Im a bulimic in remission thanks to topamax. It is a miracle drug and has given me my life back. I have struggled with binge eating for over half my life. Food is my addiction and i think there is something wrong with my brain chemistry. Why can normal people eat a meal and feel satisfied while some still have cravings long after physical fullness sets in? Many people with a healthy weight attribute their size to healthy choices but I believe something else is going on. Its not will power. They do not experience the incessant cravings I have after eating a filling meal and it doesn't take all the energy within them to resist them. They eat and go about their day. I eat and want more to the point I get physical symptoms and completely lose the ability to concentrate. Food is literally the only thing on my mind in my non medicated state. I would eat until I couldn't stand up straight or walk right. I would eat until my stomach was so full it would compress my lungs and I'd be panting like a dog.
Purging is less risky to me than consuming 8,000 calories a day and becoming morbidly obese. I dont regret that behavior. Is that horrible? As a nurse, i know the dangers of heart disease, HTN, DM and dont want to let myself get huge and take that risk. I feel guilty when I see a very large person and think, "why don't they just purge?"
Studies have shown that dieting is actually one of the main causes of binge eating disorder which is ironic considering how so many people will go on a diet to lose a few pounds then have it backfire. Our bodies are evolutionarily designed to resist famine at all costs. When it senses famine (dieting), the biological drive for food is so strong it will do everything in its power to make sure it gets food. That means intense cravings. Even if you aren't truly starving, if you body senses a cut in calories, it will think its starving and send out hunger signals. This is why diets fail 99.9% of the time. See the Minnesota starvation experiment. The psychology of hunger
