r/FoodAddiction

Hey everyone, I could really use support/ help. I’m a baker, I bake cookies & sell them, and they do very very well, and are one of my main sources of income. However, I’m trying to lose some weight 😅 and I have a serious addiction to the cookie dough. I’ve tried chewing gum, baking after eating, and all the hacks others have told me. I just still am constantly craving and thinking about my cookie dough. It’s the smell of butter, and the taste of the warm cookie dough. Also, it’s very calorically dense, so I’m not able to stay in a deficit.

And tips? It also gives me a stomachache so i don’t enjoy how I feel after.

Hey everybody, it’s my first post on here and to be honest I don’t even know where to begin. I guess I’m just hoping to find a positive community during this really dark and challenging time.

Over a year ago was when I first began resorting to food for comfort. At the time I was being bullied at school for my weight (looking back I was not fat at all, but you know how callous teen boys can be) which in turn lead me to have serious body image issues. I then began resorting to food for comfort. It was my vice, the only thing that gave me dopamine throughout my days. It became a really unhealthy coping mechanism for me to not only hide my emotions but to detach from reality. I stopped seeing friends, stopped going to school and at its peak I stopped going outside entirely.

I had developed agoraphobia whilst simultaneously fighting a battle with depression & episodes of depersonalisation. This cycle lasted for over 10 months, with multiple zoom therapy calls (because I was too paranoid to go outside), multiple attempts on my life, a heck load of emotional baggage and the pièce de résistance….. 25kg gained

At my heaviest I was 90kg (I’m 5’8).

Something then flipped after I had one of the scariest binges of my life which resulted in me being incredibly sick, I decided I needed to change something (that something being my whole entire mindset, body and soul lol) FULL REBRAND STYLE.

I busted my ass for 8 months, began going outside (even if it was to a tiny post office down the street), doing basic hygiene again, walking on the treadmill consistently. In the beginning, I was so socially anxious I struggled to talk to anyone without my mum present, couldn’t hold eye contact for longer than a millisecond and still had a major fear of being observed by others.

8 months later and life has dramatically changed since then. I’ve lost 24kg all up, I’m confident, have built a new identity for myself and can actually hold a conversation now (by myself 😅). Well that was until 3 weeks ago.. it was three weeks ago to this day that I decided I was at a place emotionally to see my abusive dad (who I went no contact with for those 8 months) for the first time again. I felt ready, what could go wrong right? WELL APPARENTLY A SHITTTTT TON.

To cut a long story short a lot of things re surfaced for me emotionally, not only did one interaction with him make me feel like those 8 months of work meant nothing but worst of all I felt like the old me. Who’d hide in the school bathrooms to escape dickhead school bullies. And just like that I was triggered and now since 3 weeks ago Ive been resorting to the same old coping mechanism younger me did to escape emotional trauma.

I’ve binged consistently for 3 weeks now and have gained 10kg, I’m petrified and I feel myself beginning to become more socially reclusive. I feel so stuck and scared, I have so many dreams I can’t loose all the progress I’ve made. I’ve work too damn hard. I’m so so lost.

How do I break these patterns ? How do I work through the deeper issues to stop falling back on food ?

If you happened to read this post I want to say thank you, it means the absolute world to me and I’d really appreciate to hear your journey. If you have any advice please feel free to share. Let’s break this toxic cycle together !!! 💛💛💛

Hi, I am a 28 F with a food addiction. It started in 2018 when I dropped a ton of weight after intentional weight loss. The validation came in, the restriction, the over -exercising, and the inappropriate eating behaviours. It started with a binge-restrict cycle, and ended up in a full-blow eating disorder which needed psychological care. After a few years, I gained most of the weight back, and lost a lot of my negative food behaviours. Despite this, the urge to eat was still there, like a never-satisfied monster.

This is confusing because I had put in so much work, I am no longer binging and restricting, but I have zero control over what goes into my body. I am no longer guilty or shameful, and although I am slightly overweight, I don’t try to compensate for my eating. My therapist felt I clearly had not gotten over whatever psychological urge was causing this behaviour. This was so frustrating because all I thought about ever was food. Not my body, not my depression, but food. Salt, sugar, deep-fried, takeout. I am gaining weight at a 5lb per month rate, and I am not concerned about my value as a person, but my physical health and energy levels.

I am spending money I don’t have, lying to my partner about my eating habits, and eating fatty and salty foods in private. I’m not eating 3000-6000 calories until I am sick. I am eating a meal deal at a fast food joint, but 3 x a day. I feel a physical twitch when someone brings a sweet treat to work. I absolutely lose control after putting sugar in my coffee.

Everyone keeps telling me this is an eating disorder, but it feels so much more than that. It feels like an addiction. The more I speak to people who’ve suffered this and other addictions, the more I see the comparison. My doctor will not diagnose me or treat me as a food addict, because they fear it will worsen my eating disorder history. Now, I feel left in the dark, with no real treatment plan besides self-help books. I want to break the sugar-fat-salt cycle, but I have no idea where to start.

Any tips on prevention and management? Any good resources (free or purchase) for programs or step-based approach? Has anyone else had the realization that their eating disorder may actually be an addiction? Thanks for the advice🙏

So I order a few times a week. I don’t even cook that’s the crazy thing. My wife cooks lovely mostly nutritious food every day. This addiction was about from before I even knew her though. Anyway I’ve tried having food in the house that could be classed as “fun foods” as I’ve been suggested before. Tried deleting apps. I’m wondering if anyone was genuinely addicted before and stopped. What did you do?

It's taken me 6 years to reach this point, but, I can indulge, occasionally, while still maintaining control and staying within my caloric restraints. What I can't do, though, is have boxes around after the fact.

I know, Captain obvious being unbelievably obvious here, but, I thought I was okay with having this stuff visible, but, I'm not.

Hi guys. I’m wondering what people think about my situation and if anyone has advice, because I genuinely don’t know what to do anymore.

I’m 21F and I moved to another country for college 2 years ago. Before that, I had never lived away from home. I ended up dropping out very early, and the past year and a half has honestly been hell.

I’ve struggled with mental health basically my whole life. I’ve seen multiple psychiatrists over the years, but I never got one “final” diagnosis. Different doctors have told me depression, bipolar, BPD, and ADHD. I was never formally told this, but I strongly believe I could also be autistic. The last psychiatrist I saw this year (after waiting 6 months for the appointment) listened to me for about 10 minutes before telling me he couldn’t help me because it wasn’t his area of expertise, and then politely escorted me out.

Since I was a teenager, I’ve struggled with binge eating and overeating, but it was never THIS bad. Over the last year and a half, I completely shut down. I have 0 friends, no job, my sleep schedule is destroyed (I sleep during the day and stay awake all night), and I spend around 1500–2500€ a month on food. That is literally the only thing I spend money on.

Part of the reason I don’t have a job and struggle to even look for one is because the one time I did work in the past, my mother shamed me for it and still brings it up to this day. She’s unemployed herself and lives off my father’s money, but constantly insults people who work normal jobs. Her mentality is basically that if you’re not immediately successful, rich, or exceptional from day one, then you’re pathetic.

The other reason is that I genuinely cannot function anymore. If anyone here has severe ADHD or similar issues, maybe you’ll understand. Simple tasks feel impossible. I stopped showering regularly, my apartment is so messy I can barely walk through it, and I feel completely overwhelmed by basic daily life, let alone applying for jobs.

I binge to the point of physical pain. I sometimes throw up, not intentionally, but because of the amount of food I eat. I gained 20kg and now I barely leave the house because I don’t fit into my clothes anymore. At this point, unless I’m thinking about food, I’m thinking about suicide.

My parents know all of this. They have absolutely no boundaries and call me 3–4 times a day. On two separate occasions I tried to cut contact because I genuinely feel like they are enabling me, but they just keep sending me money anyway.

At the same time, I absolutely do not want to move back home. My relationship with my mother is abusive, and going back to my home country feels unbearable to me. There are very few opportunities there, and the thought of having to completely start over there again honestly makes me feel hopeless.

The only thing that has helped me was Mounjaro (GLP medication). I managed to get it 3 separate times over the last year. Every single time, I stopped binge eating, lost weight, started functioning again, and actually felt like myself. Then as soon as I had to stop taking it, everything went back to how it was before.

The problem is my mother. She is narcissistic, abusive, mentally ill herself, and honestly I have nothing positive to say about her. Every time I lose weight, she completely shuts down and starts obsessing over me “having anorexia.” She cries all day, talks about it constantly, and completely refuses to acknowledge the binge eating disorder that is literally ruining my life and making me suicidal.

Because I don’t have a job and my parents financially support me, I can’t consistently afford Mounjaro. And because my mother is convinced I’m anorexic, she refuses to help with it at all.

What makes this worse is that my mother herself is overweight, refuses to exercise, but is OBSESSED with thinness, models, and skinny women. Honestly, part of me feels like she’s jealous whenever I lose weight.

Today on the phone she told me I should “just go for a walk” and I’d feel better. I told her I physically cannot fit into my clothes anymore, and she responded by asking if she should mail me bigger pants.

My father just tells me he loves me, but he doesn’t actually DO anything.

I genuinely don’t know what to do anymore. I have so much anger toward them, especially my mother, and I can’t tell if it’s justified or if I’m just trying to blame someone else for my problems.

I know I’m an adult and ultimately responsible for myself, but I also feel completely trapped and like I’m slowly killing myself with food.

Any advice is appreciated.

for me its considered affordable and has basic nutrients. i just get a tostada bowl that has lettuce grilled chicken rice and beans among other ingredients. its very savory and can fill me up for the most part. i go there often but mostly cause it doesn’t drain my wallet and doesn’t make me feel like shit

I think the root of my binge eating started in October. I started a new job in June and started to weigh less from under eating and stress. Before this whole cycle began I weighed in the range of 143-150 at 5’9 (female). Since June I was walking and exercising more and I think the loss was somewhat accidental. I weighed like 126 pounds at my doctors appointment in October. around that time is when I developed these episodes of feeling out of control around food. At work events if there was a table of cupcakes or brownies, I would feel absolutely uncontrollable around it and just keep taking more. My brain became/is hyper fixated on sweet palatable items. These episodes got worse with the holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas. I started really stressing out when I knew I would be around social events that had access to lots of desserts. These binge episodes could be 4000 till like 8000 cal. Initially, I would try to limit calories the next day and this would just perpetuate the cycle.

I think intuitive eating would be absolutely useless because my brain will just use it as an excuse to binge. So right now I am calorie tracking to make sure that I’m eating a healthy amount, and I’ve actually found some temporary success by increasing my daily calories and planning out three set meals a day. I find that I specifically binge on sweet items—protein bars, Kit Kats, cookies etc. I never binge on savory. I’ve tried cutting them out (end up bingeing at work events, accessing vending machine) and tried incorporating them into daily planned intake (which works for 3 days and then I binge the rest of the box in one sitting). Is it time to cut out protein bars and packaged sweet stuff entirely??

Most recently I was able to go five days eating 1800 and feeling great, but was on a string of night shifts. one of the last nights I barely got any sleep and at work ended up having a binge that lasted until the morning. This threw me completely off track, which was especially hard for me since I had just had almost a whole week of what I thought was freedom from the cycle. Overtime, I realized that my biggest triggers are of course restriction, but also sleep deprivation, boredom, loneliness. I also have black-and-white thinking where if I have one snack that is unplanned or something that I deem unhealthy get spirals and I end up binging because I feel like I already ruined the day.

I’m at the point now where I eat normally 4-5 days of the week and the rest are absolute binges of 4-6k calories. I’m at like 150 lbs right now but I’m sure a lot of it is water weight that would drop fairly quickly if this horrible cycle ends…This is affecting my quality of life at this point and I’m thinking of setting up with a dietician through nourish. Does anyone have any advice for me?

It’s just endless. My options are either to binge and overeat and spend money i don’t have on takeout and finally shut the internal demon up for a while so I can get some relief OR spend SOO much of my energy every fucking day fighting with the food demon in my brain endlessly every minute of every day.

I don’t even know whats better, having junk food in the house so that I don’t spend way more money on takeout, or trying to keep it out of the house so that I can have some successful days. I mostly screw myself over either way.

I don’t want to be doing this. I don’t want to fucking live like this. I dont even need to be thin. Just not obese and not destroying myself everyday with my habits.

I have a genuine popcorn problem. I cannot stop eating popcorn and I mean it from the bottom of my heart. Anytime anyone mentions the word I start drooling a little. I crave it in the morning and sometimes I go to the movies just to eat the popcorn. But it makes me so gassy. It’s so weird I’m always constipated or have diarrhea right after. Maybe because I have way too much. Especially with exams coming up I keep eating popcorn guys it’s so so bad. I’m genuinely concerned.

It started with movie marathons with my boyfriend and I tried like sucking on the popcorn? Idk how to explain but it kinda melts in your mouth. And I’m so addicted to doing that. I’ve gained a lot of weight since this addiction but I don’t feel like eating anything else???? I know it sounds so weird but I don’t know how else to put it. It’s a genuine popcorn addiction.

Does anybody know how to cure binge eating?
I've been on diet 1000 kcal deficit/daily and almost after 9 weeks of succes im binging everyday for a week now

I literally cannot stop eating before my period. What strategies do people use during this time?

Hi, I just found out about this subreddit and I struggle with food addiction. Are there any useful posts on this subreddit I could read as a person who wants to change but don’t know how?

This post is really sad for me to make. But I’ve been trying for years to stop eating like shit and it’s only gotten worse. I can’t stop eating sweet things and every time I crave it more and more. It’s so upsetting. A typical day where I wake up eat breakfast some times. Eat lunch and from there decide I can start the diet tomorrow. By the end of the day after a few snacks I’m so depressed. I just can’t seem to get in my head I need to start now.

Hi all, I need some advice. I suffer from BED and food addiction and have gained a lot of weight over the last few months and am really trying to get better. I don’t want to completely cut out processed foods, but I am making an effort to eat way less of them (especially snack foods) and also to eat out way less.

Overall I’ve been doing well I think, but sometimes it gets really hard when you are on this journey and your partner is not. My boyfriend isn’t the healthiest eater either and doesn’t go to the gym, and has talked about wanting to make better choices and take care of himself better, but has not taken any steps to actually do so, and I think we’re just at different places right now in our health journeys.

It’s not like he is not supportive of me and the choices I’ve been making, but there are things sometimes that he does that make it harder. He will buy snacks for himself and then offer them to me, or when we go grocery shopping he’ll ask which snacks I’m getting, or say we should pick something out to share, when I’ve told him I’m not eating chips/crackers right now. On the weekends he keeps suggesting we get takeout, and if I agree I will at least try not to eat my whole portion, and then he will “joke” that I “made him look fat” since he finished all of his. Or sometimes at dinner even when we do cook, he’ll make a comment about how small my portion size is and how it makes him feel like he took too much food, and I keep having to remind him that he’s like 7 inches taller than me, so it was not healthy when I was taking the same portion size as him anyways, but he still seems like offended almost.

We’ve lived together for a little over a year now, and lately I’ve been finding myself really missing when I lived alone and had full control of what food was in the apartment, how much I had, and when I went out. Obviously it’s not his fault or his problem, really, and I support him eating what he wants when he wants, but I wish he wouldn’t make comments so much. I have brought it up in the past, but more in the sense of just reminding him that I’m trying to make healthier choices so I don’t want as much snacks or takeout, not really a direct response to his comments. Is there any way I can address the comments without sounding rude/insensitive? He is kind of an emotional guy and I don’t want it to sound like a personal attack.

I’ve been married for over 10 years. When we first started dating he was chubby, then become morbidly obese. Within the past year he’s lost 100+ pounds and is keeping it off. He works out a lot to account for how much he eats. When he can’t go to the gym and over eats he’s just in such a terrible mood. He’s a different person. I need advice on how to deal with him when he’s upset about not working out but overeating. I am not overweight and I love snacks. I have cut down buying snacks and having snacks in the house. Once in a while I’ll mention I want to go to a local bakery and grab a few cookies and it starts a huge fight. He can’t just eat one or two cookies. He binges which makes him depressed.

Looking for with sugar detox retreats or structured programs (by nutritionist?).

We are located in Canada. My husband struggles with sugar and gluten (he is gluten intolerant). He is so addicted that he has never wanted to consider cutting it out but he wants to try now. He’s admitted that it’s really hard for him to not binge eat sugary processed foods and eat late at night.

What’s scary is that first time we found out he was gluten intolerant, we cut it out for 6 months and he lost 40 lbs in the first month without changing anything else. But he went back to eating gluten and gained it right back. He tried cutting gluten again and weight won’t go down and he’s given up. Something is wrong. Sugar too. He is SO addicted to the taste of sweet. I’m willing to go on a sugar & gluten free diet with him (I’m used to gluten free diet now), cook, whatever it takes. But my words have no weight and I feel that a structured retreat or program under guidance of a professional would help.

I would appreciate ANY advice.

Any programs /retreats you know that’s really good/effective?

Any nutritionist/professionals with programs that keep you accountable?

What worked for you?

Did you eventually incorporate some sugar back into your diet?

Has anyone tried any programs successfully?

What motivated you? How did you get into the mindset of wanting this for yourself?

What was most difficult and how did you overcome it?

Did you crave sugar less after the detox?

I have simply resigned to my food addiction until I can move out of my current house (I'm working diligently on it). My current house is not only stocked with trigger foods but with People that stress me out daily.

I posted this issue on another weight loss sub and I got absolutely flamed. Can anyone relate? When away from home obviously I overeat, but not nearly as much and no binges. The longest I have been away from home was 3 weeks and I lost about 7 pounds.

M - 28, 240 lbs, 5.8 ft

Subject - You are betraying your future self

Body - That's just what you are doing. Fix it. Whatever decisions you are making right now. You will regret in the near future. And far future. And rest for your life. When you wake up in the morning. Imagine yourself in the future if you continued and if you not continued, then choose accordingly.

I just wrote this email to myself, scheduled to send in the morning when I wake, so the first thing I see is this and lock in. Past few days and even years. I have had many day ones to start my diet but always broken it. I just wrote this message to myself to not break it from tomorrow, but somewhere in my brain I still have a feeling that I will break this one as well. I don't want to break this one. Drop advice, quotes, motivations, anything that will let me not break this time. Please.

This is really long and I’m so sorry but I just want to feel seen. To someone. F-23 W 214 H- 5’2 PCOS

Hello, I just wanted to say first off that I don’t even know what I’m doing on here. I guess it’s a desperate attempt for advice even though i’m the type of person who has tried everything and is hesitant to try again, kinda. I reached out to a crisis hotline for binge eating disorders last week because I was sitting on my couch just crying and i genuinely had no other idea what to do.

For context: I’ve never had a healthy relationship with food, ever. My father weighed 400+ pounds and got a gastric bypass and I grew up and watched him push his food ideologies to us. I have 8 siblings and for every meal it was, “if you want seconds you have to hurry up and eat or the boys will eat it all first.” Well I was the only one in sports at the time, volleyball, track, and powerlifting, so of course I needed to eat. I learned to shovel food down my mouth and get seconds so I had enough to eat as the portions they gave us were always so little. They also had locks on the pantry and fridge doors at the time too so getting food any other wasn’t an option.

On the flip side at my mom’s house she had 7 kids and still weighed under 120, type 1 diabetes too. So she always had an obsession with food in general to watch her diabetes but also she was fat phobic. TW: I’ve watched her threaten herself numerous times because she was so fat. I was 16 and 140 at the time when she was 114. It’s just a lot. She constantly tried to put me on diets and it just got too much.

For the record I’ve always been athletic and we owned a ranch so I was outside doing something every day and I liked that. I still like it now. I work out like once or twice a week, ride my bike, go on walks with my dog and son daily but I don’t diet. I do have it implemented in me that I need to eat healthy so I don’t really eat junk food, maybe biweekly if we’re out and about, and i’m too poor to eat out.

I just cannot look at food. I can’t. If i see it i’m going to eat it and I hate it so much. It’s not binge eating like everything in my pantry but genuinely making 4-6 full meals a day (I also will sometimes make myself throw up just so I can cook another meal because I love cooking and food is amazing). I say oh this sounds so good, and I just make it. I just eat and then I never feel hungry and I don’t feel full. It’s gotten to a point where i cannot sit at the same dinner table as my son because I cannot stop myself from eating his food. I always have to serve him another plate or something because I end up eating 1/2 of his first plate.

The only time I actually was able to control my binge eating was when I was working 2 jobs and lived by myself and genuinely only ever ate ground beef and potatoes cause that’s all I would buy. I lost 40 pounds in 2 months doing that. (I know it’s not healthy) But I am unable to do that anymore as it’s not nutrient dense enough for my son and I know that if i cook him some food I won’t be able to not eat it.

Recently my mother bought me semaglutide and I used it for about a month and lost 6 pounds. To me it’s not worth it, the side effects made me feel horrible and every time I had to remind myself that I wasn’t strong enough to lose the weight myself, it wouldn’t help.

I don’t know what to do. I want to change but at the same time I don’t care enough about myself to do something about it. I’m a stay at home mom and a full time college student. My fiancé is no help as he just starves at work cause he’s a bartender and can’t eat and then pigs out with me when he gets home.

I feel like I’m just playing the victim. I am in control of my body I’m just too tired to care. I feel like I don’t deserve to have these problems because I am an amazing person otherwise, 4.0 gpa, in every mom group I can find, my sons education is above what it should be because I try. I feel like i try so hard at everything else that this doesn’t matter. I know I matter but this seems trivial and unnecessary for me to focus on as I’m healthy, just fat.

Any ideas how I can turn this mindset around?