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Eating Dessert on a Full Stomach Helped Me Beat My Sugar Addiction

March 6, 2019Tracy ChabalaBlog, Latest Content, Stories

Like many folks with drinking problems, my first addiction was sugar. I actually recall the horror of losing my grip on a Cookies and Cream ice cream cone when I was three years old at Baskin Robbins. I was devastated, watching that perfectly good scoop of fresh ice cream hit the ground and turn into a goopy mess on the floor. I also recall hiding in the closet every Halloween so I could polish off my plastic pumpkin full of bite-sized Snickers, Three Musketeers and Mars Bars. My parents always warned me that I’d get sick if I ate too much candy, but that just never happened. To this day, my tolerance for sugar is about 10 times that of the average person.

Though I’ve managed to shelve the alcohol and the cigarettes, the sugar problem persists to this day. I’ve tried quitting altogether, but no matter how many times I hit an OA meeting, I just can’t give it up. Apparently, I’m not alone; a former AA sponsor who managed to rack up 30+ years of both sobriety and smobriety couldn’t quit the sugar either. She tried over and over and over, but she just couldn’t resist her cravings for Sees Candies suckers.

I’m sure one of the main reasons I can’t call it quits with sugar is that it never destroyed my life like alcohol. Sure, I sometimes have bad sugar hangovers, but thankfully the problem isn’t so bad that I binge on the stuff day after day after day. If I do have a sugar coma, it’s just a few days out of the month. I wish I could have iron self-control, like so many people you run into at 12-step meetings in LA who don’t consume caffeine or sugar or dairy or gluten or fructose or anything made from animals, but I’m just not willing to exert any more energy in quitting anything. Is it really that bad if I overdo it on Oreos?

Still, sugar is pretty gnarly, and gaining weight from stuffing my face with doughnuts all day is the least of my concerns. Though I wouldn’t be happy about going up a size or two, my main worry is that weight gain can bring on diabetes and insulin resistance. Diabetes in itself is bad enough, but the disease may trigger early-onset dementia and Alzheimer’s. No thank you. Then there’s the horrifying effect sugar has on my brain today; it messes with both my focus and my mood, and at times it can even trigger bouts of rage.

About a year ago, I made the mistake of scarfing down a box of Oreos with milk before bed and on a relatively empty stomach, and when I woke up in the morning I was convinced, for no reason whatsoever, that my boyfriend didn’t love me or pay enough attention to me. So, I proceeded to call him to tell him so, and when he didn’t pick up, I called multiple times, something I never do, until he finally picked up.

He answered with a quizzical “Are you okay?” With my body in a state of mild convulsion, I realized that no, I was not okay. I was in the midst of a sugar withdrawal only slightly less acute than the withdrawals I experienced from alcohol. What’s worse is that this ended up happening a second time, about a month later. Sugar, apparently, had the power to make me certifiably insane.

After these horrible occurrences and two tearful apologies to my boyfriend, I decided I really needed to take the sugar addiction seriously. But I’d already tried to quit so many times, and I just didn’t want to go through the agony of withdrawal only to give in again.

Then I remembered that a few weeks earlier I was out at a nice meal and ordered some blueberry beignets with vanilla ice cream on a full stomach, and I didn’t even finish them! The irresistible craving that I typically develop when eating something sweet on an empty stomach just didn’t surface. The same thing happened with alcohol; I rarely got blitzed while drinking at dinner, and even if I had a lot to drink usually just got sleepy and went to bed. Since I didn’t need to shovel down five beignets, I didn’t suffer from a sugar hangover or blood sugar imbalance.

Upon remembering this, I made a rule with myself that I wouldn’t have sugar unless it was on a full stomach. I’d let myself eat an entire package of Oreos if I wanted, as long as I’d already scarfed down plenty of protein and fiber.

The rule seems to be working.

Right now I’m in Armenia, my mother country, and this place has more Oreos than any other country outside of the US, so I’m beginning to believe my sugar addiction is genetic. You can find white chocolate and milk chocolate-covered Oreos, Brownie Oreos, Oreo Thins, and they even sell Oreos by the kilo.

I don’t resist buying these. Instead, I just cook up some chicken with eggplant, or eat some yogurt and lavash, and top it all off with olives and then chase whatever I just ate down with water and wait a good 20 minutes before allowing myself to eat the cookies. By the time all that food registers to my brain, I just don’t have the physiological desire to stuff my face with the cookies. I’ll end up eating maybe four or five of them (it’s a lot for some folks, but that’s nothing for me), and then putting the box away.

As a result, I don’t wake up out of my mind and in a rage at the world, and I don’t get all shaky and cracked-out and suffer from an inability to focus. For now, it’s a doable, harm-reductive approach that will hopefully help me stave off early-onset dementia, diabetes, and even an expanding waistline as I grow old.

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: recovery, sugar addiction
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An Open Letter to Anyone Struggling with Addiction
By Joe Polish
First I want to say how sorry I am that you or someone you love is struggling with addiction. I know firsthand how painful it is. Addiction nearly killed me when I was 18 years old.
What I’ve learned since then is that almost all addiction stems from trauma. This can be difficult for some people to understand; they assume trauma has to mean a person was beaten, molested or in a life-threatening accident. But we all have different levels of sensitivity.
Addiction is something you are driven to do—anything you crave that gives you temporary pleasure or relief but then causes negative consequences. Addiction is something you are unable to give up, despite the suffering it causes.
The challenging thing for people that don’t have this to understand is how someone could have that craving in the first place. They wonder why the addict can’t just make a better choice.
I’m of the belief that addiction is not a choice. Once the addict goes into a craving state, it’s beyond willpower or intelligence. Intelligence can actually be a detriment because the smarter people are, the more they believe they can think their way out of the problem.
What many don’t understand is that addiction isn’t a problem—it’s actually a solution. If you’re in pain, angst, anxiety, fear, rage, depression, sadness, loneliness or experiencing any other form of suffering, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to be out of that pain. It’s how we go about scratching the itch that causes the issue.
Ultimately, addiction is a connection disorder. It’s feeling incredibly disconnected and uncomfortable in your own skin. You just want to numb out, or escape. You want to feel something—anything except the dread that comes with that craving state…a state that always has compulsivity or impulsivity attached to it.
Looking at addiction from a state of compassion, as opposed to judgment, is critical. We cannot punish or beat addiction out of somebody. Sure, we can throw people in prison, scold them or run away from them, but that doesn’t help make the cravings go away. Love and compassion are critical—though, of course, those can be difficult emotions to embrace when dealing with addicts. The symptoms of addiction can be ugly; they often involve activities like cheating, disrupting, lying, stealing and other egregious acts. That’s because addicts will do anything to get out of the pain they are in. The addict brain has an appetite for destruction and is fueled more by chaos than harmony. In other words, it’s hard for addicts to feel okay. And it’s not easy to feel compassion for someone who’s leaving shrapnel in their wake. But the more you can understand that the addict is in pain and just trying to get out of it, the easier it can be to deal with the recklessness and chaos that comes with it.
Addiction is also biochemical. You are dealing with serotonin and dopamine. Once you quit the drug or behavior, you may have to fix and repair the gut. You have to get the body back to a state where it produces “feel good” chemicals in order to cope with the uncomfortable feelings. This means exercise, yoga, meditation, float pods, the right nutrition, and more. The issues are in the tissues, and if you can incorporate movement and communities, it can help heal. Building a rapport by being around other addicts is critical. It doesn’t have to be a 12-step meeting; you just need a community—an ongoing, consistent community.
It’s a lot of work—but not nearly as much work as active addiction. And if you’re willing to do the work, there’s freedom on the other side that most addicts and their families probably haven’t ever experienced before. The bottom line: help is available. There are many people and resources available at little or no cost.