“How do I stop myself from binge eating?”

Can you have bread as a sugar addict? How can you get past binge eating?

These and other questions are answered this week by our food-addiction expert, Bitten Jonsson, RN:

The red dog and bread

Wow! I am that person. I thought it was just me, all these years! I have those voices, I get irritated, I used to hide food, suicidal thoughts — all if it. I am now in my 40’s and managing a healthy weight just through working it out on my own. Listening to my body and learning trigger situations.

Nikki

Dear Nikki,

You might not want to hear this, but bread is sugar too. Any starch will turn to sugar when we put it in our mouth and chew it. With the enzymes in our mouth, starch (even starchy food like potatoes, chips, rice, cereal, starchy veggies and such) breaks down to sugar so your addiction is still on/active, you have just replaced sugar with bread. I usually write sugar/flour to point this out.

My experience is that flour addicts have a harder time to quit flour (bread, pasta, cereals) because it does not look like sugary stuff. I have never meet anyone that was “cured” and stayed “cured” but I do meet many people that for a while are able to quit some of our trigger foods but relapse hangs over the head. I advise you to quit flour and flour/bread substitute and learn more about your addicted brain. Are you a member of our closed support group on Facebook? If not, please join us and learn more ways to stay away from “sugar”.

Wish you a happy recovery,
Bitten

Sugar/bingeing

Hi,

Many thanks for your time,
Katrina

Dear Katrina,

What I hear is that you probably are a sugar/flour addict. And this is the name of the game for us until we surrender and do what needs to be done. First I recommend that you read Dr. Vera Tarman’s book “Food Junkies” where she explains the mechanisms in our brain that is the problem. There is so much to learn about our addiction and unless we take the lessons we will keep repeating the same behavior again and again.

Secondly, I advise you to read up on our website http://www.foodaddictioninstitute.org. and look for “self help groups” in your area: people there have surrendered and are more than willing to share how they manage this on a daily basis. I also recommend you to join our closed group on Facebook in order to communicate with others and share tools for recovery. There is no “magic bullet” to deal with this and in taking care of yourself you will help your daughter and I wish both of you great recovery

// Bitten

Tips to overcome behavioral roadblocks

Keto works. I have experienced that first hand. I’m down about 30 lbs (14 kg) since May 2018. I believe I would have lost more if I would:

I think if I can overcome these three things I should be able to drop these last 20-30 lbs (9-14 kg) rather quickly.

Marzella,

As addicts, we say “self-will run riot” and it means that we are not accepting reality. We want to keep a backdoor to our “drug” sugar/flour and do it our way. All of what you call “behavioral roadblocks” spells “addictive thinking” in my world. One of the hardest obstacles for us addicts is to surrender to the fact we have an addiction and if we don’t, we will keep doing the same “self-destructive” behavior over and over and getting sicker and sicker.

I suggest you read my answer to Katrina and do what I suggest to her. If that doesn’t help I suggest that you contact my colleague david@triggerfreenutrition.com and ask for help.

Wish you great recovery,
Bitten

Earlier Q&A

All earlier Q&A posts