I feel like eating, specifically bingeing, at very predictable times.

In the mornings, I am not tempted to eat when I'm not hungry. I rarely get the urge to eat a big breakfast. The idea of a diner-style breakfast with bread product, meat product plus eggs makes me feel ill. Plus, for the last couple of years I have taken thyroid medication which requires that I not eat for an hour after taking, so I can give more thought to what I want to eat in the morning.

Times when I do feel like eating include late night, or nighttime if I have had alcohol drinks. Another time I want to eat is the middle of the night. If I wake up, immediately my mind turns to food, specifically a bowl of cereal with either soy or rice milk.

Last night was worse than usual. I think it may have been my worst binge ever. I'd had some rum and Diet Coke while browsing internet sites and doing a little writing. I didn't have that much though, nothing over the top.

At some point the "binge switch" was tripped. I had a craving for eggs, so I cooked two and added some cheese. With that, I had a thinnish slice of toasted homemade cheddar onion bread. Almost immediately following that, I had some leftover chili con queso with some tortilla chips. Then, I had some ice cream.

The amount of food and calories that I consumed in that short amount of time was likely less than the average "American-style" restaurant meal (Friday's, Bennigan's, Denny's, etc.). Yet, for me, it was as though my stomach was filled to overbrimming. When I laid down to try to sleep, I had possibly the worst case of reflux ever. I felt like everything I ate was going to come back out the way it went in. Imagine a spilled soda bottle on its side. That was how I felt.

In retrospect, I think what triggered this binge was that I didn't eat what or when I wanted at all yesterday. I didn't eat at all until dinner time. I fed LD her breakfast, took care of LD when David when to the office and then cooked lunch for them later. I didn't eat at lunch because I planned to go to the gym after David got home and I had fed them. I won't go the gym immediately following a meal.

When I got home from the gym, I was hungry, but we were expecting a visitor so I wanted to either be in the shower (and out of view) or at least clean, so I put off eating.

Finally, when the coast was clear for me to eat, it was dinnertime so I just made a very rushed dinner of leftovers and salad for everyone and ate what I made for them (but less). It was my first food of the day and my meal was about being an example for LD (large salad, vegetables, small entree) and being the manners enforcer rather than fulfilling my hunger. Yes, these were foods I enjoy but I didn't have breakfast or lunch, and I didn't feel taken care of. At all. And not that David and LD are expected to take care of me, but I didn't take care of me.

So I supposed that could have contributed to the binge. At the end of the evening, I was all by myself, just me and the food. And notice, during my binge, not a vegetable in sight!

Being addicted to food is horrid. Yes, I am sure there are bigger nightmares in the world, but as far as commonplace afflictions, I think this has to be one of the worst.

Many "normal" people are quick to assume that overweight people are merely big, fat, stupid slobs with no self-control whatsoever. I've heard people say, "Quit crying and put down the fork" as a solution to the weight problems of others.

For a food addict, putting down the fork is about as easy as it is for the heroin addict to put down the needle. Many people are more sympathetic toward the heroin addict. At least heroin addicts are not usually fat.

Do people really think that it never occured to us to put down the fork or to eat less?

Food addicts come in small, medium, and large sizes. The small and medium-sized food addicts usually slip under society's judgemental radar because they are thin and therefore to be envied, or average in weight and therefore are normal. But, the only difference between the fat food addict and the thin food addict is the quality of their purging.

I had a very good friend who worked out regularly, looked great, and attracted a lot of attention from men. Undoubtedly many women would have done almost anything to look like her. Would they feel the same if they knew that every night after work, she drove through three different fast food restaurants and binged in her closet, while she cried? Would they feel the same if they knew that she vomited this food back up and also took laxatives daily?

Many people might have sympathy for this attractive woman. And, in spite of these issues (and I say issues because no one with a food disorder doesn't have other issues to go along with the food problems), men were interested in her. She did look good.

Now imagine an obese person driving through three fast food restaurants, and then binging in the closet. Do you think there is any sympathy for that person?

No. They should just put down the fork. Right? After all, someday it will dawn on all the fat people that society hates them and it is very easy to be normal or even slender, and all they have to do is stop eating so much. Then they'll become thin and all their problems will be resolved.

Someone ought to write a book on that, they'll be rich.