April 10, 2024March 22, 2024 by Libby

The Compulsive Eating Triangle

One of the main reasons many of my clients reach out to me is because they are feeling chaotic and out-of-control around food. Feeling like it’s hard or impossible to stop eating at a comfortable level of fullness, feeling like they constantly bounce between not eating enough and eating way too much, binge eating and feeling extreme physical distress…

Maybe you relate on some level?

Whether you resonate with full-blown binge eating or occasionally feel like you spiral “out-of-control” with food, I’m sure most or all of us can relate on some level to this dynamic, myself included!

While feeling calm and centered around food is something healthy to strive for most of the time (and a key goal we might have in client work together), it’s also not realistic to be “perfectly centered” around food all the time.

How does one get to a more calm and centered place with food? What are some of the key factors to consider?

I’m always thinking of ways to conceptualize these ideas, and one tool I have started using in sessions is what I’m calling the “Compulsive Eating Triangle.”

This tool helps us form a big picture outlook as far as what may be driving your chaotic/compulsive eating. While experiencing greater calmness with food is generally a long-term process that takes lots of untangling and healing, having a framework for thinking about this can be helpful.

How would you describe your current eating patterns?

Do you feel overly rigid and inflexible with food?

Or maybe you feel like you are always out-of-control, like you’re not the one in the “driver’s seat” when it comes to food?

Or, like many people, you may find that you bounce between the two.

Restricting and “eating clean” in the morning, and then everything explodes by the evening. Or maybe, you feel like you “eat well” for weeks at a time, only to find everything spiraling weeks later.

We know that any sort of restriction when it comes to food — mental OR physical — drives chaotic eating. Hence, the pendulum, back-and-forth dynamic.

Checking in with yourself as far as how you feel like you relate to the Eating Pendulum can be a helpful exercise before exploring the Compulsive Eating Triangle.

The Compulsive Eating Triangle:

When reflecting on your compulsive eating patterns, the 3 factors I’d encourage you to think about include:

NUTRITION, THOUGHTS, & FEELINGS

As your friendly neighborhood RD, I implore you to NOT DISCOUNT THE NUTRITION FACTORS. Again: do not discount nutrition factors! I say this with emphasis because this is in YOUR best interest.

Many of us *think* we are eating enough, or we *want to think* we are eating enough, out of fear of eating more.

Usually this fear of adding in more food is rooted in fear of gaining weight.

I don’t want you to gain unhealthy amounts of weight either, and I don’t pursue strategies to that end with my clients.

BUT, sometimes we need to be eating MORE, particularly earlier in the day, to not have the chaotic food spirals later on.

We also need to be eating enough so that our metabolisms are humming along properly. Not eating enough can ALSO be a key driver of unhealthy weight gain, by slowing your metabolism, contributing to hormonal imbalance, and causing your gut health to be all out of whack.

As your resident RD, I want you eating enough to maintain whatever weight is healthiest for you. And, if you’re like many of the women I work with, that may likely mean eating more (in a structured and intentional way). So often we may avoid eating (again, particularly earlier in the day), out of fear of eating more later on. When we do this we are just perpetuating the Eating Pendulum pattern by swinging right back into chaos later on, because our bodies are so deprived and overly hungry.

While the Compulsive Eating Triangle places key emphasis on Thoughts & Feelings (by including them in the triangle…), as the graphic below notes, we can’t out think our biology if we aren’t eating enough.

So… something to consider… are you actually eating enough?

A top recommendation for a place to start is to consider your breakfast. Does it contain an adequate amount of fat, protein, and carbohydrate? Is it satisfying and tasty? Just a yogurt or just a bar is only fueling your chaos later on.

I want you OUT of the chaos as much as you do! Hence the up-front nutrition talk.

But also, thoughts & feelings:

Just like all 3 sides of a triangle are connected, our nutrition, the way we think about food, and our feelings, all influence each other as well. This is why, in my work with clients, I place strong emphasis on exploring the thoughts & feelings behind your food patterns, not just giving you nutrition advice and hoping all goes well! I think you could get that from Google and be fine if that were to work as a form of nutrition counseling.

In this post, I’ll just highlight a couple common psychological and/or emotional dynamics that may be contributing to your compulsive/chaotic eating.

Many key thought patterns driving chaotic eating are related to the concept of SCARCITY.

Whenever we are in a “scarcity mindset” with food (this may or may not be something you are consciously aware of in the moment), it is going to fuel compulsive, quick, chaotic eating.

This might look like…

Eating one cookie and telling yourself you “messed up.” Since you messed up, and are going to “start over” tomorrow, you BETTER EAT ALL THE COOKIES NOW WHILE YOU CAN because you are telling yourself you can’t have any tomorrow no matter what.

Foods may feel “scarce” when we don’t allow ourselves to have them often, and have all sorts of black-and-white, all-or-nothing thought patterns regarding them. It is either GOOD or BAD, CLEAN or UNCLEAN. I’m not saying certain foods aren’t more nutritious than others, but viewing things this black-and-white generally only leads to implosions and chaos.

(My “beach ball theory” of food chaos is that the more we try to keep our eating “under control” (by submerging the beach ball down in a rigid and aggressive, all/nothing way), the more likely it is for the beach ball to implode out of the water, causing all sorts of chaos w/ eating).

When it comes to emotions, we may use food to help cope w/ any number of feelings that are difficult for us to tolerate.

We may also experience what I call “meta compulsivity episodes,” where we keep eating chaotically because we are distressed about the PREVIOUS dynamics with food. Eating –> guilt/anxiety –> more eating out of guilt/anxiety.

Much more could be said, and if you are experiencing any of the dynamics described in the graphic above, I’d encourage you to seek the support of a therapist, dietitian, and/or trusted friend or family member.

Closing Thoughts to Consider:

From a nutrition standpoint…

Are you eating enough? Are you eating often enough? Sometimes getting a professional’s insight on this can be helpful.

From a psychological standpoint…

A simplified framework might look like…

Build awareness of your thought patterns
Question beliefs behind thought patterns
Replace w/ what is true, and/or helpful (such as flexible thinking instead of all/nothing)
Work on moving forward w/ desired action (such as eating breakfast) even though uncomfortable

From an emotional standpoint…

Seek to identify your feelings as often as you can
Journal out feelings regarding any chaotic food experiences (what was leading up to the experience, how did you feel in the moment/after regarding the food dynamics)
Consider working with a professional to develop new/healthier ways of managing feelings, as well as to explore the deeper layers behind what might be more “surface level feelings”