AmandaJayne
Trainee Maintainer
I keep telling people food addiction is just as powerful and in some ways harmful as any other addiction.
When I was craving for that French Bread it was as powerful, if not more so, than anything I ever experienced with alcohol [I have been abstinent from alcohol for over 10 years so I know what I'm talking about]
If you said the side effects of a certain drug was massive weight gain, cardiac problems, diabetes, low self esteem, joint pain, Cancer of the colon etc etc,[ the list is endless] the government would make it a Class A drug.
Obviously you cannot abstain from food long term. But interestingly enough A.A don't say you cannot drink, they just say you CAN'T DRINK ALCOHOL.
I would argue certain foods for food addicts like us are addictive, some are not.
UNREFINED CARBOHYDRATES are addictive. i.e Sugar, pastries, white bread, white pasta. How often did you ever crave salad or vegetables or even lean meat ?
My argument is that when we return to food we should avoid certain foods for good. If we do not it is likely we will put all the weight back on. Most of us can never moderate our intake of unrefined carbs. We should treat sugar etc as an alcoholic does alcohol. If we do not I feel we may never totally recover form this addiction.
An alcoholic can never go back to controlled drinking [I work as a nurse on an Alcohol detox unit]. We can never go back to eating unrefined carbohydrates safely without it going out of control. The physical reason for this is the mood altering effects of an insulin rush [which you get when you eat unrefined carbohydrates].
It is people denying this or not believing it that results in 90% plus of people who lose weight putting it all back on again. Try to be one of the 10% that don't.
MORE PEOPLE DIE OF OBESITY [AND THE COMPLICATIONS OF IT] THAN ANY OTHER DRUG INCLUDING CIGARETTES AND ALCOHOL.
Thanks Mr Creosote, for starting this thread. I have a lot of sympathy for your opinion. There is no doubt that certain foods awaken a need in me to consume them, without needing to be physically hungry in the first place, until there is none left.
Sadly, the bottom line is that I am individually responsible for what I choose put in my mouth. I'm not happy about this, but it is an undeniable fact. Therefore I have to find a way to deal with this 'addiction'. I could stop eating the food which makes me feel this way - but this just seems to lead to a sort of 'waiting game' thing, where somewhere in the future I wait to 'fall off the wagon'. and when I do, I do it big time.
So, therefore I have to learn to live with it. Learn to be vigilent to the dangerous times, and more importantly learn to have the will to deal with them when they happen, not close my eyes/mind to what is happening. It starts and ends with me, no one else.
KD - thanks for your link to that article. Where do you find these nuggets of wisdom? Keep them coming.
AJ