What I Wish Women Knew About Binge Eating

"I just cannot stop snacking."

"I gave myself too many cheat days this week."

"I am good all day and then I ruin it at night."

"I feel so guilty after eating that much."

Sound familiar?

If you've ever said these things, you've probably also wondered why you're so obsessed with food. Maybe you've asked yourself what is wrong with you - why can't you just stick to a diet? Why does food seem so easy for everyone else?

You may have even asked yourself, "Am I a binge eater?"

But what I bet you haven't asked is:

"Do I have an eating disorder?"

Most women don't.

And part of the reason is that we've completely lost the plot when it comes to understanding binge eating.

Today, I was sitting on the patio of a local coffee shop enjoying my second iced coffee of the day (well, it was matcha but caffeine is caffeine). To my left, two women were swapping ideas for making snack dips “healthier” (news flash, black beans simply CANNOT be chocolate!). To my right, an employee on their lunch break was eating leftovers from a glass container so small I wouldn't even hand it to my toddler without a side dish (I wouldn’t be giving him glass containers anyway, but that’s beside the point). At my feet, a little brown bird hopped around looking for crumbs.

Only one of these creatures was eating according to its body's cues.

Spoiler Alert: it was the bird.

The rest of us were doing what modern women have been trained to do: thinking about food, managing food, optimizing food, earning food, avoiding food, measuring food, compensating for food… all while wondering why food takes up so much space in our brains. Turns out, we’ve become so afraid of binge eating that what we’re actually doing is blindly walking directly into it’s open arms.

How We Lost the Plot:

Somewhere along the way, we started using "binge eating" to describe almost any eating behavior we feel guilty about.

Had dessert? Binge.

Ate chips after dinner? Binge.

Ordered takeout twice this week? Binge.

But binge eating is not a synonym for overeating. It is not a synonym for enjoying food. And it is definitely not a synonym for being imperfect.

We didn't arrive here by accident. For decades, women have been sold the narrative that vigilance around food is health & discipline and that controlling our bodies is self-care. Then we're surprised when food occupies more and more of our mental space, and guess what, we slapped a problematic term on that too (enter “food noise” into the chat).

Just like saying "I'm so OCD with folding the laundry" doesn't mean you have Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, calling every guilt ridden eating episode a binge and every food thought food noise does not mean someone is experiencing binge eating.

You might think I’m being a little sensitive, but the problem is more than just semantics. When we casually label every uncomfortable food experience as a binge, two things happen:

First, we reinforce shame: every meal becomes evidence that we're failing, every craving becomes proof we're out of control.

Second, we create immense confusion about when someone actually needs help: the question arises “isn’t everyone like this?”, and truly struggling people sit in my office every day wondering if they even deserve support because they've spent years hearing that we all struggle this way. This drives people straight to the quick fixes like diets & weight loss drugs and perpetuates the cycle all over again.

To some degree, yes. Most people occasionally overeat. But there is a difference between overeating and binge eating.

According to the DSM-5, binge eating involves consuming an objectively large amount of food within a discrete period of time while experiencing a sense of loss of control. It is often accompanied by eating rapidly, eating beyond fullness, eating when not physically hungry, eating in secret, and feeling intense shame or disgust afterward.

For some readers, that description may hit close to home.

For others, the bigger realization might be this: You aren't binge eating. You're just hungry.

You're restricting all day and your body is screaming at you to eat at night.

You're trying to satisfy a craving with foods that don't actually hit right.

You're spending so much mental energy trying not to think about food, that food suddenly becomes all you can think about.

So, How Do We Find the Plot Again?

The irony is that many of the behaviors marketed as solutions to food obsession and binge eating can instead, intensify it. Binge eating is emotional by nature, but it is also biological. When your body consistently receives the message that food is scarce, forbidden, or tightly controlled, it responds exactly the way a body is designed to respond: it becomes more focused on food.

That isn't weakness. That's survival.

Real binge eating deserves real treatment. Not because someone lacks willpower and needs a rigid plan to “fix” themselves, but because eating disorders are complex conditions involving biology, psychology, relationships, coping and oftentimes a focus on healing co-occurring  disorders like trauma.

Recovery will never come from finding the perfect diet, supplement or food rule.

It comes from understanding what your behavior is trying to accomplish for you, and then building a healthier way forward focusing on values based coping instead.

So, what do I wish women knew about binge eating?

I wish they knew that not every extra serving is a binge.

I wish they knew that unwarranted guilt is not a diagnostic tool.

I wish they knew that food taking up space in their mind is often a sign to get curious, not critical.

I wish they knew that for generations women have been taught to distrust themselves around food, when the reality is we have known how to fuel ourselves all along.

And most of all, I wish they knew that whether they're struggling with occasional overeating, intense food thoughts, or a diagnosable eating disorder, they deserve more than shame as their treatment plan.