Food addiction, Over eating is very similar to Alcoholism and other addictions..
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If someone says they are addicted to sugar, I highly doubt they will grab a spoon, crack open the sugar jar and go to town. Or dig through the trash looking for half-eaten candy bars.Except for the fact that you can't avoid food unless you want to starve to death... but you can avoid alcohol...
This is just a silly argument to me. People who say they are addicted to food never mean that they are addicted to all food. Usually they say they are "addicted" to cake or fried chicken. If they were truly addicted to food, when they had a craving then a carrot stick would suffice just as well as a Hershey bar. But that's never the case, is it? It's always with the high calorie foods that people cry "addiction." I call shenanigans.
This is just a silly argument to me. People who say they are addicted to drugs never mean they are addicted to all drugs. Usually they are "addicted" to heroin or cocaine. If they were truly addicted to drugs, when they had a craving then a Tylenol would suffice just as well as an eight ball. But that's never the case, is it? It's always with the high impact drugs that people cry "addiction." I call shenanigans.
You wouldn't have people drinking gasoline, huffing paint doing whatever they can when they can't get theit drug of choice. That isn't the same as having splenda instead of sugar
I wouldn't disagree with that, but I would say that someone who says they're addicted to cake isn't going to pass up brownies or ice cream when they can't get their favorite either.
Actually, that isn't true. There are people who have to pour dish soap (among other things) onto the food they put into the trash otherwise they will dig through and eat it later.
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Liftng4Lis wrote: »What about the other things that have been termed addictions: gambling, sex, even computer use- is that a misuse of the term. I have heard overeating grouped in with these
I do think something you can be physically addicted to is different
I have a mental illness and i was in a class where they showed us the 12 steps because our lives had become unmanageable even though we didn't all have substance abuse problems and that wasn't why we were there
Again, you can use the 12 step program to curb many addictions/habits. You can NOT say they are the same as drugs and alcohol as these are psychological and VERY different.
Saying that means you don't think the brain is part of the body. It's ALL physical, even when it's just in our minds. Here is a link to a short note from Johns Hopkins about how exactly food addiction does in fact alter brain chemistry very much like abuse of other substances does:
http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/publications/cutting_edge/cutting_edge_summer_2013/unraveling_the_brain_chemistry_of_food_addiction__
I think the OP may have had some clumsy phrasing or whatever but seriously, the reactions are SO hostile and over the top it's pretty gross in here. Can you not handle anyone saying anything that you disagree with? Is it so very impossible to say, "I don't agree with these points for these reasons" without making it a personal attack and deciding that all discussion should be shut down?
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snowflake930 wrote: »Interesting topic. For the first time, last weekend, I was thinking about this and comparing it to what a person addicted to alcohol feels. I constantly think about food. What I am going to eat next. Justify to myself that I will be able to start over again tomorrow if I overindulge. How is this NOT an addiction? I can have alcohol in the house and have no problem not drinking any, for me that is easy. Not so with food. Call it what you will, to me it IS an addiction.
.......................and, everyone has to eat to survive. Not so with alcohol.
I feel like this whole thread is mixing up addiction with dependence. Tolerance and withdrawals are symptoms of dependence. Compulsive behavior is a symptom of addiction. With many substances, addiction and dependence are intertwined; however one can certainly exist without the other and they are not the same thing. I'm dependent on, say, iron but I'm not addicted to it (get sick without it but never think about it). I'm addicted to cigarettes but I'm not dependent on them (have no problem going days without, but get obsessive thoughts that drive me to smoke sometimes).
People die from drug and alcohol withdrawal because they are dependent, not because they are addicted.
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snowflake930 wrote: »Types of addictions, may, or may not be more harmful, depending on your point of view and the long term affects. However, it does not necessarily, make one addiction better than the other, or worse, for that matter.
Stands to reason though, you can survive without using other addictions, if you can end the habit. Not so with food. Easier, or harder, who is to say. To the individual their addiction is worse to them.
I totally take personal responsibility for my issues with food. No one else is to blame for my "abusing" food.
You can also survive without eating whatever food it is you are 'addicted' to.
It isn't any one food for me, it is/was too much of everything I ate. You can not survive without any food, that is my point. Is this clear enough. I overate everything, so how will your statement work for me?
BTW, what is your degree in that you are so knowledgeable about someone you have no clue about?
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I know what I thought I stood to gain from shaping a narrative that my over eating was an addiction and that the reasons I did it was because of xyz non-sequiturs. I know any answer or reason sounded better than greed (the actual feeling I experienced around delicious food) and laziness ("I'll start tomorrow, after I get MINE today! I want to chillax TODAY! My weight is future me's problem, they can do the hard work to fix it that present me quite frankly doesn't feel like doing.")
I don't like that I felt this way, and behaved in this way, but owning up to behaviors and thoughts that most reasonable persons would consider contemptible, it has helped me a lot more than what I see as mostly useless narratives.
An "addiction", "genetics", "evolution", "media", "society", "Big Business", are all the narratives I would reach for if I was looking to scapegoat and deflect from the shortcomings of my character, and I have yet to see what other purpose these narratives serve, i.e. what is their pragmatic purpose if the power over your life isn't yours but rather is anything or anyone else's. But their appeal is obvious, these narratives sting a whole lot less than "greedy" and "lazy." These narratives solicit sympathy for our situation, rather than contempt, they make it easier to live with ourselves. But greed and laziness are what ring true for me, they are what is at the root of my eating to excess and weight problem.
So, forgive me if when I hear other people reaching for these other popular narratives, that I suspect they might be as full of it and as dishonest about their situation as I was.
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My two cents: An addiction is something that takes control of your life, must be done repeatedly, affects relationships, is unhealthy and much more than this. Yes food can be an addiction and it can affect the pleasure centres in the brain. There is a thing called gambling addiction. That is real too...so you can't say there is no such thing as a food addiction.0
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DevilandhisAdvocate wrote: »My two cents: An addiction is something that takes control of your life, must be done repeatedly, affects relationships, is unhealthy and much more than this. Yes food can be an addiction and it can affect the pleasure centres in the brain. There is a thing called gambling addiction. That is real too...so you can't say there is no such thing as a food addiction.
The difference being that 'food addiction' as a phenomenon is often just a tired old excuse that sounds good.... just like 'metabolism' and the good old 'weight loss plateau' that doesnt exist.
Take this post which I have just commented on - http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10013334/relapsing-back-into-food-addiction#latest
The OP starts of talking about being under the curse of a food addiction, then later asks people to stop him from being so lazy. So it is laziness, not an addiction. Try asking a drug addict if they are addicted because of laziness....0 -
sarahjane135 wrote: »I used to be an alcoholic, trust me it is NOT the same. Are you going to overeat and wreck your car, sleep with random people, fall down, pass out, lose your memory, go to jail, etc.? My alcoholism never got as bad as doing all those things but it does for a lot of people. Take responsibility for your overeating.
I think you are confusing the effects of the addiction with the brain/psychological condition of addiction. What the original poster is saying that she has the feelings and emotions typical of an addicted person and uses food to medicate. There is a chemical released in her brain that gives her a temporary relief, she feels shame after, feels out of control etc... The end result is overweight rather than being drunk simply because food raises insulin levels rather than blood alcohol.
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Agree^Wrong answer.
Alcohol is a drug, so potentially addictive. A Burger King whopper is not a drug so saying it is an addiction is just living in denial.
Agreed. To compare drug addiction or Alcoholism to over eating, binge eating etc is well minimizing what true addicts actually have to go through to beat it.
When you steal, lose your job, sell your body and basically do whatever you have to do to get that next whopper you let me know...
When you actually get physical ill because you couldn't have that whole pizza let me know
When you become homeless because you spent all your money on KFC let me know
Otherwise no.
There are whole hosts of bulimics on an eating disorder support forum that i'm on who do all of those things because of their addiction to food...Steal food, steal money, bounce checks, run up huge loans and vast amounts of debt to support their habit, run their blood sugars high by not taking their insulin (diabulimia) so that the body cant metabolise the sugar out of their blood stream (life threatening), spend their days in self loathing praying for any release from the allure of food and then spend all night binging and purging repeatedly because they cannot control it. Then spend the rest of the night with the sweats, heart palpitations, blacking out from electrolyte imbalances and being dealthy afraid of that theyre doing to themselves and wondering if they'll wake up in the morning.
How dare you trivialise that experience whilst complaining that the idea of food addiction trivialises alcoholics. You are very sorely mistaken and you should be ashamed of yourself.
ETA you do not just get over an eating disorder, it is not just done after a few rounds of therapy and the physical behaviours are gone. There are lifelong health conditions that plague you afterwards and those thoughts and whispers will always be in the back of your mind waiting to catch you in a weak moment0
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