Can You Die From Overeating?
Yes, it is possible to die from overeating. Consuming an excessive amount of food can lead to acute conditions like choking, food impaction, or even a heart attack due to the sudden strain on the heart. Chronic overeating can also lead to obesity and associated health risks such as diabetes, heart disease, and certain types of cancer.
What Is Overeating?
Overeating is a term that refers to the consumption of an energy intake that is inappropriately large for a given energy expenditure [1]. In other words, if you overeat, given that you have not done anything to release/give out the energy.
This behaviour can range from casual overindulgence to an obsessively overwhelming drive to consume food [2]. If this behaviour is repeated, it may lead to obesity or other clinical diagnoses such as binge eating disorder or bulimia nervosa [1, 2].
It is also essential to determine the source of the need to overeat, which might be either emotional eating or uncontrolled eating, both resulting in a profoundly negative impact on health and well-being [2].
Overeating is typically linked to emotional stress. The individual affected by it uses the food to soothe or numb the feelings that are threatening to the person [3]. It is also associated with increased consumption of energy-dense products, expensive body mass, and weight gain [4]. Alternatively, it can be a learned habit that might have been conditioned by various internal and external cues [5]. Further, it can also be a result of an addiction to a certain food, in particular, those with high concentrations of sugar, refined carbohydrates, fat, salt, and caffeine [6, 7].
What Is Happening In My Body When I Overeat?
When you overeat, your body responds with several changes to manage the abnormal food intake. Firstly, your body increases energy expenditure because it needs to work harder to process the extra food you have consumed [8, 9].
Apart from that, your autonomic nervous system's sympathetic and parasympathetic functions are altered. We observe increased vagal activity and enhanced baseline plasma norepinephrine levels [10].
The body must also store the excess energy, predominantly triglyceride molecules, in your subcutaneous and visceral fat compartments. This is precisely how overeating may result in obesity if the overeating continues for a prolonged period. Because your body’s fat storage capacity is exceeded, energy is stored around tissues and organs, which is not the case when eating normally [11].
Overeating may lead to metabolic disorders like impaired glucose homeostasis, lipid disorders and hepatic steatosis[12].
In addition, overeating can also affect mental well-being. It may affect your mood and emotions, which may lead to emotional eating and, thus, further overeating. In addition, when overeating is associated with reward and gratification, it may alter dopamine production, which then influences the reward and pleasure centres in the brain [13].
Can You Die From Overeating?
Overeating can lead to fatal outcomes. However, it is only when it results in conditions such as gastric distension, duodenal obstruction, and acute renal failure.
A case was reported where massive gastric dilatation, renal failure, and bilateral ureteral obstruction due to an overeating episode caused death [14].
In addition, there are mental health conditions that involve overeating, such as bulimia nervosa. For instance, a woman with such a disorder died because of intestinal obstruction caused by the excessive volume of food she consumed [15]. However, this is a rare case of such happening.
Another case of binge-eating episode causing a stomach rupture and then subsequent death due to the leakage of food material within the abdominal cavity was also reported [16]
Overeating may lead to fatal consequences due to mechanistic damage to organs managing food intake and processing. Therefore, it is important not to overeat intentionally. It is always best to maintain a balanced diet and avoid excessive food consumption. If you have a problem with frequent overeating, make sure to seek medical help.