Vanessa,

This will be a long entry. Apologies in advance.

If you never heard of it, I want to introduce you to something called Structured Eating (SE). Structured eating is just planning in advance that you will eat every 3 hours. Some people prefer 3 meals and 3 snacks; others like 6 small meals. There are advantages and disadvantages to both, so I recommend you try it both ways. I like the sensation of being a bit full, so I prefer to eat the meals/snacks, but if you hated being full, you might want to go the other way.

It's important to have protein in your main meals (breakfast, lunch and dinner) and to have carbs in all your meals (so that your body has the energy to keep going). In that way your urge to binge will be lowered quite a lot, because your body will be having what it needs.

I started structured eating 13 months ago, and have been trying to stick to the 3 hours frame as much as I could. Especially at the beginning I was in desperate need to have something I could trust and rely upon, and the 3 hours frame did wonders for me. The other side of the same coin is that by eating every 3 hours you create a pattern your body and your mind can start rely on. Every time that I have a urge or a binge-thought, I have something I can use to try to calm it down, because I know that I will be eating shortly: it's an hour, sometimes a couple, but I know I am going to eat soon.

Personally I don't decide what to eat during the day in advance, I don't prepare it the day before - this doesn't work with me as it tastes too much like a diet. Others do a meal plan and schedule out everything. I leave it to my intuition to decide what to have for a meal or a snack, although even in this case it's "structured intuition" in the sense that with the time I am practicing my skills when doing my weekly food shopping or going over a menu' when I eat out. I try to buy the food I know I will feel safe with.

If I have lunch at the office, I prepare my lunch box in the morning. I like leave something open to my intuition and try to feel what I am up for rather than preparing it in advance (but again I know this can be very triggering especially at the beginning of structured eating).

When I travel, I rehearse like crazy for the meals, stick to the 3 hours even during long flights or jet leg, and decide a bit in advance what 'type' of food I will have for every meal in general terms (general like 'a sandwich', or 'a fruit and yogurt' or 'a chicken curry' and so on), so I am not clueless (and most prone to anxiety and binging) when it's time.

The most important thing is to keep moving toward recovery. It can take a while to learn how much food your body needs and overcome the fear that you'll keep gaining-and-gaining-and-gaining if you eat normal meals and snacks. It's okay if it takes a while! It's okay if you're still restricting and you keep slipping ever 3, 10, or 30 days, That's fine!! You just have to keep trying. Most newbies have an inaccurate sense of what recovery is like. They see the 'success' cases, the people who, for whatever reasons (social support, a happy life, low stress work, committed personality, completely 'over' bulimia, etc.) are able to stop bingeing right away.

It is NOT the norm to 100% stop the BP cycle after deciding you want to quit. It IS okay if you are still restricting or bingeing. If you were binging 6 times per day and now you're down to 6 times per week, that's 700% improvement.

So, here's how I would prioritize behaviors in recovery: THE MOST important thing is to be honest. The second most important thing is to keep trying. The third most important thing is to not purge. The 4th most important thing is to not restrict. The fifth most important thing is to not binge.

Vanessa, take some time to test, experiement, see what it works for you and what doesn't. Structured eating wants to be an ally, not an additional constraints. It takes time to find what works for you with it, I am still experimenting with it and see that things keep changing, so really every meal is different from another and the frame develops as you practice it.

Please don't give up!
Bub