A binge-eating disorder is a serious nutritional problem characterized by episodes of overeating that is repeated at least twice a week for a period of several months. Recurrent episodes of binge-eating are usually associated with eating much more rapidly than normal, eating an amount of food that other people would consider excessive, eating when being not physically hungry, feeling uncomfortably full after binge-eating, eating alone because of embarrassment, and feeling guilty after binge eating.

All these symptoms may also be found in bulimia, another severe eating disorder, but the difference is that bulimia is always associated with compensatory behaviors. This may be vomiting, using a laxative, fasting (not eating anything for more than 24 hours), excessive exercising and other inappropriate ways to avoid become overweight. People with a binge-eating disorder do not purge their body of excesses calories, and in the meantime they can consume from 10000 to 20000 calories throughout a day, that is why most of them are obese (have more than 20 percent above a healthy body weight).

Obesity may complicate such severe diseases as diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, atherosclerosis, gallbladder disease, and particular types of cancer. Also binge eating provokes psychological problems. These people have permanent feeling of embarrassment, guiltiness, shame, and have no self-confidence. In most cases people with a binge eating disorder cannot solve their problem by themselves and need a professional treatment.

Initially if a patient can abstain from eating trigger foods it is very useful. However, the most effective binge eating solution is cognitive-behavioral therapy, interpersonal psychotherapy, and treatment with medication, self-help groups and others. The type of treatment is determined for each patient individually. But there is a binge eating solution that can be useful to any of them. First of all, patients are recommended to learn to express their feelings (both good and bad feelings) because their suppression may be one of provocative factors for a binge eating episode. A patient cannot abstain from eating trigger foods if they cannot learn to suppress the desire to eat.

This seems like an easy-to-follow binge eating solution: identifying and abstaining from trigger foods. But the more effective binge eating solution lies in identifying the emotional and psychological consequences that motivate an individual to eat.

The patient must clearly understand that his inappropriate appetite has nothing to do with real hunger and must learn to differentiate these feelings. An efficient binge eating solution can be maintaining a food diary. The patient should write down every aliment consumed in a given period of time and try to identify trigger products (the specific food that may provoke binge-eating episodes), and food that he prefers to eat during binge eating. The patient must abstant from eating trigger foods and avoid keeping them in the house. It is also important to eat only at established meals times and avoid fad or very restrictive diets as they may aggravate binge eating. Only by learning to identify trigger products can a patient actively begin to abstain from them.

Psychotherapy helps patients discover and admit their emotional problems and solve them. It is important to have self-confidence, as negative emotions such as stress, fear, and shame can act like trigger factors. Although binge eating disorder is a newly recognized condition, health care professionals have established a binge eating solution that can help affected people return to a normal life.