How to Stop Purging: What Actually Helps Break the Cycle

First things first—welcome. I’m really glad you’re here. Even reading this blog post is a meaningful step.

If you’re here, there’s a good chance you’re looking for something practical. Something that explains what’s actually happening in your body and brain—and what to do when the urge to purge shows up. You may already recognize the pattern: urges that rise after eating, a short sense of relief, and then the cycle starting all over again.

As an eating disorder therapist in Orlando, I work with many people who feel trapped in the cycle of purging. You may have already tried to stop on your own, but found yourself struggling. When the urge feels too strong, it’s easy to feel helpless, ashamed, or like you’ve failed. I want to be very clear: this is not a willpower problem.

Purging is a behavior that becomes reinforced over time. It’s often linked to fullness, anxiety, blood sugar changes, and learned relief. When you understand why the urge happens, change in eating disorder therapy becomes possible.

This guide focuses on real, evidence-based ways to reduce purging urges, stabilize your body, and build alternatives that work in everyday life.

Ways to Stop Purging: What This Guide Covers

In this guide, we will:

• Define restriction

• Define purging

• Define binge eating

• Explain what leads to purging

• Break down the restrict–binge–purge cycle

• Build the foundation for breaking that cycle

Then we move into practical tools:

• How to build motivation to stop purging

• Ways to reduce triggers before urges show up

• How to manage urges to binge eat and purge when they arise

Defining Restriction, Purging, and Binge Eating

What Is Restriction?

Restriction is any way of eating that doesn’t give your body enough food, consistency, or variety to meet its needs. It doesn’t always look extreme. Often, it shows up in subtle ways.

Restriction can include:

• Time-based restriction
  Eating only at certain times, delaying meals, or setting cutoffs like “no eating after ___” (including intermittent fasting).

• Food-type restriction
  Avoiding entire food groups (like carbs, fats, or sugar), eating the same “safe” foods repeatedly, or avoiding foods you enjoy because of fear.

• Portion restriction
  Eating smaller portions than you want or need, stopping before satisfaction, or rigidly measuring food.

• Compensatory restriction
  Eating less after a binge, purge, or “overeating,” or planning to restrict the next day to make up for it.

• Rule-based eating
  Following strict diets (Keto, Paleo, Atkins), needing to earn food, eating only if you’re “hungry enough,” or eating only “approved” foods.

• Mental restriction
  Allowing food physically, but judging yourself for eating it or telling yourself you don’t deserve it.

• Macronutrient restriction
  Avoiding calories, carbs, fats, or protein beyond what your body actually needs.

• Volume eating as restriction
  Filling up on low-calorie foods to avoid eating enough or to avoid fullness from more satisfying meals.

• Emotional restriction
  Ignoring hunger because emotions feel overwhelming or inconvenient.

• Exercise-driven restriction
  Eating less to compensate for workouts or to “match” exercise.

• “Healthy” eating used as control
  Choosing foods based on fear or rigidity rather than nourishment.

What Is Purging?

Purging is any behavior used to try to get rid of food, calories, or the feeling of fullness after eating.

Purging behaviors include:

• Self-induced vomiting

• Misuse of laxatives

• Misuse of diuretics (“water pills”)

• Use of enemas

• Misuse of medications or supplements to cause vomiting, diarrhea, or fluid loss

• Chewing and spitting out food

• Fasting or severe restriction after eating to “undo” a meal

• Compulsive or driven exercise used specifically to compensate for eating

What Is Binge Eating?

Binge eating involves eating a large amount of food in a short period of time.

Common features include:

• Feeling a loss of control while eating

• Eating even when not physically hungry

• Eating quickly, urgently, or secretly

• Bingeing alone due to shame or fear of judgment

Sometimes people feel like they’ve binged because the amount feels large to them, even if it wouldn’t be considered large to someone else. These are called subjective binges.

What Leads to Purging?

The Restrict-Binge-Purge Cycle

Before talking about how to stop purging, it’s important to understand why it often happens.

Restriction and yo-yo dieting are often at the center of the binge–purge cycle. Restriction doesn’t always mean barely eating. It can look like skipping meals, eating less to “make up for it,” cutting out foods, or telling yourself tomorrow will be different.

When your body isn’t sure when it will be fed, it reacts. Hunger gets louder. Food thoughts increase. Urges to eat can feel overwhelming. This isn’t a personal failure—it’s your body trying to protect you.

Purging can happen whether or not someone truly binges. For some people, the binge feels large but isn’t objectively large. For others, it is. Either way, the urge to purge is often fueled by discomfort and fear afterward.

After a binge, many people respond by restricting again. That restriction sets the stage for the next binge, which can make purging feel like the only way to cope. But purging doesn’t break the cycle—it tightens it. Eating regularly and reducing restriction helps your body trust that food is coming, which can soften binge urges over time.

You Need to Stabilize the Restrict-Binge-Purge Cycle

At Bloom Psychological, we recogognize that stabilizing blood sugar is one of the most important steps in breaking the binge–purge–restrict cycle.

When blood sugar drops too low, the body goes into panic mode. You may feel shaky, anxious, irritable, dizzy, or suddenly very hungry. Eating can feel urgent and hard to stop. This is not a lack of control—it’s your body trying to survive.

After a binge, fear of weight gain or discomfort from fullness can lead to purging and then restricting again, which causes blood sugar to crash. Over time, this trains the body to expect deprivation, making urges stronger.

Eating regularly helps calm this response. Meals and snacks are most stabilizing when they include:

• Carbohydrates (bread, rice, pasta, potatoes, fruit, cereal, crackers)

• Protein (eggs, yogurt, cheese, tofu, beans, fish, nuts)

• Fats (butter, olive oil, avocado, peanut butter, nuts, seeds)

These work together to keep hunger manageable. Toast with butter and eggs is more stabilizing than plain toast. Yogurt with fruit and granola works better than fruit alone.

Nourishing your body isn’t about eating “clean.” It’s about giving your body enough fuel so it doesn’t feel like it has to take over.

Honoring Satiation and Savoring Food

Satiation means feeling comfortably full and satisfied—not still craving more. This is harder to notice when eating feels rushed or guilt-filled.

Savoring can help. Try choosing a food you enjoy, like a favorite chocolate. Break off a small piece and let it melt in your mouth. Notice the smell, texture, and flavor. This helps your brain register satisfaction instead of urgency.

Savoring isn’t about eating less—it’s about eating in a way that feels enough.

Motivation to Stop Purging

When you try to stop purging, anxiety often shows up with convincing myths.

Myths vs. Reality About Purging

Myth: Vomiting gets rid of the calories I ate.
Reality: Research shows the body absorbs about half to two-thirds of calories, even when vomiting happens immediately.

Myth: Purging prevents weight gain.
Reality: Purging often increases bingeing and slows metabolism over time.

Myth: Laxatives or diuretics cause weight loss.
Reality: They cause fluid loss, not fat loss.

Myth: Purging is the only way to relieve fullness.
Reality: Purging makes fullness and bloating worse over time.

What Are the Consequences of Purging?

Purging causes real physical and emotional harm over time, including:

• Tooth erosion and very expensive dental damage

• Swollen salivary glands (“chipmunk cheeks”)

• Burns and callouses on fingers

• Esophageal tears and bleeding

• Bloating, constipation, and slowed metabolic rate

• Loss of hunger and fullness cues

• Dangerous electrolyte imbalances

• Strain on work, relationships, and daily life

• Increased shame, anxiety, and depression

Purging slowly takes away energy, focus, and connection—even when no one else knows.

Identify the Losses

In eating disorder treatment, I encourage clients to ask themselves:

• What do I avoid because of purging?

• How much mental energy does this take?

• What has secrecy cost me?

• How has this affected my relationships?

• How does my body feel after purging?

• What would I continue to lose if nothing changed?

Ways to Reduce Triggers That Lead to Purging

This section focuses on changing the conditions that make binge eating and purging more likely before the urge even shows up.

• Track the feelings or situations that lead up to an episode

  Pay attention to what is going on for you right before you experience the urges to purge. Normally, there will be a thought that occurs, followed by an uncomfortable emotion. This pattern tends to lead to symptom use as a way to cope. Work with a therapist who can help guide you through these triggers in a more manageable way.

• Map your high-risk patterns

  Identify the days of the week, times of day, and situations when purging most often happens. Patterns matter more than individual episodes.

• Identify high-risk locations

  Notice where purging usually occurs (specific bathrooms, bedrooms, being home alone, after restaurants). Location is often a stronger trigger than emotion.

• Design your schedule around risk windows

  Instead of hoping urges won’t appear, plan around the times they usually do. Build structure into those windows.

• Plan the opposite of isolation

  If purging tends to happen when you’re alone, plan activities that involve being around others—especially in public or semi-public spaces.

Examples:

• Meeting a friend at a café or restaurant

• Reading a book at a local coffee shop or library

• Attending a class (pottery, art, fitness, language)

• Game nights or standing weekly plans

• Volunteering or running errands during that time

• Avoid “empty time” after meals

  Unstructured time right after eating is a common trigger. Schedule something neutral and predictable for post-meal periods.

• Create routines that replace purge-linked habits

  If purging follows a specific sequence (come home → TV → binge → purge), intentionally change one or more steps in that chain.

• Limit access to purge-associated spaces

  Keep doors open, spend time in shared rooms, or arrange your environment so bathrooms or private spaces aren’t the default after eating.

• Reduce secrecy opportunities

  Plan your day so there are fewer long stretches of being alone during high-risk times or reach out to someone you trust to hold you accountable.

• Stabilize eating earlier in the day

  Consistent meals and snacks reduce biological vulnerability later, lowering the likelihood that triggers escalate into urges.

• Revisit and adjust weekly

  Triggers change over time. Reassess what’s working and update your plan rather than assuming it should look the same forever.

Managing Urges to Purge

When the urge to purge shows up, it usually isn’t random. It’s often the result of a combination of body sensations, thoughts, and emotions happening at the same time. Understanding these pieces can make urges feel less overwhelming and easier to interrupt.

Body Sensations

Urges to purge are frequently triggered by physical sensations in the body, especially after eating.

• Feelings of fullness, pressure, bloating, or nausea
  These sensations can feel intense or alarming, particularly if you’re not used to eating regularly or have a history of purging. The body may interpret normal digestive sensations as something that needs to be “fixed.”

Coping Skills for Uncomfortable Sensations

• Fullness is a sensation that typically peaks within the first 15 minutes and falls within 30.

  The anxiety and urges to purge will follow the same pattern. Turn on a timer for 30 minutes and see for yourself. How long does it take your body to feel differently? How long for the urges to decrease?

• Challenge the thought: Fullness does NOT equal weight gain.
  Even eating a very large amount in one sitting does not automatically cause weight gain. Weight gain happens when the body consistently stores excess energy over time—not from a single episode. After a large intake, much of the energy is used for digestion and to refill depleted energy stores in the body. This can cause temporary fullness, bloating, or scale changes, but that is water and digestion—not fat gain. Turning food into body fat is a gradual process that requires repetition, not one moment. What leads to weight changes over time is the binge–purge–restrict cycle itself, not a single day or meal.

• Distract from the sensation.
  While the goal is to not purge, in reality, it’s normal to not be successful on your first few tries. Instead, the goal should be to put as much time as possible between the urge and the action. See how long you can go! In the meantime, distract yourself. Create a go-to list of 3 activities that last at least 10 minutes each.
  Connect with nature, go for a walk, write a gratitude list, watch an episode of your favorite show, call your best friend, color – or better yet – paint.

These sensations are uncomfortable, but they are not dangerous, and they do pass when the body is given time.

Thoughts

Urges are often fueled by automatic thoughts that feel urgent and convincing in the moment.

• “I need to get this out right now or I will gain weight”
  I know this feels so urgent right now – and I promise you – it’s your eating disorder lying to you. Purging is not accomplishing what you think it is or want it to. Research shows that even if you purge immediately after eating, vomiting will get rid of only about half of the calories you consume. You are so much better off avoiding the consequences that come with purging, treating yourself with love and grace, doing some self-care, and focusing your energy on preventing the next cycle.

• “I need to go exercise and burn this off or restrict tomorrow.”
  I get it. If purging won’t get rid of those calories, at least I can burn them off – right? Ehhh. Exercising puts your body in a state of depletion, which increases hunger. Your brain and body are designed to alert you of depletion – and make sure you don’t ignore the alarm. That means until you adequately refuel, you will have constant cravings – which will lead to another binge.

  “But I can refuel in a healthier way!” Yeah – you could, but purging and exercise depletes your body to the point that it will demand the type of food that quickly stabilizes blood sugar. These foods are typically starchy, sugary, or salty and often trigger another binge. If they don’t immediately do so, they will typically set you up for the cycle the next day. If you don’t believe me - test the theory out!
    
  These thoughts promise relief, but they are short-term solutions that keep the cycle going. The relief purging provides is temporary, while the urge tends to return stronger the next time.

Coping Skills for Eating Disorder Thoughts

• Read through the myths about purging,

• Play the tape forward – you’ve probably already tried doing what you’re thinking in your head, what happened last time?

• Ask yourself – what do I lose by purging?  

• Slow down your racing thoughts by regulating your body – your heart is probably beating faster, your breaths are likely shallower.
  Close your eyes and imagine that you are in the place that makes you the happiest.
  Pull to mind every sense. What do you see? Hear? Smell? Feel? Taste?

Feelings

Strong emotions are a major driver of purging urges, especially when they feel overwhelming or unbearable.

• Shame — feeling bad about eating, your body, or the urge itself

• Disgust — toward your body or the sensation of fullness

• Helplessness — feeling trapped or out of control

• Panic — fear that the feeling won’t end

• Anxiety — a sense of urgency or internal pressure to act

Purging often becomes a way to escape these emotions rather than process them. Unfortunately, it tends to increase shame and anxiety afterward, restarting the cycle.

Coping Skills for Strong Emotions

When emotions spike, the goal is not to “process” them — it’s to get through the wave without purging.

For Shame & Disgust

• Change clothes (loose, soft, no mirrors).

• Sit upright rather than curled inward — posture affects intensity.

• If Shame or Disgust were a character - what would they look like? Imagine IT is the one saying those things to you.

• Talk BACK to your inner bully - and get angry:
  “I am not interested in taking feedback from someone whose sole purpose is to tear me apart.”
  “Literally NO ONE asked you for your opinion.”

For Panic & Anxiety

• Slow the body first (not the mind):

• Inhale 4 seconds → exhale 6 seconds, repeat for 2–3 minutes.

• Lower stimulation: dim lights, silence notifications, reduce noise.

• Temperature shift: hold something cold or splash cool water on your face.

For Helplessness & Feeling Trapped

• Sit in a non-bathroom space (couch, bed, porch, coffee shop).

• Set a short timer (10–15 minutes) and commit to not deciding anything until it ends.

• Choose a passive, predictable activity: familiar TV show, audiobook, folding laundry, scrolling something neutral.

• Move. No. Not to burn calories - to shift from racing thoughts to a moving body. Have a dance party, jump up and down, go for a walk. Do not use this skill if it is going to trigger exercise!

For Urgency & “I Have to Act Now”

• Delay, don’t deny:
  I’m not talking about 15 minutes - I’m talking about 2. Your goal is to teach your body, “I can pause.” Tell yourself, “I can decide later.” Urges lose intensity when not acted on immediately.

• Keep hands busy: hold a pillow, stress ball, ice, or wrap up in a blanket.

• Stay visible: be in a shared space, keep doors open, or be around others.

Stop Purging Today:
Dr. Kait Offers Eating Disorder Support in Orlando, FL, and Nationwide via PSYPACT

If you're supporting someone with an eating disorder—or if you're the one struggling—know that professional guidance can transform the recovery process. At Bloom Psychological in Orlando, FL, we specialize in compassionate, evidence-based treatment for eating disorders, body image concerns, and the complex emotional challenges that accompany them.

Whether you're seeking therapy for yourself or looking for guidance on how to better support a loved one, Dr. Kait understands the nuances of this journey. Recovery is possible, and you deserve support that meets you where you are—with warmth, expertise, and without judgment.

Ready to take the next step? Reach out to Bloom Psychological today to schedule a consultation. Healing begins with connection, and we're here to walk alongside you.

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Other Therapy Services at Bloom Psychological in Florida

At Bloom Psychological, we know that trauma can impact every part of life, far beyond food or body image. That’s why, in addition to Therapy for Complex Trauma and Therapy for Eating Disorders, we offer specialized support for individuals navigating a wide range of emotional challenges.

Our trauma and complex PTSD therapy helps you safely explore painful past experiences, rebuild trust in yourself, and create a foundation for deep, lasting healing. We also offer eating disorder therapy and support for Anorexia, Atypical Anorexia, Bulimia, Orthorexia, Binge Eating, Exercise Addiction, and Body Dismorphia. Additionally, our individualized support for UCF students (University of Central Florida) is available to those facing stress, identity questions, and mental health concerns in the midst of a pivotal life chapter.

Wherever you are in your healing journey, Bloom Psychological offers a compassionate, trauma-informed space to be seen, heard, and supported.

About the Author

Though I now call Florida home, my Jersey roots still shape who I am: honest, grounded, and authentic.

I’m Dr. Kait Rosiere (pronouns: she/her/hers), a clinical psychologist who specializes in body image, eating disorders, and complex trauma. I am a Certified Eating Disorder Specialist (over 2000 hours of specialized eating disorder training) based in Orlando, Florida.

I want to start by saying that I’m so glad you’re seeking help. We don’t always give ourselves credit where it’s due, and this is no small step.

Maybe you’re taking it because you feel lost or empty. You’re tired of feeling sick — or tired of feeling tired.

I’ve been there, I’ve walked that walk, and I’d be honored to guide you through your own healing journey. I’m here to tell you that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel and you don’t have to find it alone.

Full recovery from your eating disorder is possible. Together, we can discover the most authentic, glowing version of you.