My Real-Life Account Of How To QUIT BINGE-EATING. Part 2

Several tips and techniques, as well as a real life account of how to put them into practice. I talk about stopping drinking alcohol, managing stress, tiredness, grumpiness, and that strong voice that says sugar will help me! This is Day four and five of my ‘no sugar month’.  This is the second part in a series of episodes about how I manage the emotional side of giving up comfort food.

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SPEAKER_00 0:07

Hi, this is Shelley Treacher from the Binge and Overeating Recovery Podcast. Today I'm gonna carry on telling you what it's taking for me to give up sugar for a month. Last week I told you about what the beginning of that process was like. This week I'm gonna tell you what it took to get through the end of the first week. This is day four. Here I talk about stopping drinking alcohol, managing stress and grumpiness, and managing that strong voice that says chocolate would actually help. I have succeeded in not eating sugar today, which I'm pretty proud of because I got quite grumpy this morning, but I'll tell you all about that in a minute. I have four things to tell you today because I needed four different skills, believe it or not. Well, I know you do believe that because I know you know it's not easy. And I carried on, so I had a really mindful breakfast again. This time I had some form of scrambled eggs, and the same as I had yesterday, and I really took my time on it because I enjoyed it so much yesterday. I thought I've kind of stumbled into something really good here. I'm gonna make giving up one thing that I enjoy uh as pleasurable as possible. So that is my first piece of advice to make it as pleasurable as you possibly can to give up, and this is my second piece of advice, only one thing at a time. And refined sugar is what it is for me. Uh so make it as simple as possible, make it as pleasurable as possible, and take your time working out how you're gonna do that. So that was great, that worked. I got through breakfast really easily. I had thought about the chocolate, but with this pleasure and the novelty of it, I thoroughly enjoyed my breakfast. So I'm like, no, I don't want the chocolate. Um, another thing that's also helping me is I have a buddy, and I wasn't sure if she was going to give up sugar at the same time as me or not, because we've been talking about it for weeks, and then I suddenly said, Look, I'm doing it next week, I can't wait any longer. And she said, Okay, I'll try. And last night she informed me that she hasn't eaten sugar this week. So that gave me a boost. That helps somehow to feel like I'm not on my own and I'm not crazy, and somebody else is trying to do this, because the world will try and tell you that you're crazy for giving up sugar. When I said that that meant alcohol as well, to so many of my friends, they're like, What? That's not even possible. Why would you choose not to be happy? is the argument. Um, I have a lot of arguments against that. I I I think real happiness is probably achieved through not relying on a substance. That's what I'm aiming to prove here. Anyway, so it's nice to have a friend. So that's the third piece of advice. Maybe try and find a friend to do this with. And I'm sure if you don't know anyone in person, there'd be someone else in the group who would like to try something like this, maybe even a minor scaled back version of this. If I can facilitate that, let me know. But so I got through the day thinking that I had a buddy, and then I got a message from a buddy saying, I've just had ice cream. Four steam. And it is hot, isn't it? Ice cream would be really nice today. But it didn't make me feel worse. It actually made me feel a little bit self-righteous. I've got to be honest, I felt like I haven't had ice cream today. I didn't need sugar today. I haven't been out though, she's been to the sea. I might have felt differently if I'd been to the beach. Um, so having a buddy swings and roundabouts so far it hasn't made me think, right, I want to give up because she's given up. So far, it's worked in my favour. And then the last thing I want to tell you about is I got really grumpy this morning. At some point, mid-morning, I got very grumpy because I was in between jobs and I only had enough time to do one thing, but another thing presented itself. Isn't this just typical of life? This is the way life works, right? This case it was my cat vomiting. I'm like, couldn't you have just waited until I had a few minutes to deal with this? And so I have to clear it up, I had to feed her, and I was just grumpy about this whole thing. I was hot, I did not want to have to clean something up in the middle of this sweltering heat, trying to cool my house down, which is impossible for everybody in England right now. We are not used to this, nobody has air conditioning. Um, so I was really grumpy, and of course, of course, I thought of you because I thought you'll understand. The chocolate came up in my head. It was like, oh, go on, just have some, it'll make you feel better, you're tired, uh, and you haven't got enough time for everything. It'll give you a bit of a boost, and it would, it would give me a little bit of a kick and a lift, uh, so that I would find the miserable task of cleaning up cat vomit in between work, hot, weltering work, um, a little bit more bearable. I didn't do it. I didn't have the chocolate, although I've got to say the voice in my head was why not? You know it'll make you happier. It doesn't matter about the group, it doesn't matter about everything that you've promised, it doesn't matter about any of the emotional stuff. You know it would just make you feel better. It was quite a strong voice. But I didn't have it because I got to being really curious, and so this is my fourth offering for you. I became really curious about what it is that I think the chocolate does for me and what it actually really does for me. And it was pretty soon that I realized that it's because I was tired that I wanted it. I thought it would wake me up, but I remember thinking last week, this isn't even waking me up. I just it just makes me a bit touchy and fast, which gives me the illusion of waking up a little bit. Um, so I kind of was able to put that one down because I had a reality check. I was I was just really aware that it wasn't really going to make me feel the thing that I wanted it to make me feel. And so then I surrendered to being tired because that's when I realized, oh, I'm just tired in this heat, it's so exhausting. So I was grumpy, I worked through it with reality check, and I surrendered to the feeling that I was trying to ignore and trying to block. And actually, I've got to say that once I'd surrendered to that tiredness and just thought, oh yeah, I don't like being tired. I remember that from last year. I'll just let myself be tired. It's a message. I'm tired, I need some rest. And I was allowed to take the next, I was allowed, I gave myself permission to take the next tasks that I had to do with a much more relaxed attitude. So that's the benefit of staying with what I was really feeling. That's it for four things, four offerings, taking it slowly, taking one step at a time, taking it um simply as possible, making it easy and pleasurable, and just doing one thing. Just give up one thing, don't diet, for God's sake, don't die. Um, I can't tell you not to diet. If you want to diet, if that makes you feel safer, that's up to you. But uh, I know it causes a rebellion which is inbuilt in having comfort foods anyway. So it's just one rebellion to another, which doesn't solve any problem. So, those things plus staying with how you feel, working out what the reality is of what you feel and what you really need. That's enough for today. This is day five, where I talk about not being perfect and about easing up on stress before you start giving up a substance, and about planning in pleasure. I also talk about the real reasons that I have for giving up a comfort substance. Today I've got a couple of things to say to you, a little bit different to the rest of the week. I'm gonna make a confession to you and normalise how normal I am. I'm gonna show you that I'm not perfect and I'm gonna promote to you that you try not to be perfect yourself. Because we're not, we're human, that doesn't work. So, today, Fridays are usually quite a busy day for me. I finish up with a lot of things that I've been trying to do for the rest of the week, and it I am often a little bit tired on a Friday, so I've named it Coffee Friday. So I often have a coffee on a Friday, I don't usually drink coffee the rest of the week. I've been wondering how I would do with this in this no sugar week, because you know, in my back in my mind, I'm like, this is an addiction to a substance. Surely I'm by me having that, then I'm promoting to you that it's okay to be addicted to a substance. But really, I think we have to be realistic. We're all addicted to lots of different substances, and I can confess that coffee gets me through the day on Friday. There's been times when I haven't had coffee, and sometimes I give up coffee and do the same thing as I'm giving up sugar with coffee. Um, but I really do believe that making it as simple and pleasurable as possible for yourself leads to you wanting to not do these things. And so I really haven't wanted sugar again today, which is great. I feel like all the things that I've set up, all the things that I've told you from Monday to Friday have set me up really well to not really crave sugar so much today at all. Um, obviously, I've managed some of that by having a cup of coffee. A really small one, I have to say. It's like barely any actual coffee in it, but it makes a difference when you don't drink coffee. Um, so I just wanted to normalize for you that that's I'm not perfect, and I think that's okay. I don't think aiming for perfection is gonna make anybody do anything uh well. Uh and uh and I know and I also know that I can give up coffee as well with exactly the same techniques, so I'm not too worried. Um, I hope that was clear. I feel like I might have garbled that. But I also want to it's well, I mean, also this is good information, isn't it? This is something that I'm working on long term. I get tired on a Friday, so maybe I should do less on a Friday, and that is what I'm aiming for. One of the things that's got me through this week not wanting sugar is I prepared for it. I made my week less stressful, I made myself have less work, and I decided to take myself through my work and through my life much more pleasurably this week. I really prepared for that, knowing that tiredness is one of the things that really trips me up in terms of needing comfort. And it's worked really well. I had actually a really stressful week last week, which is where I got all this information from, not this week, but the week before. And I just thought, wow, I really need to ease up on that to be able to not want any comfort from the sugar so much to help myself with that. So I really made some changes this week. I've decided not to take any clients on in the evenings anymore. I'm just doing a couple of groups, and that's a nice decision for me. Not going to be a nice decision for some of my clients, but it's kind of what I have to do. And I decided that I need to do something sociable on Wednesday nights because that's the night when I feel like a little bit like work is taking over, especially now that we're all online. So I need to do something sociable on a Wednesday. And you know, funnily enough, I realised that I actually have quite a lot of people who have been asking me to go out on Wednesdays, and so now I'm gonna say yes. It's funny how you can get locked in a system and habits where you've well, I've been thinking that I there's nobody I can call on, but I didn't really think about it. I actually have a lot of people I can call on. Um, so that's something nice for myself. I've also done loads of other little things that have just been great. It's been great to address it all this week. But Friday, there's something I can't shift yet. So I chose to get through through it with coffee. And uh and I'm working on it, you know, it will change in time, I'm sure of that. So that again is to normalize that some things don't change quickly. Sometimes you can't help what your system is, what your structure is, who you're looking after, all the jobs that you have to do. If you're looking after kids and you're working, you're looking after one of your parents, you've got your work cut out, and it's not going to be the easiest thing to change. But those are the things that need to be addressed. Having time for yourself, having pleasure in life, doing things just for the sake of doing them, having the time to do that. The other thing that's on my mind is tonight, Friday nights, I visit my bubble. It's still happening, which I'm really happy to say. Um, my goddaughter lives there and my best friend. And every Friday I usually have a glass of wine to wind down. At least that's what I'm telling myself. I tell myself I need I need this glass of wine just to let go. Um, I'm not going to be having that glass of wine tonight, and what I'm going to be bearing in mind the most is that I really don't feel good about going slightly um anaesthetized and absent when I see my goddaughter. She's only 10. She certainly isn't absent, she's very present, and and she's having a bit of trouble at school, so I want to be present for her. She's a little bit lonely and feeling like she doesn't have the best friends at the moment. She can't find her people. I'm sure we all know what that's like. And so I want her to feel that she has my attention. So that's the reason that I'm going to be not drinking tonight, apart from doing this sugar thing. It's gonna, I think that's gonna keep me going because that's something more important to me that's in my value system, and really means a lot to me. So I'm gonna be bearing that in mind, as well as what I talked about yesterday, about questioning why I really do things. I don't need to unwind. I've had a good week, I've enjoyed a lot of things, and the sun helps me unwind. Um, and I'm with my best friends. There shouldn't really be anything to unwind from. Um, or two. I I really am quite comfortable with these people and can really be myself, so I'm gonna maximize on that and stay present with all of it tonight. I will let you know on Monday how it went. Uh, Saturday I I sometimes have drinks, sometimes don't. Obviously, I won't be this Saturday. I usually buy lots of chocolate in my Friday shop, not lots, some chocolate in my Friday shop, and I usually have it on Saturday morning. It's not going to be happening tomorrow, so I will tell you all about it on Monday. I suspect there might be different challenges at the weekend to win the week, but I will look forward to telling you them all, quite honestly. To sum up, these are the tips in this podcast. Have a buddy to commiserate with and to support you. Identify and challenge the voices in your head that tell you the substance will make you feel better. Manage tiredness by surrendering to it. Explore what the food actually does for you and to you. Make your detox as pleasurable as possible. Ease stress and difficulty in your life before your detox and during and after. Plan in pleasurable activities. Bear in mind your more meaningful reason for quitting and your real values. That's it for this week. Please join me next Wednesday where I'll continue to tell you what it takes for me to get through the second week of this journey. And the effects on me of giving up refined sugar. As usual, I am so happy to receive your comments and questions. Please let me know how you're getting on with these tips, and I'd love any questions if you have any. And if you want to go further, one of the best things to start with is to subscribe to my mailing list. You'll see the link below. This way you'll get access not only to this podcast but everything else that I produce, which is quite a lot. I'm in the media every now and again, about different subjects, so get on that mailing list and you'll get everything that I have. Thank you for listening. I'll see you next Wednesday. Have a lovely week.