I have heard the term Exercise Bulimia a lot from clients recently. While exercise bulimia not an official DSM V diagnosis, the DSM does specify that bulimia nervosa includes binge eating combined with compensatory behaviors such as excessive exercise in order to not gain weight. So, compensating for binges through excessive exercise is bulimia nervosa.
This was a profound realization for me in my own journey. I thought exercising wasn’t as “bad” as vomiting, so I could justify my behavior. Hey, it was socially acceptable–even commendable–to go run enough miles in a day that one would think I was training for a marathon. No one would know that I was doing it to compensate for binge eating, right?
When Is Excessive Exercise A Problem?
Just like with any behavior that gets in the way of living your life fully, exercise bulimia interferes with your vitality, your energy, your relationships, your health, and your ability to be fully alive. So how do you know when exercise is too much?
Answer these questions to learn if you may be exercising to the point that it’s detrimental to your life or pushing to the edges of exercise bulimia.
You feel anxious or panicked if you can’t exercise.
You obsess or can’t stop thinking about exercise.
You find yourself distracted from normal activities (school, work, conversations with loved ones) because you’re thinking about your next workout, how much food you ate that you need to get rid of, or how to squeeze in enough calorie burning for the day.
You hide or lie about how much you exercise.
You have injuries from exercise that you ignore or that won’t heal.
Your entire day is ruined if you can’t exercise.
Your whole life is built around your exercise schedule.
You ignore other areas of your life so that exercise can be top priority.
You have little to no other hobbies that do not include exercise.
You become angry at loved ones who want to do things with you that take up too much time away from exercise.
You spend an excessive amount of time recovering from exercise. Time that could be spent on other pursuits.
What Is Recovery From Exercise Bulimia Like?
Similar to recovery from bulimia, the journey to recovery from exercise bulimia will include:
Nutrition work (including learning how to eat regularly throughout the day, to eat all food groups including sugar and treats in moderation, and how to listen to your body’s hunger and fullness signals).
Body image therapy or coaching.
Learning how to cope with your emotions without going to self-destructive behaviors.
Un-learning the attitudes and behaviors around food that are no longer serving you.
Becoming aware of your patterns so that you have a plan in place to not resort to your old behaviors.
Dealing with the root causes of exercise bulimia.
Improving your sense of self and generating good feelings about your life.
Challenging yourself to find new hobbies and enjoyable activities outside of exercise.
Setting goals for you life and being able to go after them in an attainable, balanced way.
Will I Ever Be Able to Exercise Normally?
Absolutely. Exercise is a normal enjoyable part of life. You will find a new relationship with exercise so that you can do it for pleasure rather than punishment, purely for calorie burning, or for compensation for how much food you’ve eaten. Discovering new ways to exercise that feel supportive of your recovery and fulfilling in your life will be key. You will likely not return to your former levels of exercise, unless you are a competitive athlete (in which case it will be very important for you to ease into your former levels of training with a new mindset and new set of tools). Recovery takes time and persistence. It can be very challenging at times, but the new life that you get to live free of obsession around food, weight, and exercise is 100 percent worth it.
If you’re interested in learning more about bulimia nervosa, this article from the National Eating Disorder Association is a great place to start: https://www.nationaleatingdisorders.org/learn/by-eating-disorder/bulimia
And, if you’re curious about why you binge eat and what that has anything to do with exercise bulimia try my recent blog post: https://eatingrecoverycoach.com/2019/10/21/why-do-i-binge-eat/
