The curse of binge thinking

Are you a perfectionist? Always comparing yourself to others? Then you could be one of the millions suffering from ...

YOu’re sitting at home trying to watch TV, but a trivial row with your husband earlier in the evening starts to dominate your thoughts.

Your mind begins to race and flit from one negative thought to another — how could I be so rude, I’m a hopeless wife, what if he leaves me?

On and on it goes, for hours, until your mood is so low, it’s all you can do to haul yourself to bed — where it still carries on.

experts call this ‘binge thinking’ — a form of emotional oversensitivity that often spirals uncontrollably into nervous anxiety or a sense of anger at the world, and leaves you feeling defeated.

It can affect every area of your life — from intimate relationships, to work, to friendships, to self-image.

In my 34 years of work as a therapist and counsellor, I’ve come to the conclusion we’re in the grip of a binge-thinking epidemic. My specialism is stress, and I’ve seen time and again how overthinking ramps up the stress levels and has a physical impact on the body itself.

Binge thinking particularly affects women, and this summer’s Cambridge university study revealing that anxiety is twice as likely to affect women as men came as no surprise to me.

Binge thinking lies at the root of many cases of female anxiety, but there are ways to combat it. read on to find out how . . .

Are you . . . trying to make your life perfect?

BInge ThInkIng and perfectionism often go hand in hand.

Fact: Perfection doesn’t exist. Trying to make all aspects of your life perfect is impossible and can only set you up for failure and self-blame. For perfectionist binge thinkers, the smallest flaw can sustain hours of anguished introspection. Why did I get so nervous during that meeting at work? I’ll never have the perfect sex life unless I lose weight . . .

Classically, the overthinker doesn’t stop at one ‘failure’, but finds her mind racing to other areas of her life, until the negative thoughts reinforce each other and create habit-forming connections in the brain.

Taught from an early age not to upset other people, women are particularly prone to this highly self-critical form of binge thinking.

STOP! You can’t escape overthinking until you recognise it. If you get angry when even small things go wrong, you need to take a step back. give yourself a break and accept your standards aren’t realistic.

Are you . . . always watching everyone else?

SOCIal media has made this easier. everyone feels a pang of envy when looking at other people’s holiday snaps, but binge thinkers take it to a different level — not only obsessing about the work status or social lives of others, but thinking about them irrationally, too.

When people make assumptions based on very little evidence, we call it cognitive distortion; and binge thinkers are masters of it.

You pass another woman your age in the supermarket. She’s nicely dressed, so you assume she’s welloff, happily married and has three high-flying children. undoubtedly, she’s doing better than you. and later, you recall her well- cut coat and let your thoughts race away.

Soon you believe the reason she didn’t smile at you is because she thought you weren’t worth knowing.

Be aware that the tendency to compare can be quite random — a story in the paper about a breakthrough novelist or a powerful businesswoman can equally trigger a bout of torturous self-scrutiny.

STOP! learn to distract yourself as soon as you feel the pull of anxious rumination. all you need is ten minutes doing something else. use that mental energy to do the crossword, or throw yourself into gardening.

Do you... catastrophise?

OVerThInkerS are apt to ‘write a script’ — and the plot rarely ends happily. If you’re stuck in a rut of binge thinking, you’re more likely to imagine the repercussions of your actions in the worst way possible.

The meeting that went badly at work? after an hour or so of catastrophising, you’ve been sacked, you’ve defaulted on the mortgage and you’re living in cardboard city.

Catastrophising is often at the root of health anxiety, too — a form of hypochondria, which itself is binge thinking — working yourself into a frenzy of anxiety over small physical symptoms until you’re convinced you have some terrible disease.

STOP! every time you have a thought that threatens to trigger a bout of catastrophising, jot it down. Then, with a clear head, think of a rational response to it. ‘I snapped at my husband. I’ll apologise and he’ll know I love him.’

Do you... find it impossible to let go?

In ManY ways it’s natural to let thoughts dwell on loss in the aftermath of a break-up or bereavement. Traumatic incidents take time to absorb and I’m always amazed when people think they should be ‘over them’ in mere months. It can take much longer to get over a divorce and two years to recover from the death of a loved one.

But involuntary and uncontrollable binge thinking after loss is not healthy either, particularly when it starts to cause physical symptoms of stress such as headaches and a weakened immune system.

Stress is a biological fact. You might start to pick up more colds or have problems with digestion. Paradoxically, binge thinking can also cause an inability to ‘think straight’ because your head feels cluttered.

Binge thinkers tend to let their minds flit from the concrete to the abstract, so re-visiting a sad event becomes something deeper: why am I here when they’re not? What’s the meaning of my life? Will I be alone for ever?

Small hurdles also become hugely overblown. I once had a client who became stuck on the question of her own identity as a widow: on a passport renewal form was she Mrs or Miss? It preoccupied her so much, her mind was whirling with anxiety.

STOP! Try to remember your loved one positively. how did they make you laugh? When were you both happiest? after divorce, wrench your thoughts from worries like loneliness and financial constraint, and instead re-imagine your life in terms of new freedoms.

accept offers of support from friends and family. Plenty of people also see bereavement counsellors.