-Advertisement-

Scary Things That Happen To Your Body When You Overeat

Have you ever wondered how to stop binge eating? Or, how to stop overeating during your meals?

We wanted to find out exactly what happens when we sabotage our diets, so we consulted two experts on the body and its reaction to food: Lisa Eberly, RD, MPH, and Nicole Aurigemma, MS, a physiologist at Penn State Muscle Biology Lab.

But before you start digging into pie and potatoes with reckless abandon and no foresight, here’s a rundown of exactly what goes on in your body during and post-binge.

What is binge eating?

A binge is relative to everyone’s personal eating habitsand body and doesn’t necessarily have a quantified threshold. Both our sources described it as eating more food and more sugary and fatty foods than you would in a given meal.

Many of these symptoms can become more severe with consistent binge eating, less so if you’re balancing your feast with healthy habits.

Here are scary things that happen to your body when you overeat:

Your stomach stretches

“Your stomach is very elastic … like yoga pants!” Eberly explained. “The exact size varies from person to person, but the average adult can hold about one liter (the size of a Chipotle burrito).” We like how she explains things.

“When eating a huge meal, the stomach can stretch up to four liters.”

(She noted it’s like wearing a dress or pair of pants that are two sizes too small.) But as mentioned, your stomach is elastic and returns somewhat quickly to its one-liter state. This isn’t the case if you keep binge eating.

“However, when you overeat, particularly somewhat regularly, your stomach can stretch permanently,” she said.

“So, those who regularly eat past feeling full may have bigger stomachs than those who don’t, leading them to need more food to feel full … a very vicious cycle.”

And there are factors that can make this situation even worse. Eberly said, “When you drink soda or beer with dinner, those gases contribute air into this stomach and intestinal space, stuffing it further.” Keep carbonated beverages to a minimum, and “try ginger tea.

Stomach tissue malfunctions

Eberly also told us that “the tissue at the opening of the stomach that tells the brain you’re full can malfunction.”

This part of your body is called “an electrical conduit pathway.” That pathway essentially “asks” your brain if your body is full and satiated. Within 20 minutes, the brain signals and lets you know that you’re full.

But if you overeat, “you risk this malfunctioning long-term, making it more difficult for your brain to recognize fullness.”

 Your brain has an addiction-like response

Aurigemma noted that this “highly palatable food” can have interesting and possibly dangerous effects on the brain.

“Overconsumption of these highly palatable foods can trigger neuroadaptive responses in the brain reward system, similar to those seen in addiction,” so if you’ve ever wondered if sugar is actually a drug, here’s your proof.

Let’s look at how this works: When you eat regularly, you feel a normal sense of hunger when you need food.

This is because the “hormone called ghrelin is increased before meals and stimulates appetite.” Those same hormone levels “decrease after food is consumed.”

Then you feel full, and you can move on with your day. It’s not the same during an overload of stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, pie, cocoa, eggnog, etc.

“With a high fat and sugar binge, the ghrelin remains elevated even after eating,” Aurigemma said. This means that you don’t feel as satiated and your brain doesn’t know when to stop.

Then there’s the feeling of addiction, thanks to the release of dopamine.

She explained that “on top of influencing appetite, ghrelin also activates the dopaminergic neural pathway involved in regulating reward and motivating behaviors; so by eating fatty and sugary foods, your ghrelin levels remain increased, which activates the dopaminergic pathway to release dopamine you start to crave these highly palatable foods because these foods make you feel good due to the dopamine release. This leads to a pretty vicious cycle.”

“If you have a tiny bit, you’ll want more; however, the more you have, the more you’ll want. The brain feels rewarded after eating comfort food, and overloading that rewarding sense can create an addictive and habitual cycle.”

She noted that it’s important to remember that one big meal isn’t going to throw you off course, but “overeating regularly is where you run into trouble.”

The dangerous territory is when you feel like you can’t “quit” food because our bodies are “naturally hardwired to seek high-calorie foods (thanks, evolution.)”

She encourages us to balance sugary carbohydrates and fat with protein and greens to keep ourselves in check.

Hormones are released and fat is stored

While ghrelin stimulates appetite, other hormones keep it in check and stimulate a full sensation … but this process c take up to 20 minutes, so if you’re eating quickly and ravenously, “you may eat far past fullness before your brain gets the memo,” said Eberly.

“Oxyntomodulin and Peptide Tyrosine Tyrosine (also known as PYY)” are the satiety hormones that make you feel full, Eberly told us.

“They’re secreted by the intestines when you eat a high-calorie meal, and when this reaches the brain, it tells you that you’re full,” she said.

“Additionally, a hormone called leptin tells the brain how much energy you currently have, and how much food you need  kind of like a bank account living paycheck to paycheck.”

This hormone also triggers your brain to stop eating, and as Eberly put it, says to your brain, “Bro . . . bro . . . put the fork down.”

Because you’ve consumed more energy than your body needs (unless you’re running a marathon after your holiday meal), “the metabolic chemical reactions that process food work overtime to metabolize all that food,” Eberly said.

“It gets stored as fat rather than being converted to energy . . . I know this one seems obvious, but yes, overeating equals extra fat.”

“This is particularly true with foods that contain high-fructose corn syrup,” said Aurigemma, “which has been shown to increase fat accumulation.”

She noted that upping your carb intake drastically can lead to “the increase in expression of genes involved in de novo lipogenesis, which essentially is the conversion of dietary carbohydrates to fat, which is then stored within the body.”

Your blood sugar goes on a wild ride

When you binge, “the pancreas produces extra insulin to process the sugar load from the carbohydrates and remove it from the blood,” said Eberly.

And it doesn’t stop there. “Your body will produce insulin until your brain learns that the sugar levels in the blood are safe.”

“But hormones don’t move as fast as we think they do,” she said. By the time your brain gets the memo that your blood sugar is normal again, your levels are often too low and below the healthy threshold. “This leads to exhaustion, dizziness, nausea, and even depressive symptoms.”

And big surprise: “These symptoms often make us want to eat more food, particularly carbs,” she told us. Her suggestion again was to go on a 20-minute walk after your meal.

 

Leave A Comment

Your email address will not be published.

You might also like