Binge Eating

Spring Detox Marketing: Don’t Get Duped!

March 30, 2021 by Kerri Fullerton

A patient sent me the website to a cleanse that was recommended to her. The longer I was on the site the more frustrated I got.

Like most cleanses or detoxes, there’s a specially formulated concoction that you drink in lieu of eating food. This is the only thing to be consumed for a few days to a week (although some ‘allow’ you a ‘sensible’ meal once a day in addition to these pouches).

The claims are remarkable. Promises of weight loss (no shit, you’re starving yourself), promises of healthy (the quick changes in your labs are not permanent – they’re temporary just like the cleanse and accompanying weight loss).

What really got my goat this time was when they said “Kick start healthy eating habits, gain control over portion sizes and improve energy”.

Let’s review the cycle of restriction:

Starving your body will make you HYPERfocus on food. This is natural – it’s like if you weren’t able to breathe properly, it becomes difficult to focus on anything else. Or if you’re deprived of enough water your thirst will overcome you.
Under-eating sets you up for OVER-eating. Just like when you can finally breath again you will take DEEP breaths and breathe more heavily until your body believes that you have free access to air; when you eat again, you will be DRIVEN to eat HUGE amounts until your body feels safe that food is longer restricted.
That energy that they’re promising? It comes from your body having to produce cortisol to keep you going (cause you know, there’s no FOOD to do that). Our stress response will make us more alert because it’s getting us ready to escape danger. This is TEMPORARY access to the emergency fund. The trouble is, most of us are chronically OVER-stressed and need help reducing chronically high circulating cortisol. So yes, you may have some extra nervous energy but that’s not the same as being able to focus and be engaged positively in your life.

Look, I get the desire to shake off the winter blues and get back into something. In fact, I encourage it. But can we please find ways to re-engage with life and health promoting behaviours WITHOUT causing harm in the process?

The next Living Life As A Rebel group starts at the end of April. If you’re itching to ‘do’ something without getting caught in another diet cycle, then this may be just what you’re looking for. Register before April 12th to get Early Adopter bonuses!

Join the Rebellion

Stress Eating: how to handle the next day

December 11, 2020 by Kerri Fullerton

The stress eating from last night woke up in the middle of night, bloated with gas pains. My pyjama bottoms felt like they were digging into my swollen belly. There was no way to get comfortable.

It would’ve been easy to blame it all on the food. After all, I did have a take-out burger, some fries and about six Halloween candy bars. Much less than I would’ve eaten of the past, but still more than my body needed at the time.

My stress eating food choice — My Stress Eating choice: Fast food hamburger and french fries

But the story begins way before the stress eating started…

It’s been a long couple of weeks. Heck it’s been a long year lol

If you read my last blog you’ll know that my child was in self-isolation because of classmate testing positive for Covid-19.

Being that I work from home, thankfully, I didn’t have as much a routine change as others would. But I still had to adjust to another person in the house all day with a different schedule than mine. I’m tired.

Then the washing machine died. Add laundromat to the list. My hubby is very handy and took it apart to fix it…only to get sick himself. So now he’s home all day and my laundry room/pantry is filled with a disassembled washer. I’m more tired – my sick husband isn’t able to do his share of the load right now.

Finally, yesterday afternoon, while on a Zoom meeting with a patient, the power went out. Sigh. Hotspot computer to phone, carry on. And now it’s dark at 5pm; we have no heat; no way to cook supper; AND I was supposed to attend a virtual conference at 5pm.

So I asked the boys what they wanted for dinner. I messaged the conferenced organizers and told them that I wouldn’t be attending. Then I drove into town to hit the drive-thru of their choice. We ate by flashlight at the kitchen table. Then we retreated to bed with a down duvet, Netflix and the Halloween candy.

By this point, I’m exhausted. My ability to pivot with the changes is diminishing quickly. My reserves are almost gone.

And then it happened

That’s when it happens isn’t it? That’s when old coping strategies re-emerge. In the moment they feel easy and right even if they’re not in our best interest.

In intuitive eating we talk about attunement. This is about being able to hear our bodies needs and responding to them in a timely manner.

I’m in need of a tune up. And it was the bloat that woke me from my sleep that finally got my attention.

This morning as I reflect on the last couple of weeks I can identify some of the warning signals. These are like the gas light or the oil light on the dash of the car. Warnings that I need to tend to something that I’m perfectly capable of doing. My dashboard lights include: mindless social media scrolling; struggling with my body image; not feeling my hunger cues; waking in the night and having a harder time falling back to sleep; feeling the siren call of the scale; overeating or eating foods that I know don’t feel good physically.

When I don’t notice these warnings then I get the full on Check Engine light. This also happens when I see them and choose not to respond to them. The “this is now serious” light. This could look like waking with gas pains and bloat; pain; swelling; extreme fatigue; difficulty concentrating; overwhelming overwhelm (vs the ‘normal’ overwhelm). In the past, binge eating fell into this category.

Again, I have the opportunity to look at what needs adjusting, do the tune up and carry on. If I choose not to, then I get the “this car ain’t safe to drive” notices from my body: losing it on my family; melting down when I can’t find my hairbrush; inability to make decisions or plan my next step; anxiety or even complete shutdown where I cannot answer the phone, get out of bed or put on clothes. In the past, my ED behaviours showed up here.

My reflection today revealed a few missing warning signals: difficult body image and the scale calling to me has been going on for a few weeks; the mindless social media scrolling started a few days ago; yesterday I didn’t feel hunger once and maybe even the day before; finishing off with the dinner and snack choices of last night.

In the past, I wouldn’t have looked at this way.

Food guilt and body shame would’ve driven the reflection instead of self-compassion. I would’ve decided that clearly Halloween candy isn’t safe in the house (not acknowledging the Halloween candy has been safe for two months now). That I need to get my shit together. That would’ve included a kitchen purge and meal plan that didn’t include take-out and some sort of exercise plan to go with.

What I know now is that the stress eating is the last part of the story. The stress eating is simply what finally got my attention. It’s not about the food and it never was. Instead, it’s about what led up to me not being attuned. By either not being able to see my needs or not responding to my needs in a timely fashion.

Diet culture and the current health and wellness trends would have me believe that all of this can be solved with the right plan or pill; that all I need is a commitment and will power and I’ll be good to go.

Thankfully I’ve chosen to stop buying what they’re selling. I’m choosing to look at what’s been in the way of my ability to listen to and respond to my body signals. It’s time to cull my list of responsibilities and expectations again. It’s time to Delegate, Delay and Delete again. I need less stress and pressure right now, not more imposed under the guise of ‘health’. I need more compassion and less judgement.

Until next time,

Kerri

Looking for a new kind of plan? Registration for the next Living Life As A Rebel is now open. Learn more

Is Food the Answer to Your Mood?

January 15, 2019 by Kerri Fullerton

“I just need to get my weight down and my food under control. Then I’d feel better.”

Have you ever thought that? It would be shocking if you said no.

I’ve seen so many books, blogs, and posts claiming that if you want to take care of your mental health you need to take care of your diet.

While I won’t disagree that food can impact mood, I’d like to talk to you about how your mood impacts your food. And more importantly, how you can take care of it.

When I was about 12 years old I told my mom that I wanted to lose weight. I truly believed that if I could change how I looked then I could change how I felt. And who could blame me? Look at the message of every weight loss or fitness commercial. The before is sad and frumpy. The after is happy and confident.

My Mom didn’t want me to do anything crazy so she took me to see the doctor. It was the best of the options that she had at her disposal. The doctor proceeded to ask me what I wanted to weigh, and then told us that I didn’t need to lose weight. But if I was determined, then Weight Watchers was the way to go. It was then, as it is now, viewed as the ‘healthy way’ to lose weight (I’ll do a rant on that another time).

Off we went to the first meeting and weigh-in. I was already within my BMI range (again, another rant for another time). But that didn’t stop them from signing me up and helping me lose weight.

That was the beginning of my dieting cycle. From age 12 to age 30 I lost and gained 15, 20, 30 lbs, over and over again. Each time I lost, I gained a few more.

Now I don’t blame my mother or my doctor. They only did what they thought was best.

If they knew then what I know now, they would’ve referred me to a psychologist. Someone who would’ve helped me understand why I thought that my happiness and confidence would be found within how I looked. Maybe they would’ve had me read More Than A Body by Lindsay and Lexi Kite.

You see, I was struggling with anxiety, but nobody knew, me included. And the repeated failures at weight loss only added to my anxiety. I developed depression as well. I couldn’t understand my lack of will power. I developed binge eating disorder that progressed to bulimia. I didn’t tell a soul.

Here’s what I know now.

Food is very powerful at affecting mood. In fact, in can raise neurotransmitters like serotonin and dopamine. It can also decrease the stress hormone cortisol.

Lately this has been seen as a bad thing in the media. It’s been called “addiction” when in fact it’s not at all. To create the environment for addiction-like behaviours around food, first you must restrict. That’s worth repeating. In order to create the food addiction model in mice and humans, they must first RESTRICT the food.

My dieting created more food cravings.

Then to add insult to injury, being in a state of depression, anxiety and or stress, actually limits your ability to implement lifestyle change.

Research published in Basic Clinical Neuroscience last year showed that when we are in a state of stress, depression, and anxiety that our memory is diminished, our impulse control is decreased, it’s harder for us to plan, and we aren’t able to go with the flow as easily. All skills that are required to make lifestyle changes!

What can you do?

If this feels a little depressing and frustrating, I hear ya.

The good news is that there is a way out of the endless loop of hanging your hopes on the next big thing only to be left feeling like you failed again.

Step 1: Get a proper assessment done

I get it – you want to feel better. And yet very few doctors, nurses, naturopaths, dieticians, fitness trainers or nutritionists are going to first assess your ability to make the necessary changes.

Find someone who is going to assess your stress levels, and your mental health status. These pieces need to be addressed first, from a chemical perspective.

Does that mean that you have to go on meds? Of course not. There are wonderful herbs, amino acids, and other natural solutions available. Just be sure to seek out professional help – someone who has the training necessary to support this. Someone who won’t shy away from telling you that meds might actually be the best option right now.

You can find professionals around the world who have been trained in Intuitive Eating and understand the dangers of prescribing a diet by using this link here: https://www.intuitiveeating.org/certified-counselors/. Yep, I’m on there.

Step 2: Get Treatment

That sounds silly I know but you’d be surprised how many people don’t get treated once the problem is identified.

Whether it’s “just stress” or it’s depression and/or anxiety, it won’t go away with awareness alone.

Some don’t want treatment because they see it as a weakness. They ‘should’ be able to just figure it out. Please know that the chemistry is strong and real. Getting treatment makes you stronger not weaker.

Maybe you don’t want treatment because you think that it’s a forever thing. While sometimes that’s true, often the treatment is just a temporary thing. Like using a crutch with a broken leg. Once it’s healed, then you can start rehab and create a lifestyle that will support your healed self.

This is where the team approach can be very helpful. Maybe the psychologist identified the problem and you need the naturopath or the MD to help with the treatment side.

Step 3: Make lifestyle changes that will last

This is the step that we all want to start at. We want to exercise more and eat better.

When you have steps 1 & 2 in place, you’ll be in a position for step 3 to be successful.

Lifestyle changes need to be slow, steady and sustainable to have any lasting impact. And that’s what you really want right? You don’t a temporary solution. You’ve been there and done that.

It’s time to put the horse before the cart.

Dedicated to helping you find peace and power with your body,

Dr. Kerri

P.S. If you’d like to chat, book a connection call. It’s free and there’s no pressure. If I can’t help, I probably know someone who can.

What my food cravings were trying to tell me

April 5, 2018 by Kerri Fullerton

All of my life I’ve felt like I had demons in my head telling me to eat. Those demons were my food cravings.

Each and every day they were a reminder that I couldn’t be trusted with food.

When I’d finally give in, I’d eat to excess and feel awful. Physically I’d be stuffed and bloated. Emotionally I’d be so ashamed.

Monday morning was my reset. The day that I’d get control.

Except that the control only lasted a few days at best. Often I’d be back into the food by Monday afternoon.

So how did that change for me? Why is this no longer my normal?

It changed when I stopped seeing my cravings as these awful demons, and started to see them as compassionate confidents.

I realized that my cravings for foods that didn’t serve me, but actually harmed me, must have a purpose. Otherwise, why would they still be there?

Think about it. Why would I continue to engage in a behaviour that didn’t give me some kind of benefit? That doesn’t make sense.

At first, I acted like a rebellious teenager. Even though I’d realized that the food cravings were a compassionate voice, I’d still yell and rebel when those voices tried to guide me. I’d push them away and act out (usually by restricting my food severely or by overeating).

Until one day, after I’d overeaten, I sat there bloated and uncomfortable and ashamed, I didn’t want to do this anymore. So I said “OK crazy food brain – what is it that you’re trying to tell me?”.

What I heard was that I was tired. Or overwhelmed. Or scared.

Each time I got a different message with the same theme.

I needed to be nurtured. I needed to be comforted. I needed to feel loved.

Sometimes it was something leading up to the cravings. Often for me it was lack of sleep or an over-scheduled life.

Other times it was something that was coming up. A presentation. An event.

No matter what the cause, it became clear that my food cravings were me trying to take care of myself.

That was hard pill to swallow.

It was easier to make it the foods fault. To tell myself that I was a food addict or that it was these deceitful food companies putting addictive ingredients in there.

Looking within is a lot more uncomfortable. And it’s worth every moment of discomfort.

Now when I have a food craving, I have choices.

I can eat some of what I’m craving. I can do it sanely. I can do it moderately.

And when enjoying that bit of food doesn’t satisfy, then I can see the continued food craving as a gift.

It means that my stress has surpassed my ability to cope with it.

It means that something needs my attention.

And just like when a baby starts to cry we go down the list “Hungry? Wet? Dirty? Tired?” I too can go down my list.

Am I getting enough sleep? Am I getting enough rest? Am I moving my body enough? Am I acknowledging and dealing with my feelings?

Once the real reason for the food cravings is unveiled, they go away. Just like that.

P.S. Watch the video on YouTube for more Food Cravings goodness

I am celebrating 8 years of being purge free!

October 11, 2017 by Kerri Fullerton

That’s incredible to me. What blows my mind is that I didn’t even realize that I had an anniversary to celebrate because being purge free is my new normal.

9 years ago my son was born. 8 years ago we were leaving his cake smashing photo session to celebrate his first birthday and I was at one of the lowest points of my life. My binging had gotten out of control in the year after he was born. The lack of sleep, the financial concerns around being self-employed and having staff and other practitioners counting on me, this little person that relied entirely on me to survive…it was all too much.

My cravings were huge, my self-confidence was in the basement, and my shame was skyrocketing. I was a naturopathic doctor – I ‘should’ be able to lose the baby weight and get my body back, I ‘should’ be eating perfectly healthy because I was responsible for the health of this other person, I ‘should’ be a role-model for all of my patients and colleagues, I ‘should’ be loving every minute of being a Mom – it had taken me two years to get pregnant, how could I complain?

I was at war with myself every day. Desperately trying to stay above water – to put a smile on my face, look after my patients and love motherhood. Desperately trying to keep myself out of the food and yet every day, sometimes multiple times a day, I would eat HUGE amounts of food as fast as I could so that nobody would know. I would go to drive-thru’s and order enough food to feed a meeting and scarf it back in the car, by myself, and then get rid of the wrappers. Only eating ‘healthy’ food in front of others or small ‘reasonably healthy’ treats. It was physically painful to eat that much food. And when I couldn’t take it, I would throw it up. Sometimes I would end up back in the food even after that.

And who could I talk to? I was the health professional. I felt like I was trapped in my own personal hell. Knowing that I needed someone like me to help me out and having too much shame to reach for it.

After my son’s cake smashing we were driving to the cottage to celebrate with the family. I broke down. My husband knows my history. He saw me unravelling before him. He had outright asked me if I was throwing up and I had lied. That day in the truck I told him what I had done. He was so angry with me. Lying was going too far. So, I dug deep, put my shame aside and I reached out for help. I started seeing a counsellor that I had met. What was her solution? Just don’t eat the food. Really? Thanks. Hadn’t thought of that.

I learned an important lesson that day. It wasn’t the first time that I had asked for help. It also wasn’t the first time that a health professional had let me down. That they had not really understood the hell of binge eating and had ended up adding to my shame. They didn’t realize that they were only adding to my sense of shame and embarrassment. They were contributing to my isolation and withdrawal.

But this time I was NOT going down without a fight. I was NOT going to let her stop me from getting the help that I needed. The lesson I learned is that stepping out of shame and sharing the dark side is as much about picking the right audience as it is about the speech itself.

I found someone who had been where I was. I found someone who understood just how much food I could eat in one sitting and not cringe when I talked about it. I found someone who was compassionate and understanding. I found someone who understood that this had nothing to do with food or my body.

That was 8 years ago. As I write this it feels like yesterday and a lifetime ago all at the same time. I am so grateful that purge free living is my normal. I am so grateful to not have to carry that heavy burden of shame and guilt. I am so grateful to be that person for others now.

You are not alone. You will get free of this. You can be trusted.

XO
Kerri

Live Life. Love Food. Be Free.

Recovering from the Easter Bunny – After a Binge

April 20, 2017 by Kerri Fullerton

Food has been part of celebration, grief, and tradition for as long as human history dates back. It’s not going anywhere. So when holidays like Easter come around, things can get a bit stressful. The endless sweet treats delivered by the Easter Bunny fill many homes with unwanted temptation; so how did it go? If your answer is ‘not well’ you’re not alone. Problematic eating behaviours are far more common than we realize[i], and with the size of the diet and fitness industry, that’s no surprise. So many women are fighting their own personal battles with food, with their bodies, and with their thoughts. With all of this pressure on us, it’s important to know that there’s a way out. We don’t need to feel trapped or isolated by food anymore. It’s not a one shot deal, but I promise you, there is something at the other side of this.

Even from the young age of five or six I remember Halloween being a rough time for me. I was always so excited to gather all the candy, but absolutely mortified to find that it was going to be taken away. My candy was immediately rationed out and I was never allowed to just indulge and have what I wanted. But I couldn’t understand what was wrong with me; I wasn’t able to have just one or two candies like my parents wanted me to. For me, only having a couple was torture. So as I got older I learned not to eat what I wanted in front of other people. I would sneak food, eat in private or in hiding, then I would scrunch the wrappers up and get rid of the evidence. This was all to make sure I would never get caught eating.

I remember babysitting in my preteens and rummaging through the cupboards looking for anything I could get my hands on. The shame I felt by doing this was absolutely overwhelming. My first official diet was when I was 12. I was very uncomfortable and embarrassed in my body. I went to my mom and asked if she could help me. She was always on one diet or another, so she was the person to ask. She took me to the doctor and he couldn’t understand. I was already at a healthy weight, but because I insisted, he directed me to Weight Watchers. I know now that I was trying to manipulate a body that didn’t have anything wrong with it. I didn’t actually need to lose weight, but I believed that it would make me happier, and I believed it would bring me confidence. It developed my fear of getting fat, and I was willing to do just about anything. But it was the moment I began my first diet that my disordered eating began. That’s when the bulimia swept in. For years I was plagued with worry and fear. But gradually, as I was going through school to become a naturopathic doctor, I found another way.

Recently I marked an anniversary; I have not thrown up, on purpose, for 8 years now. Not that I never overeat, but bulimia is not part of my life anymore. Believe me, it really is attainable. Know that the feelings of shame, thoughts of negative body image and self-criticism are what binging is really about, not the food itself. So often we talk about food, but we don’t talk about this important stuff. We need to focus our energy on developing our self- respect, and dare I say, our self-love.

Here’s how you can overcome overeating:

Release – This first step is all about forgiveness. Every failure that you’ve had with dieting is weighing you down. It could be anything, a small slip up, a binge or the taste of a treat that throws you into a tailspin of heaviness. Every one of these perceived failures chips away at your confidence and prevents you from moving forward[ii]. Get focused and let go of the guilt and shame. You do this by finding acceptance. It’s not about condoning the negative food act, it’s about accepting that there will be slips ups and mistakes and not letting it have any power over you. Don’t make everything into such a big deal. Think about how heavy a glass of water is. It’s light when you pick it up and put it down, but how heavy does it get when you hold it for an hour. How heavy is it if you try to hold it for a week? Release the feelings of guilt and shame and unburden yourself. Once you have accepted that what happened, actually happened (you overate, you binged, whatever it is) it’s time to move on. Colouring, tai chi, meditation, yoga or really anything that lets you refocus, is a great way to begin to allow your body to release any negative feelings you have.

Realign – We need to understand what we’re actually looking for. You might think it’s weight loss, and the world is telling you it’s weight loss, but that’s probably not what it’s really about. We need to understand that health and weight are not the same, they may be related, but they are NOT the same. We all see the ads; the diet and fitness industry is constantly encouraging us to drop the weight: “Drop 20 pounds in 30 days!”. But what they don’t tell you is that almost all diet and weight loss plans do not see any long term benefits[iii]. They don’t tell you that research supports the body’s ability to become healthier without losing any weight at all. When you re-define your goals from weight loss to focus on actual health benefits, you’re able to discover what you truly want. Would you like to have more energy, more blood sugar control, or keep up with your kids? Healthy to me means being able to live a life I love in the body I have and being able to participate in anything I want to participate in. Find a new way to measure your goals, and use that to define your success, not your weight.
Relearn – Now you have to relearn how to eat. We’ve been taught strict food rules ever since we were young. But before we learn new rules, we need to unlearn all those other old ones. Instead of labeling everything as either ‘good’ or ‘bad’ we need to find a balance. The world of nutritional science is still so young that much of the information out there is deceptive. Instead, trust that your body knows what you need and how much you need. You can learn to make all foods safe, and get rid of the stigma around them. No more skipping or skimping meals; primal hunger from being starving removes your ability to control yourself. When you satisfy yourself, you’re less likely to overindulge. Finding success with any long term food plan requires the inclusion of foods you love. Follow what your body tells you. Food needs to satisfy your body’s needs, and the needs of your taste buds.

Food doesn’t need to be scary, and it doesn’t need to be private. We don’t need to feel guilty around food, and we don’t need to constantly be wondering what our butts looks like in those jeans. You’ll find you have so much more time when you shut off and block out those negative thoughts. Tune into what your body wants and remember your forgiveness and acceptance. Know that this is a process, and it will take practice. We take care of the things we respect. So work on finding respect for yourself and your body, instead of dropping weight. No matter what, remember that there is always hope; your new journey is only just beginning.