Just "one last binge/cake/pizza..."

Have you ever decided that you were going to go on a diet or "be good" from tomorrow and then noticed that you gave yourself permission to have "just one last"... binge/cake/pizza/dessert/bottle of wine...? Basically by deciding to go on a diet or restrict your food intake the following day, you then gave yourself permission to eat LOTS the day prior to the diet. This is a very common thing and is something that is often called "the last supper effect". If you feel as though you will only get one more delicious meal for a long-time, of course you are going to go all out and over-indulge. Yet the problem with this mentality is that once you begin your diet, or "being good" you may end up breaking one of your diet-rules, and then decide "I've ruined it, so I might as well have ONE LAST binge again and then start again tomorrow".... and so begins the cycle of bingeing/overeating and restricting.

The last supper effect is something that I see very often with clients that I work with and there are a range of different tools that can be used to stop you from getting into that trap of promising yourself that you will "start your diet tomorrow" and then end up bingeing/overeating. There is also research that has been published on the last supper effect and how it can actually end up driving individuals to eat a lot MORE than they would otherwise. For example, a study conducted by the university of Toronto in 2002 took a group of participants, randomly assigned them to 2 groups and told one group that they were going to go on restrictive diet the following week (whereas the other group was not told to go on a diet). Immediately after being given this information, both groups were asked to complete a food tasting task in which the researchers measured their food consumption. Those in the group that had been told that they would be on a diet ate 50.3% more than the other group (an average of 44g of food instead of 14g). This research shows the psychological impact that just telling yourself you are going to go on a diet can have on your food consumption. Rather than helping you to eat less, it often causes the opposite effect and drives you to eat more over the long-term.

This is why, when I work with clients, I help them to change the way that they think about food. Once we change their mindset and the thoughts that they have about food, this then has a profound effect on their natural food choices. A lot of what drives our food choices is often psychological - our thoughts and mindset around food as well as the habits that we have built around food, have a huge impact on what we end up eating day-to-day. If you would like to free yourself from the trap of the "last supper effect" and change your mindset around food so that you can finally get healthy in a sustainable way, I have built an 8-week binge-eating and over-eating treatment programme that will completely transform your relationship with food and help you to get healthy without it feeling like a constant battle or struggle. You can find out more about this programme here: https://www.thefoodtherapyclinic.com/online-binge-eating-treatment

Binge-eating and over-eating is usually not just about not having enough willpower - it is often a pattern of thoughts and behaviours, a mindset around food, that drives you to keep over-eating/bingeing. If you are ready to break free from this cycle then please get in touch.