ALBANY, N.Y. -- Grabbing a handful of cookies off the plate, stealing a roommate's food, overeating while home alone. These could be signs of compulsive overeating.
In the United States, the nation's fixation on weight is only making the disorder more prevalent, specialists say. The number of support groups for people whose lives are controlled by food has risen sharply in recent years.
Jim M., a member of Food Addicts in Recovery Anonymous in Saginaw, Mich., tells a typical story.
''I didn't have that switch that says, 'You've had enough.' I just always wanted more and more and more," said the former college football player, who like other 12-step program members wouldn't allow the use of his full name.
Jim's obsession was so great that he constantly broke off social engagements to eat giant piles of food in the privacy of his home.
''I just always made food my priority," he said.
Since 1998, the number of support groups hosted by Food Addicts has grown from about 20 to 300 nationwide. Overeaters Anonymous, founded in 1960, now has more than 4,300 meetings in the country.
David Levitsky, a professor of psychology and nutrition at Cornell University, in Ithaca, N.Y., said compulsive overeating is becoming more widespread, in part because the country has a growing obsession with weight loss. Dieters make a religion of calorie-counting, starving themselves until their bodies rebel with a binge.
That sets off an ensnaring cycle of guilt, dieting, and binge-eating, he said.
Binge-eating disorder is more prevalent than anorexia or bulimia, according to the National Association of Anorexia and Associated Disorders.
Even thin people and those of average weight can be possessed by binge eating, said Susan L., who chairs the group Food Addicts. The only uniting characteristic is an overwhelming preoccupation with food, she said.
''Not all overeaters are obese, and not all obese people are overeaters," she said.