Will I have to be careful my whole life?

Heya,

So I was doing really well, almost a month without binging, and this time without going the other way and restricting. 3 and a half weeks and I was eating 3 healthy meals a day and exercising regularly and I was happy,actually happy with life, until one day I came home and found my brother had made a chocolate cake. I thought to myself go on have a slice and I thought I could handle it. It was delicious! And when I had finished my slice I felt like another. My sister had had 2, my brother 3,so why not me too. So I had another slice, and then before you know it,3 hours later, I'm collapsed on my bed, bloated and with severe stomach cramps! It was not until the next morning that I fully realised what I had done. I couldn't believe that after all of my hard work I had just caved like that. I didn't even feel myself doing it! Then feeling depressed over what I had done, I spent the next day binging .
I'm only just coming back now after 3 days. What I'm asking is am I going to have to be strict with myself for the rest of my life? When will I be able to trust myself? I thought I was in control last Sunday but I clearly wasn't. Is this just the way it is for people with eating disorder? Do we just have to be careful with food all the time?

Thanks for listening, and sorry for rambling on,
Emer xxx

Hi Emer,

Sorry to hear you had a relapse but can you view it as a blip along the road to recovery - which is not a smooth one. As for your question I think it depends on you. Some ppl can recover fully from an ED and it not be an issue anymore, if it is more of a food addiction then you might need to be more careful, like an alcoholic being careful with alcohol or abstaining. You obviously cant abstain from food but perhaps write some trigger foods down which are a no no. Perhaps over time you will be slowly able to reintroduce these but if so slow slow slow. These are my thoughts anyhow, but I am still recovering.

Cracked

One of the biggest hurdles for me was realizing that a mistake isn't the end of the world. I am still eating healthier then I ever have before, so if I eat something that isn't so healthy, or even eat unhealthy a whole day, I am still doing better. You can't get down on yourself.

Sometimes success means decreasing the intensity and length of a binge, insead of just stopping all together. If you used to binge for a week and eat twice as much food, you have made progress. All your hard work is not lost - just get back to healthy eating and you will forget it happened.