for them. It’s not a I MUST HAVE THAT NOW kind of thing. To normies, hunger is a gentle nudge saying “hey, you are low on fuel, you should probably eat soon,” and they go about their merry way until its convenient to eat.
To people with food issues, hunger is either a screaming alarm telling you that if you dont eat right now and fill this void you aren’t going to be able to think about anything else until its taken care of, or a big high five saying, “great job, you are being strong, keep it up.” Either way, that stupid little hunger cue (which if you have ever had a past in binging, you know its not even hunger, simply not being full is enough to send you into a anxious food spiral.)
Its all about immediate gratification. People with food issues use food to fill some void, and when the slightest hint of a trigger arises, you need to fix it NOW.
THAT’S how you know if you have issues with food. If you need food so intensly at any given moment, out of no where, whether you are hungry, anxious, sad, lonely, happy- anything, and you cant think about anything else until you get it (or deprive yourself of it, in an anorexic’s case) you are abusing food. Its like a drug fix- you cant think of anything else until you get that hit.
It took me a while to figure out how to tell when I was genuinely hungry or not. I was always scared of being hungry, and at first I thought it was because I didnt want to engage in restriction patterns like I used to before bulimia put me in a choke hold (I dappled in starvation, but was never very good at it) but I later realized that was a lie I told myself to rationalize continueing to abuse food. I was actually scared of getting hungry because I would get anxious, and nervous, and I needed my fix. Eventually, with a lot of white knuckling I got through it, got used to it, and figured out my REAL hunger cues as opposed to my anxious hunger cues.
I discovered its ok to be hungry. I’m actually hungry right now but wanted to finish this post first. That’s not restricting, its not starving and as long as Im not about to pass out, its perfectly healthy. I don’t use food to fill voids anymore.
Except for the one that’s in my stomach, so I’m going to go eat now.