How Binge Eating Affects Your Post-Workout Recovery

What is Binge Eating?

The binge eating cycle is described as a severe eating disorder characterized by frequent food consumption in large amounts without feeling the urge to stop. It could generally mean you’re eating uncontrollably, so even after your workout, you find yourself going for junk food that you should avoid in the first place. On occasion, almost everyone overeats, but when it feels out of control, you cross the line and become a binge eater.

To reap the most from your workout, you have to control how much and what you eat. Otherwise, you’ll be taking two steps forward in the gym and making three backward through your stomach. Some people use workout as an excuse to eat afterward. They don’t understand that the urge to eat after a workout cultivates a rewarding behavior, which gradually leads to overeating and finally binge eating weight gain.

How Binge Eating Impacts Your Post-Workout Recovery?

When you go to the gym, your goal is to stay fit and maintain a healthy lifestyle. However, many people cannot escape the temptation to catch some snacks after each workout session. This behavior is damaging as binge eating causes many health problems, including weight gain and problems such as high blood pressure, which could last a lifetime.

Despite burning calories during a workout, eating too frequently will undo your progress. You may not experience gains despite sweating calories away in the gym. If you have to eat anything after a workout session, make sure it’s food that does not contribute an insane amount of calories. It’s advisable to work with a professional to design a good workout plan that includes proper dieting.

In addition, binge eating causes depression. You feel depressed about your food habits. If the eating disorder leads to weight gain or another health condition, you may feel depressed. At this point, depression may in itself lead you into overeating as a coping mechanism, so it compounds your problem further. It’s even worse if you’re gaining weight despite spending hours in the gym trying to get fit. To realize any benefits from your workout, you have to fix your eating habits, including the type of foods you eat each day.

Eating uncontrollably will also raise the composition of body fat, which could mean a lower metabolic rate. More muscle mass helps you during your workouts, so gaining weight through body fat is not a good sign. When you overeat, you risk gaining weight and reducing your energy levels, which lowers your motivation to exercise or be active.

Warning Signs You Have a Binge Eating Disorder

Binge eating is usually not an occasional habit. The American Psychiatric Association recognizes binge eating as a disorder. So, if you’re unable to resist the urge to have a bite of your favorite snack after a workout, you might need to evaluate your life to know if you’re experiencing a clinical problem. Here are the warning signs.

• Using food to cope with negative emotions or celebrate experiences
• Eating unusually large amounts of food, especially in short periods
• Eating when you’re not hungry
• Feeling your eating habits are out of control
• Eating until you feel uncomfortably full
• Feeling disgusted, ashamed, or guilty about your eating habits
• Frequently dieting without weight loss

When you discover any of these signs, consult with a physician to find a cure as most of the time, the problem is psychological. The problem with binge consumption is that you never compensate for the calories you consume with a workout. Even if you binge after a workout, it’s detrimental to your health.

How to Recover From Binge Eating?

As with all other addictions, you first acknowledge you have a problem. With this information, you can outline how the disorder affects you and draft steps toward recovery. To avoid binge eating consequences, you have to understand what’s happening in your mind to cause this problem. It might be a struggle to flip the habit instantly, so the solution is to do it gradually. Here are actionable ideas to help you stop overeating.

Work out before a meal

You can combine binge eating and fitness but in a way that benefits you. One solution is to schedule your workout right before your main meals. This way, you’ll refuel with the food you would have consumed anyway, and you’ll avoid taking extra snacks.

Don’t eat out of habit

Many times, overeating after a workout is a consequence of routine more than anything else. If you consume a 400-calorie smoothie after each gym session, you develop that habit no matter how intense or how long your exercise was. The solution is to pick different snacks for each workout. During short workouts, consume fewer calories. Binge eating in bodybuilding is common because of eating habits that spiral out of control.

Drink water after your workout session

During workout, you lose fluids. Replacing these fluids should be the priority. Having a lot of water in your belly reduces appetite a little. As soon as you finish your gym session, guzzle water to quench the thirst and fill the space in your tummy. But don’t consume massive quantities as too much water can cause low salt levels in the body.

Refuel along the way

If your workouts last longer than two hours, a sports drink will keep your body feeling energized, and you’ll not get a ravenous urge afterward. Just avoid anything with protein as such food would take longer to digest.

About Thomas Nemel

The author of the article is Thomas Nemel. He is passionate about copywriting, workouts and cars. Thomas likes to write articles about  fitness and review the CBD oil tincture . He loves to stimulate people to engage in exercising and healthy living.