"What is the binge restrict cycle?”

Lucy Newport • November 26, 2023

Reading time: 5 mins


I believe this cycle is more prevalent in our culture than we know. 


It’s a pattern that many women unintentionally find themselves in when trying to take control of their weight through what they eat. And because it’s a pattern that’s surrounded by feelings like guilt, shame and failure, those of us stuck in it often keep it a secret. 


Maybe that’s why you’ve found yourself here. Because you have an idea of what this cycle might be, but aren’t exactly sure how it fits in with you or your loved one's relationship with food.


The secrecy around binge eating is so unfortunate because in keeping these experiences to ourselves, we’re denying this deeper connection to one another and the support and healing that can come with it. 


The ‘binge restrict cycle’, also often referred to as the ‘binge eating and restricting cycle’ generally has four main stages, though, of course, these will vary from woman to woman, person to person. 


In this short guide, we’re going to explore each of these stages and how they play into one another.



The cycle in a nutshell 

Here’s a short video briefly explaining each stage in the binge restrict cycle: 

Now you’ve got this overview, let’s dig in a little deeper…



Stage one: A sense of “not enough” 


This is how the binge eating and restricting cycle usually begins; you feel a sense of “I’m not good enough” or “I’m not worthy enough” or simply “I’m not enough” and feel that if you could just lose a bit of weight or reach your ideal body size, you’d be fixed.

That you would be whole.

In this first stage, you’re believing that your worth and the way your body looks go hand in hand which simply isn’t true! And it’s okay if you’ve believed this for most or all of your life. This is what many of us have been taught by our society. 


(My work is all about showing you there is another way!)

Stage two: Dieting for weight loss

This is the ‘restriction’ part of the cycle where you limit what you eat through dieting, counting calories, fasting, doing cleanses or anything else where you’re restricting what you eat. 


The type of restriction we’re talking about is any rule you have about food that is linked to your desire to change the shape of your body. 


It’s a rule about what you eat, how much you eat and when you eat. And it can be really sneaky too. You may not feel as though you have strict food rules and that instead you’re “just being good” but this can also have a huge impact on your relationship with food. 


Intense exercise can play into restrictions too, which may look like you only being allowed to eat something if you’ve done X amount of exercise, or exercising until you’ve burnt X amount of calories. 

Stage three: Urges for food


Because of these restrictions, you begin to notice your body urging you to either eat more food or to eat certain types of food. This happens on both a physical and a mental level.

At the physical level, you may not be giving your body the energy that it needs to do all of the incredible things it does. Or you may not be giving yourself the full range of nourishment you need, especially if you’re cutting out a whole food group like carbs or fats.

And so your body urges you to eat because it’s simply trying to survive (and dare I say it, thrive!).   


At the psychological level, we want what we can’t have. As soon as you say “I’m not eating that” you are likely creating this tension within yourself where you want it more. And the more you can’t have it, the more you want it and so again you get these urges to eat that particular food.

This is often referred to as the forbidden fruit effect. Can you see how this has played out in your life both with food and other things you’ve wanted but told yourself you can’t have?


These also explain why it is that once you “give in” and start to binge, you don’t stop until you’re uncomfortably full. Because this part of you that’s urging you to eat knows that once the other part of you that restricted “wakes up”, it’ll put those rules back in place. 



Stage four: Binge eat 


You reach this stage after repeatedly ignoring the messages from your body to eat either in general or to eat a certain food. You go from potentially being able to eat and enjoy some of what it is you want to feeling as though you’ve been possessed as you rush home from the supermarket to hide away and binge. 


What tends to happen after a binge is that you feel guilty or disappointed in what you’ve done and try to “make up for it”. 


And so you restrict your food again, maybe even making your food rules tighter in an attempt to make sure that you don’t have a repeat of the binge. It’s that “my diet starts tomorrow and this time I will be good” moment.



I think it’s worth noting here that not everyone who goes through stages one and two will start binge eating. 


Some might experience a gradual “falling off the wagon” where their food rules get more and more relaxed until they’re back to where they started with their eating. These people, although they end up eating those previously restricted foods, tend to still judge what they’re eating and themselves for eating it, creating this dissonance in their relationship with food. They’re not truly free, or even fully enjoying it. 


Others can keep up with diets and other restrictions for a long time. But again, if this desire for weight loss comes from a place of wanting to fix how their body looks, they’re not loving and accepting what they have. And by restricting their food, they may also be restricting their relationship to life! Consider that for a moment…


What I find really interesting about the binge restrict cycle is how you can go around and around it, not wanting to truly look at the fact that to stop bingeing, you have to do something different. It took me a long time to see this at least. You think that this time, somehow, the next diet will be the one that you stick with. 



But this is what my mini-course Breaking the Cycle will teach you; how to free yourself from your binge eating and restricting cycle without feeling uncontrollable around food. 


It’s very much an experiential course so instead of just learning how to get out of the cycle, you’ll begin taking action in ways that feel safe and nurturing. It’s the initiation into a different way of eating that as you work with it over time, takes you deeper and deeper into true food freedom.

If you know deep in your bones that it’s time to try something different, you can learn more and enrol in Breaking the Cycle here. I hope to see you there. 



Learn more in my mini-course 'Breaking the Cycle'