Night Eating

[Dawni962]

I suffer from chronic pain in my groin.  The pain wakes me every couple of hours and it takes another hour or so to get back to sleep.  During this time I binge eat and as a result have regained most of the 27lb I lost this year.  



Please Please Please can anyone give me some help.  My doctors are of no help at all.

[Roger Gould, M.D.]

You binge because you feel helpless or powerless...once you figure out what to do re the pain in your groin and your sleep disruption, the binge will stop. There are probably options you have not completely explored...

[Jaquta]

If pain is the trigger for the binge eating then eliminating or managing the pain would seem like the best solution.
What do your doctors say and are doing about your pain?  Pain is usually there for a reason.  Identifying and treating the source would seem the most helpful outcome.

Could you distract using another activity when the pain wakes you?

It must be very disillusioning to have worked so hard to lose weight only to have put it back on again.  
Don't beat yourself up about it but don't make pain an excuse to over-eat.
Don't let your doctors attitude discourage you either.

Dr Gould also has a website (shrinkyourself.com) that you may also find useful.

I believe you should follow-up with your doctor.  The pain in this instance seems like the priority.  Perhaps consider getting another opinion if they seem unhelpful or ask them to explain and clarify the situation.

Good luck.

[Dawni962]

Thank you for your helpful comments.

Just to give you some background to this problem.  I have had so many tests that I find it really difficult to keep going back the doctors.  I do believe they really do not know what to do to help me.

The only painkiller that seems to work is tramadol but I end up like a walking zombi.  Down to choice's and I choose to have my brain working.

I was feeling very low when I first came on the site but just having you reply has made me feel better.

The Expert is right but unless he can get my doctors to come up with some different options I really do not have any control.

[Totie]

What type of pain?

[Jaquta]

You're welcome!

Probably you feel embarrassed for them and possibly even partly responsible.
A good doctor would either diagnose the problem or refer you on.  None of this is your fault!!  A good doctor will always be aware of their limits and limitations.

Which is understandable really.  Feeling zonked out all the time doesn't feel great and isn't really a solution (not if it can be avoided).

Members and experts at medhelp help me feel better about myself too.  For the most part I've found members to be very helpful and supportive.  Not to mention empathetic, etc.

It would be somewhat amusing to see the expert stand over your doctors and order them to reach different conclusions and to come up with different answers.
I wouldn't mind seeing him go head to head with my treatment team either.
Alas, life is never that simple.

I have a few other suggestions.
If you can't get on top of your pain you might like to try reading the book, Full Catastrophe of Living, by Jon Kabat-Zinn.  Or something similar.  I think his philosophy is to focus on mindfulness (meditation) to combat pain.  He runs, or ran, pain clinics.  It could be worth a go.

My first suggestion though would be to check out the undiagnosed symptoms expert forum.  I remember seeing it and I just had a look and the expert is responding to posts.  The expert there may have some suggestions or be able to point you in a particular direction.

One final thing.  You mentioned feeling very low when you first came here.  Physical things can really drag our mood down so just be cautious of that and if you feel depressed at all then talk to your doctor about it.  (That's one they should be able to help with.)

Also, don't let doctor's just make this about weight, not if it's caused by something else.  Both my parents have had sore groins at various times: my mother's was due to a blood clot from doctor's accessing her femoral (artery or vein -I can't remember which).  My father's was from a hernia.
Keep looking.  I'm not sure what options the doctor was referring too.

Just wondering if sleeping pills would help with the sleep.  I guess that just gets real messy and if the pain is that intense it's going to wake you anyhow.

To Totie.  We were talking about chronic groin pain.