Non-Food Restrictions and What It Means For You

One of the questions I ask potential clients in our consult calls is if they are noticing restriction in other areas of their life. This usually stumps them, because they don’t see the connection between food restriction and other areas of their life. But, when I start providing examples, the lightbulb usually turns on.

The restriction and bingeing cycle exists outside of how you eat.

An easy example is with money. Let’s say you go to Target and you intend just to get shampoo and a new USB cord. This is all you’ve budgeted for and you really want to save money. So you are reminding yourself the whole drive there about your budget and how you’ve got to be good this time. But, somehow on your way to electronics, you see the new home goods display and grab a new throw pillow. And somehow you’ve picked up a few items on your way to the shampoo and suddenly you’ve spent $100. You come home feeling upset with yourself for not following your budget and for not being “good”. The new items both feel good to have but also feel a little shameful to have. You decide to commit to your budget even more now and you vow the next trip to Target will be different.

I’m totally guilty of this! Can you see how the restrictive self-talk and spending spree binge are similar to each other?

Honestly, can you see the shame in this pattern?

When I work with folks around restriction/binge cycles with food, I always make sure we bring in the other areas of our life where these cycles show up. The most common areas I see the cycle are:

• Money

• Emotions

• Boundaries

Here are some examples of how these kinds of restrictions can look like:

• I don’t feel anger, I only feel annoyed. I’m not someone who gets angry. (Restricting emotions)

• I don’t want to say anything to my coworker about how their comment made me feel, because I don’t want them to get mad. (Restricting emotions and boundaries)

• I need to be good with spending and I can’t go shopping at all this month. (Restricting with money).

Do these sound familiar? Bingeing in these cases can look like:

• Passive aggressive jabs at the person you’re angry or hurt by.

• Isolating yourself.

• Over-spending the next time you go out.

• Exploding with emotion in a different area of your life, such as by crying or getting angry at someone else.

I will be honest- I see this pattern a lot with caregivers and parents especially. Caregivers have to keep so much of their emotions to themselves throughout the day as they prioritize their children or loved ones. I often see folks who come to me with worries about their food binges. When we explore the bigger patterns in their daily lives, we will often see the binge time is their only time for themselves they’ve had all day.

To me, this is connected to a sense of empowerment and agency.

So how can we change this pattern and why is it important to change?

Your emotional needs are valid and deserved to be met. That doesn’t mean we get to live our lives like toddlers, allowing every feeling to take over the room. It does mean we don’t shove our feelings down all day long while trying to ignore them. It does mean we speak up when others hurt us and it does mean we respect our needs and wants as valid.

To do this requires you first get in touch with your emotions, your needs, and your wants. This is sometimes easiest to do by connecting to your body. Other times it may be helpful to journal, talk with a trusted friend, or spend more time being quiet with yourself. This is often a step for folks requiring assistance, like therapy or coaching.

Then, we bring in self compassion. I have a whole course on self compassion on my website that can aid in this part of the process. The whole point of self compassion is this: to validate your emotions as understandable, and to learn to give yourself care in that emotion. It sounds very simple, and sometimes it is! Sometimes this brings up a lot of emotion and historic pain, and here again I want to offer the option of a therapist to help you in this process.

The bottom line is that you deserve a life that is expansive, fulfilling, and authentic. You deserve to eat delicious and nutritious food, you deserve to feel the full range of emotions, and you deserve to have your needs met.

You do not have to keep yourself small in any way.

For assistance with connecting to a more engaging and fulfilling life free from restricting yourself, check out my e-courses and resources here on my website. I’m available for one-on-one therapy as well, and there are links on my page to help you find providers in your area.