I just read "Overcoming binge eating", by Dr. Christopher Fairburn.

Brief summary:

Binge eating is a recent phenomenon: it appeared just a few decades ago. It
affects mostly young women, due to the social pressures to be thin. About 1 to
3% of young women binge at least twice a week. A binge eating problem can last
several years, and in some cases almost a lifetime is wasted on thoughts about
food and on eating. Many try hard during the day to overcome the urge to
eat, but binge at dinner (on average 80 minutes, 3000+ calories).

The main paths to bingeing are something like:

     -->dieting ---> anorexia ---> binge eating
    |                                  |
    |__________________________________|

or

being overweight --> dieting <----> binge eating


which is worsened by self-induced vomiting or misuse of laxatives.

Most common triggers of binge eating: negative feelings (depression,
anxiety, loneliness), having nothing to do, thinking about food,
eating (anything at all).

Common patterns: sense of loss of control, self-induced vomiting or misuse of
laxatives, eating in secret, shame/guilt, restrictive dieting, excessive
concern about shape/weight. The foods eaten during binges are usually
high in fat and carbohydrates, easy to eat, don't require any preparation,
and are the "forbidden foods" (chocolate, cookies, ice creams...)

Any binge eater can seek professional help or try a self-help program, but the
cure usually lasts several months. The self-help program involves several steps:
self-monitoring, establishing regular eating patterns, finding substitute
activities, recording and solving problems (a "problem" is something which
triggers binge eating), reintroducing the "forbidden" foods in the diet.


Comments:
--------

Probably few raw food eaters have problems losing weight, but I claim that
the scheme described above, with a few modifications, applies to a
substantial percentage of instinctos and fruitarians. The following is
largely based on hearsay (or "read-e-mail") and imagination, but is
probably not far from reality:

 1) Instinctos and fruitarians share the goal of detoxing. In addition,
instinctos believe that the more pleasure they have, the more they will
detoxify. Thus, the "fear of gaining weight" described above just has to be
replaced by the "fear of toxemia". Both instinctos and fruitarians have
restrictive diets, and thus "forbidden foods". Instinctos refuse all
"non original" foods, and fruitarians... only eat fruits, which is aggravated by
a strong vegan dogma and hostility towards those who eat animals.

 2) As the diet is restrictive, it leads to cravings, even exceptions,
cheating and eating in secret. That pattern is more common among fruitarians
(I believe).

 3) I don't know if any raw food binge-eater uses vomiting, but raw food,
and especially fruit, is laxative in itself. And cassia, which is of
course used to help cleansing/detoxifying, has a strong laxative effect
which helps to keep the digestive tract at a reasonable volume [that part
is only speculation from me, as I have very little experience with cassia]

 4) Due to their restrictive diets, many raw-fooders may have negative feelings
like loneliness (especially during meals). And as instinctos and fruitarians
follow extreme diets, their thoughts are excessively turned towards food,
and may lack substitute activities.


Let me add that, one of the "myths" of instincto, is that the causes of
overeating are "non-originality" of the foods and social conditioning.

 *non-originality: certainly our ancestors were protected from binge eating
because original foods gave them clear instinctive stops (and in addition,
they had less food available, exercised more, had less depression...). Nowadays,
eating exclusively wild food would keep binge-eating at a manageable level,
but eating without pleasure beyond the instinctive stop is definitely bingeing
and a widespread behavior among instinctos.

 *social conditioning: we were force-fed during our childhood. Burger often
accuses the "une cuillere pour maman..." ("one spoonful for mummy..."). In
addition, it is impolite not to finish one's dish, etc...

I don't deny the "social conditioning" factor, but I definitely believe
that it is not the root cause of binge-eating. Improving the quality of
the food may help correct the symptoms (besides contributing to Burger's
bank account), but won't suppress the real causes.

askj gszjh tgwas ,a
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^C^C

Oops, I just dropp@d my fruit on th@ [log in to unmask] H@y! What happ@n@d??

^C^C^D^X
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