Overeating Disorders As Well As Its Causes and Symptoms Easily Explained

By Claire Carradice

According to the National Institute of Mental Health, 20% young women report that they have had compulsive overeating problems. Unlike anorexia and bulimia, compulsive overeating is also rather common in men, who account for approximately 40% of overall compulsive overeating disorder cases.
Overeaters and Compulsive Overeaters are often obese and are susceptible to many health problems due to being overweight, some of which are high blood pressure, hypertension, diabetes and high cholesterol. Those who are obese increase their risk of heart diseases, many types of cancer and gallbladder disease. Compulsive overeaters often feel fatigued.
The majority of Overeaters feel as if they have no control over their overeating behavior, and eat in secret and when they are not hungry. They also feel shame and remorse over their behavior. Indeed, most times they simply don't have control over their habits.
What are the causes of overeating?
Causes of overeating vary, but there are usually a variety of contributing factors. A traumatic event, which may have taken place years before compulsive overeating manifested itself, is often a cause. Such events may include, but are not limited to:

• Sexual abuse or rape
• Emotional abuse
• Parents' divorce
• Death of a loved one
• Physical violence

The overeating begins gradually and often starts when children first start developing overeating patterns. Some children turn to food whenever they are upset. They begin to use food to soothe and comfort themselves. If left unchecked, this habit follows them to adulthood, and ultimately, obesity.
A friend was only four years old when she began putting on weight by overeating. At the time, her parents were going through some difficult times, and one of them may have been having an affair. Being a very sensitive child, she could have picked up on this, and started to soothe herself with food, resulting in weight gain. For the rest of her life, her weight went down and then back up again. In adulthood, she became obese.
Signs and symptoms of an Overeater, or Compulsive Overeater:

• Rapid weight gain
• Eating large portions of food even when not hungry
• Disgust and shame after overeating
• Depressed and anxious mood
• Eating food to the point that one is uncomfortable and even in pain
• Going from one diet to the next constantly, searching for answers to permanent weight loss
• Feeling out of control over food
• Eating late at night
• Using food to entertain when alone
• Hiding food around the home, anticipating the next binge
• Does not use any measures at all to purge the binged food
• Constant weight fluctuations
• Sexual avoidance
• Exhibits an abnormally low self-esteem
• Attributes any successes or failures to weight
• Avoids many social situations due to low self-esteem, or simply feeling uncomfortable
• Uses food as a "drug" to self-medicate feelings

Practical advice for the Overeater:

• Larger plates mean larger servings; up to 25%-28% more, so buy smaller plates as a start.
• Watching TV while eating can cause you to eat up to 40% more food. Don't eat while watching TV!
• It takes 20 minutes after we eat before the stomach tells the brain that it is satisfied. If you start feeling full, put your plate down. Wait 15 minutes, and you will more than likely find that the desire for more passes. If not, continue eating. But at least become aware of the feeling of satiety.
• It was found that both children and adults pour up to 76% more liquid into short, wide glasses than they do in tall, slender glasses. This is because we focus more on height instead of width, what's known as the vertical-horizontal illusion. Don't use short, wide glasses!
• As far as food cues are concerned, visual matters! An example: students at an all-you-can eat buffet, ate chicken wings nonstop when their tables were continually cleared. They simply didn't notice how much they were actually eating because there was no evidence in front of them. In contrast, people at buffets who gathered all they planned to eat, including dessert, before they sat down, ate 14% less than those who just take a little at a time and go back and forth for seconds. Take all you plan to eat up-front!
• Put the amount of a snack you want to eat in a bowl or on a plate, so you can see exactly how much you're putting into your body, and don't eat straight from the packaging.

If you need help to break the destructive habit of overeating, http://www.get-thin-for-good.com offers a free "Get Thin for Good" program which aims to help you change the way you relate to food which is the reason you are overweight in the first place. The program does not focus on dieting, slimming products or deprivation.