Five Simple Steps to Stopping a Binge
When you have a negative feeling, the thought of comforting and drowning yourself in food sounds like a wonderful idea. Your mind will be taken off of dealing with your emotions and food will heal all. This is the truth for about the first five minutes of binge eating. After that, you will continue to eat, but not because you are hungry. You will start to notice that your original feelings of sadness or other reasons will come back, along with new feelings of guilt because you just consumed so much food. Is there a way out of this crazy cycle?
Of course there is! Here are five steps that you can start implementing into your daily life to conquer a binge. The first step is to feel deserving of yourself. You need to feel that you are worthy enough to change your binge eating habits. Only after you do this and improve your self-esteem can you win the war over Binge Eating Disorder.
The second step is to throw out all foods in your house that you like to binge on. Remember, if the food is not readily available to you, it will be harder to binge. This also means when you go grocery shopping. When you don’t purchase foods that you binge on, it will be easier to conquer a binge while you are at home. You want to make it as hard as you can.
The third step is to buy a journal. In your journal, you are going to record all binges and what feelings were present during the binge. Record all details including the time, day, what you ate, how much you ate, and how you felt before and after the binge. Journaling is a great tool because this will provide insight to you as to why you turn to food like you do. This will help to narrow down your binges so that you will be able to see any similarities that happen when you binge.
The fourth step is to find a way to relax yourself. This is most important to do when you feel a binge coming on. Relaxation is very important in clearing your mind and turning away from the binge. Listen to nice, classical music, take a warm bubble bath, pamper yourself, go for a walk on a nice day, mediate, or picture yourself somewhere else where binging isn’t a part of your life. Another thing that you can do for relaxation is to go for a nice drive. Maybe you live by the ocean or a lake. Maybe you have some great scenic roads. Just remember not to take any money with you and try not to drive by anywhere that has food. You want to make the binge go away and you don’t want to be tempted to give in.
The fifth and final step to stopping a binge is to talk about it. Talk to a friend or anyone else that you can trust about how you are feeling. If you are upset, vent your frustrations out to them. Just having someone listen will be very helpful to you. You will feel that a weight has been lifted from you after you get everything off of your chest.
By: Kristin Gerstley
endbingeeating.com endbingeeating.com
Kristin Gerstley is the owner of endbingeeating.com endbingeeating.com which is a site that helps people overcome their Binge Eating Disorder. She also publishes a free newsletter offering tips on how to stop binge eating and regain control of your life.
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Brief Guide to Generalized Anxiety Disorder
General anxiety disorder, also referred to as GAD, is a feeling of constant fear that rests in one’s mind. It is an ongoing feeling of worry, of impending doom and upsets the daily life of the victim. People suffering from this disorder worry and fret about most of the things whether social, political, environmental, athletic, academic or artistic.
A free-floating anxiety or apprehension generally characterizes this condition. It need not be associated to a specific cause or situation, but people eventually inculcate the habit of worrying without any reason. People with this disorder live with a constant fear of failure in their minds, even if they have been successful in the past. They don’t mind going great lengths to perfect everything they are involved in. Adolescents with this disorder constantly yearn for praise as they are pretty uncertain and insecure about themselves. They develop a very pessimistic outlook towards life. A person suffering from GAD often has chronic, recurrent episodes of anxiety that last for several days, weeks or even months.
This disorder is a little more common amongst females as compared to males, and is found to occur in about 2 to 3 per cent of the general population.
A number of reasons can be listed down for GAD. Some people are genetically prone to developing it. Other factors include traumatic and disturbed childhood, stressful life events like a job change, a move, death of a beloved, marital spat or separations. Heart palpitations, sweating, trembling, nausea, easy fatigue, restlessness or feeling edgy, irritability, erratic sleep patterns and disturbances, muscle tension and difficulty in concentrating are some of its vital symptoms. The best way to deal with GAD is to consult a physician, who will thoroughly diagnose a patient’s condition, based on the description of the various symptoms. Certain medical conditions may also trigger off these symptoms, like substance abuse, heart disorders, thyroid disease, hypoglycemia or conditions such as depressive disorders. The patient may be advised tranquilizers, antidepressant drugs along with psychotherapy (both psycho-dynamically oriented as well as cognitive behavioral psychotherapy). A number of techniques such as relaxation exercises, breathing exercises and distraction that is, taking the anxiety out of one’s mind by focussing on other things have proved quite effective in getting over GAD.
e-AnxietyAttacks.com Anxiety Attacks provides detailed information on Anxiety Attacks, Physical Symptoms of Anxiety Attacks, Anxiety Attacks in Children, Causes of Anxiety Attacks and more. Anxiety Attacks is affiliated with e-AnxietyDisorders.com Generalized Anxiety Disorder.
Supplements for Athletes
There are two types of Athletes, the highly trained competing at the top level and the recreational athlete.
These two categories are subdivided into the various sporting activities that they take part in.
The dietary supplements that the two types of athlete require are different and within the sub categories this also holds true but without the same importance.
Athletes competing at the top level of their chosen sport will have coaches, dieticians and nutritionists to maintain and improve their competitive edge.
They will be on carefully monitored diets and supplements to maintain their bodies at the peak of fitness.
The recreational sportsman has to rely on his own resources.
Whatever our recreational sport and whatever our standard we all have a desire to excel, to improve and to win.
Apart from a natural ability, such as a good eye or fast reactions, not many will be content to plod along without making some effort to perform just that bit better, be a little more competitive.
That means that we must pay attention to improving our fitness and mental focus.
The first answer that comes to mind is physical training and practicing our sport and this is absolutely the correct initial approach.
At the same time our competition and our team mates are likely to be thinking along the similar lines.
If they are not you are very likely to over take them in the pecking order. It is just as probable that they will be putting in more or less the same effort as you.
So the next logical step forward in this competitive arena is to seek out additional ways to improve performance and to do this we only have to look at what the professionals do to tweak their abilities.
What they do is take nutritional supplements for athletes!!
There are best supplements for muscle growth, best supplements for stamina, best supplements for increasing energy levels, best supplements for injury recovery, exhaustion recovery, the list goes on and on, but most are not practical for the recreational sportsman.
The options for us fun athletes need to be narrowed for practical purposes.
Research has shown that the amount of essential minerals and vitamins that we obtain from our every day food is gradually diminishing. The reasons are given elsewhere on this website.
These substances that are so vital to the efficient functioning of our bodies and minds can be obtained from the variety of vitamin and mineral supplements that are commercially produced.
About 150 million people in the United States are thought to be taking nutritional supplements including vitamins and essential minerals.
An ever-increasing number of medical professionals are recommending a regular regime of multivitamin and dietary supplements to compensate for the lack of natural sources in every day diets to encourage good health.
Active sportsman can top up with extra amounts of vitamins and mineral supplements that are considered to be best for their particular sporting activity but take care not to over indulge.
Moderation is necessary as in some instances excessive exposure to certain supplements can cause problems, some of which can be serious.
The body also imposes its own limitations on the amount it needs so overdoing the supplements just becomes a waste of money.
Research the supplement market to find the products that will suit your particular needs, for example there are certain supplements essential for muscle development that will be helpful to weightlifters and other sports that have an emphasis on strength, similarly for runners needing stamina etc.
Just be sure that all the supplements and vitamins are manufactured to pharmaceutical standards and check the labels in the unlikely event that the product contains traces of any substances banned in sport.
For more information and advice on nutrition for athletes please visit nutrition.hotexercise.com nutrition.hotexercise.com
Fertility and Increasing Sperm Volume
The volume of semen released by a man during ejaculation is closely linked to the chances of conception. In order to fertilize an egg, a large amount of sperm is needed, often numbering to the hundreds of millions. For pregnancy to occur, one sperm cell must manage to survive long enough to reach, and therefore fertilize, the egg.
Under natural circumstances, producing hundreds of millions of sperm cells is not a problem for the average male. A man can produce can manufacture several hundred million sperm cells each day. However, problems occur when outside elements are introduced into the body, such as when a man begins to drink excessively or smoke on a regular basis.
When a man takes up drinking and smoking, his sperm count decreases, which reduces his possibility of fertilizing an egg. A poorly-balanced diet, drug use, and lack of exercise can also decrease the volume of sperm released at ejaculation. The same is true when a man experiences too many ejaculations in a short period of time, such as when he has multiple intercourse sessions within a day. Each ejaculation will reduce the amount of available sperm left within the body.
Men who are suffering infertility problems may try increasing the volume of their semen, and thus their sperm. As mentioned before, the amount of semen released by a man has a direct relationship with his partner’s pregnancy. To increase this amount, amino acids such as L-lysine, L-arginine, and L-alanine can be consumed. Other supplements worth looking into include ginseng and biloba leaf. These products increase both sperm count and improve sperm health, contributing to better fertility.
Jeanette Pollock is a freelance author and website owner of infertilitydomain.com infertilitydomain.com. Visit Jeanette’s site to learn more about infertilitydomain.com/2006/07/31/fertility-and-increasing-sperm-volume/ how to increase sperm volume.