You may have promised yourself more times than you can count that this time you're going to do things differently.

You'll stop overeating at night, cut out sugar, get yourself back on track, decide to stick to the plan this time and be even more disciplined. You know you can do it when you really put your mind to it - and yet, somehow, you keep falling off again.

And after an evening where you've eaten far more than you intended, tomorrow - or Monday - can feel like the perfect place to start over.

For a while, it may even work. Until you're tired, stressed, sick of thinking about food, hungrier than you expected, or the day simply doesn't go according to plan. 

And suddenly you're back in that familiar conversation:

“I've ruined it now anyway. Fuck it - today's a bad day, I'll start again tomorrow.”

And somehow, once you've crossed that line, 20 extra calories and 2,000 extra calories can start to feel like exactly the same thing…

And perhaps the most frustrating part is that you already know so much.

You know what a balanced meal looks like. You know that eating until you're uncomfortably full isn't what you actually want. Sometimes you're even completely aware of what you're doing while you're right in the middle of doing it.

And still, it can feel as though you can't quite access everything you know at the very moment you need it most.

Over five days, we'll look at why this keeps happening - even when you know better.

We'll start with the thoughts, rules and decisions that can make food take up so much space in your head, and look at why trying even harder to control your eating can sometimes become part of the very cycle you're trying to escape.

We'll explore what happens in those moments where it can almost feel as though another part of you takes over, why food can become such an effective way to switch off, get some relief or finally relax, and what may have been happening long before you ever opened the cupboard.

And perhaps most importantly, I'll show you a different place to begin - one that doesn't require another diet, another set of rules or becoming even better at controlling yourself.

Because perhaps you don't need another answer for how to finally get this right, but to understand why it has been so difficult in the first place.

Hi, I'm Camilla

I'm a registered dietitian, binge and emotional eating coach, therapist, somatic embodiment facilitator  and founder of The Body of Freedom Method. I've spent years working with women who know an enormous amount about food, health and everything they think they should be doing - but still find themselves struggling with cravings, overeating, emotional eating and binge eating, thinking about food far more than they want to and constantly trying to get their bodies back under control.

Many of them are left with the same question:

I’m a smart and resourceful woman, WHY can’t I handle my food issues?

My work looks beyond the food itself, because eating doesn't happen in isolation. It happens inside a body, a nervous system and a life - alongside hunger, stress, restriction, emotions, exhaustion, learned patterns, body image and the relationship you've developed with yourself over the time of your life.

When we begin looking at the whole picture, much of what has felt frustrating or impossible to understand around food can begin to make a lot more sense. And when we understand what is actually keeping the pattern going, we can begin untangling it and finding a way out.

If you've recognized yourself in what you've read here, this is where I would begin.