Issue link: https://cp.revolio.com/i/270856
Abby's Magazine - March / April 2014 | Page 19 4. Foods high in fat and sweets stimulate the release of the body's own opioids (chemicals like morphine) in the brain. 5. Drugs we use to block the brain's receptors for heroin and morphine also reduce the consumption and preference for sweet, high-fat foods in both normal weight and obese binge eaters. 6. People (and rats) develop a tolerance to sugar— they need more and more of the substance to satisfy themselves—just like they do for drugs of abuse like alcohol or heroin. 7. Obese individuals continue to eat large amounts of unhealthy foods despite severe social and personal negative consequences, just like addicts or alcoholics. 8. Animals and humans experience "withdrawal" when suddenly cut off from sugar, just like addicts detoxifying from drugs. 9. Just like drugs, after an initial period of "enjoyment" of the food the user no longer consumes them to get high, but to feel normal. Remember the movie Super Size Me, where Morgan Spurlock ate three super-sized meals from McDonald's every day? What struck me about that film was not that he gained 30 pounds or that his cholesterol went up, or even that he got a fatty liver. What was surprising was the portrait it painted of the addictive quality of the food he ate. At the beginning of the movie, when he ate his first super-sized meal, he threw it up, just like a teenager who drinks too much alcohol at his first party. By the end of the movie, he only felt "well" when he ate that junk food. The rest of the time he felt depressed, exhausted, anxious, and irritable and lost his sex drive, just like an addict or smoker withdrawing from his drug. The food was clearly addictive. The problems with food addiction are compounded by the fact that food manufacturers refuse to release any internal data on how they put ingredients together to maximize consumption of their food products despite requests from researchers. In his book, The End of Overeating, David Kessler, MD, the former head of the Food and Drug Administration, describes the science of how food is made into drugs by the creation of hyper-palatable foods that leads to neuro-chemical addiction. This binging leads to profound physiological consequences that drive up calorie consumption and lead to weight gain. In a Harvard Study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, overweight adolescents consumed an extra 500 calories a day when allowed to eat junk food as compared to days when they weren't allowed to eat junk food. They ate more because the food triggered cravings and addiction. Like an alcoholic after the first drink, once these kids started eating processed food full of the sugar, fat, and salt that triggered their brain's reward centers, they couldn't stop. They were like rats in a cage. Stop and think about this for one minute. If you were to eat 500 more calories in a day, that would equal 182,500 calories a year. Let's see… if you have to eat an extra 3,500 calories to gain one pound, that's a yearly weight gain of 52 pounds! Five suggestions to break food addictions: 1. Balance your blood sugar: Research studies say that low blood sugar levels are associated with lower overall blood flow to the brain, which means more BAD decisions. To keep your blood sugar stable: Morgan Spurlock and Big Mac - Samuel Goldwyn Films Roadside Attractions