Binge Eating is Not a Character Flaw
By Katherine Metzelaar, MSN, RDN, CD
The culture says, “it’s just about having more control.” The doctors say, “people really can’t handle themselves around food.” The coaches and therapists say, “she eats emotionally.” And, the dietitians say, “he just doesn’t know when to stop and needs a meal plan.”
It’s the same rhetoric every time of blaming the individual for binge eating, chalking it up to lack of self-control, lack of knowledge and lack of awareness. This shaming of the individual has become normalized and accepted without considering the harmful and damaging impacts that this has on people, not to mention how shame can increase binge eating behaviors.
Binge eating, contrary to our cultural understanding, is not about self-control. The use of binge eating behaviors says nothing about a person’s moral character. Rather, binge eating is incredibly adaptive and may have served, or be serving, a useful purpose. And when I say useful, I don’t mean comfortable and I don’t mean desired. What I do mean is binge eating is trying to illuminate something and it’s our job to get curious about it rather than to shame and blame a person. So here are a few things to consider:
Binge eating can be a response to food restriction and lack of access to food which often present in the same way. Your body and brain cannot distinguish between intentional food deprivation (dieting, cutting out food groups, etc.) and not having access to food. It interprets both as the same and makes adjustments accordingly. There are physiological and biological adjustments that take place when, for example, the body doesn’t have access to enough carbs or to enough energy from food. It does things like break down muscle (low carb and energy intake), slow down metabolism (low energy intake), increase neuropeptide Y to increase our desire for carbs (low carb intake), increase dopamine when certain foods are consumed as a way to reinforce continually seeking out food (low carb intake), to name a few. Your body and brain are wired for survival.
Binge eating can also be an adaptive response to trauma (fyi dieting, disordered eating, and eating disorders are all traumatic). Binge eating can serve to help sooth and cope with big feelings and emotions, to create a sense of safety and to manage our environment. It can also be a way to directly impact the nervous system, allowing it to shift into rest and digest when other coping skills are not accessible or are not yet learned.
Culturally, we have become so accustomed to the elevation of food restriction and the demonization of binge eating. Because of this, we don’t often realize how harmful blaming individuals for binge eating behaviors is and how it limits our ability to identify that we need help and to move forward to get the support that we deserve.
Binge eating is not about having more control and it should never be an opportunity to double down or diet/restrict even more. Binge eating may very well be an attempt at survival and we need to start honoring that over individual “responsibility” and self-blame.
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