Via a pointer from Michael Prager comes Marie Claire’s story of a woman dealing with compulsive overeating via Overeaters Anonymous. It’s not exactly a flattering review.
Michael’s response came from his perspective of someone who has successfully used an addiction approach to resolve his food issues: he’s lost 160lbs and maintained it for 20 years.
His take on the author’s “pretty disordered eating” was essentially that she was not seeing the forest for the trees. She might find OA “a deeply flawed best option” but whatever your thoughts about 12-steps, admitting you have a problem is a pretty good first step!
To that end, I found this paragraph particularly striking (emphasis mine):
Cutting carbs wasn’t the problem, which nixed Weight Watchers; my wallet couldn’t bear a pricey university clinic. The Anonymous meetings are free, available around the clock online and throughout town, no appointment necessary. They’re sort of like Cheers, the place on the corner where everyone knows your name. And your sin. Also, I was eating sprinkles with a tablespoon.
Guess what? If you’re eating sprinkles with a tablespoon and “frosting is [your] crack” … cutting carbs most definitely is a problem!
Managing overeating
That said, I’m actually sympathetic to the author’s struggle with using a 12-step approach to address overeating.
This is mostly because I don’t believe that overeating is a spiritual — or even “emotional” issue — I think it’s a brain chemistry issue. Check out Dr. Gabor Mate talking about brain development and addiction (starts about 6:30):
Mate describes four circuits in the brain involved in addiction:
- opiates/endorphins
- dopamine
- adrenaline
- impulse control
And one Mate doesn’t talk about but which I recently stumbled upon is the endocannibinoid system, which I suspect is responding negatively to the high amount of omega 6s in our veggie oil-filled diet.
[Side note: Arachidonic acid is/can be a precursor to ECS agonists. One of these, anandamide, is apparently somewhat similar to THC, the substance in marijuana responsible for the high (and the munchies!).]
And of course, this doesn’t speak to other potential appetite mediators like insulin, leptin and so on.
It’s the food!
Our Western diet is wreaking havoc on our brains. And Gary Taubes notwithstanding, it’s probably not just carbs (or sugar). It’s other manufactured substances now passing for food: processed veggie oils, refined grains like wheat that are stripped of all of their nutrients, and other excess additives like salt, designed to make industrial food palatable.
So while I don’t denigrate 12-step or other programs (as Michael notes, many have found benefit from them), my preference to go direct to the source. I think a better approach is to deal with cravings in the brain via nutritional food choices and other supportive activities (it sure beats irreversible weight loss surgery).
I’m only an “n=1″ experiment (still ongoing!), but my brain on SAD is completely different from my brain on paleo or Perfect Health or whatever my current tweaked diet is these days.
It’s tough living in our culture and dealing with 24/7 food in your face. And I think Michael is right about this: the craving may never really go away. But it can become manageable.
I think it’s a little like grief. Hurts like hell at first, and stays with you forever, but it becomes easier over time.
The problem with knowing the cause of overeating is that I still need to live with it. Cutting out the carbs may help, but the food craving… hunger… whatever you call it… is still there. OA provides some relief and can become something else to obsess over. Low carb by itself does not remove the compulsion. There is the compulsion, then there is diet. They are separate. I must deal with both.
For OA to provide a benefit, the 12 step philosophy must be learned and adopted. I have been around OA for 20 some years, and it took years learn and adopt the AA/OA philosophy, and some day I just revert to the sociopath that I naturally am. Some days I am just unable to be interested in other people. It is that interest in other people that makes OA work.
Fred, I am completely with you that cutting the carbs doesn’t do it. I’ll share more at a later date (I’m still a work in progress!), but on the diet side, I’m also focusing on not just cutting carbs but going nutrient-dense … eating really healthy foods, and particularly the healthy fats. Everyone is different, but for me, that diet gets me about 80-90% of the way re compulsion to eat. For the rest, I’ve been doing neurofeedback (since October). They don’t like it when I describe it as such, but I like to call it computer-facilitated meditation. This combined with diet is making a really huge difference for me.
Great post… thanks for directing me to the Marie Claire article, I found it very interesting and relate to her experiences.
I have to disagree with you a little on the “source” issue thing. You say, “I don’t believe that overeating is a spiritual — or even “emotional” issue — I think it’s a brain chemistry issue.” This may be true for some people, but I don’t think all.
Some people overeat just because they’re not informed about nutrition, it’s something that just naturally creeped up on them, etc.
However, for others, I think it’s totally different. For people like me and the author of this article, there’s been something (a stigma of sorts) attached to us as long as we remember related to food. Maybe a few negative eating encounters scarred us for life, so we now have emotional relationships with food, who knows.
I think it’s a brain chemistry issue, when, yes, you eat chocolate and you get a whoosh of sugar and anti-depressant components… making us feel good. But take chocolate out of it and you might find some overeaters will eat just about anything that’s available when they need to cope with something.
Anyway, glad I stumbled upon your blog… enjoying it! Thanks.
Thanks for the comment. Yep, I absolutely agree that overeaters will eat just about anything when they need to cope; but (you say tomato, I say tomahto?) I think that’s ultimately a brain chemistry issue.
Check out around 5:30-6:15 of this video from the NY Times. Or check out David Kessler’s The End of Overeating.
Emotions are certainly involved in the process. But it’s the brain that’s linking emotions and behavior — the two are very much intertwined.
My theory is simply that fixing the brain chemistry makes the coping much, much easier!
Great video and article. You’re right… tomato/tomahto issue.
I think brain chemistry and I immediately think that there are misfirings in the brain which is causing us to eat more. And, so while that’s kind of true, I think there’s also a learned behavior associated with it.
However, sounds like you’re thinking more of the brain chemistry being behind the learned behavior and reinforcing it, which makes perfect sense. That it’s the chemical reaction in the brain to the food that makes us go bezerk for overeating.
Sounds a lot like the research from Dr. Amen, too. Interesting stuff. (http://www.theamensolution.com/)
I think there is no doubt that overeating is a chemical issue. After we remove the food, the chemical issue remains. It is that chemical issue causes the cravings or a perverted hunger. Responding to the cravings or excess hunger results in overeating.
There may be a spiritual solution, and by spiritual I mean a non physical solution. Essentially, that mental change is an attitude change sufficient to bring about an end to the overeating, even though the carvings or hunger may remain. I spend half my day hungry just to maintain my weight loss, and that is on low carb. Before low carb, it was all day hungry.
OA has had this figured out long ago, without a clear understanding as to the cause. Now we better understand the cause, but who is offering any solution for these odd things like ADD, OCD, ADHD cravings or perverted hunger? All we can do is learn to live with the problem.
It is the same as Gabon Mate talked about with ADHD or ADD, remove the drugs, the problems remains.
Removal of the carbs is essential to remove the insulin/blood glucose out of phases curves and the issues with cephalic phase insulin release, both of which drive me to eat.
It is my opinion that any grossly obese person, as I was, ( I’m just overweight now) likely has numerous causes of overeating, and to recover we need to ferret out all the causes and apply corrections.
We are all in process, progress not perfection. Thanks for the Gabon video and all the information. Keep up the fine work.
My qualification are not in nutrition, I just read and test it on myself.
I’m glad you shared this article. I read it recently in Marie Claire myself and had a similar reaction to it.
As someone who’s suffered from a binge eating disorder (or whatever you want to call it) for the better part of my life, I have to say that I also agree with your personal belief that this is an issue of brain chemistry. How else can explain my ability to eat a diet completely devoid of the processed foods, sugars, and food-like substances you talk about, and yet occasionally the (strong) urge to binge asserts itself? I can’t explain it. I can do everything “right” — good sleep, adequate physical activity, the right nutrients, liquid, etc. and yet still…still…that compulsion remains. It’s frustrating as hell.
For me, at least, it’s not about not knowing what to do (if it were that, I’d have been rid of this issue decades ago). It’s not about the inability to express myself-my thoughts and emotions. No, anyone can tell you I have no trouble speaking my mind, sharing my feelings, etc. And, for me, no 12-step or spiritual program is going to help. That’s not where I’m broken. It’s something else…something in the chemistry or connections in my brain. I just wish knew WHAT…and then, of course, HOW to fix it.
Until then, I take some relief in knowing there are others like me out there who are hoping for the same thing. Thanks, Beth, for sharing your thoughts, and for your blog.
Jennifer, exactly!! This is where I am right now. Eating the way I do has completely transformed me … my equilibrium is at a much, much higher level than it used to be. But every so often, something (usually stress-related) triggers me. But I think it’s still brain chemistry … it’s just some kind of really Pavlov’s dog kind of thing re stressors and ingrained coping mechanisms.
I haven’t yet put up a big post about this yet, but what I’m doing now (in addition to healthy eating and high intensity strength training) is neurofeedback. I call it computer-facilitated meditation, so think programs in that space (which train the brain to better deal with stress) are going to wind up being a really useful complement for compulsive behaviors.
Fascinating stuff, ladies. I’ve been reading a lot about the link between depression and rheumatoid arthritis… it’s just amazing how the body is so reactive and connected.
Can’t wait to read about your computer-facilitated meditation… just fascinating.
Jennifer… I relate a lot to your story. I’ve had the worst binges when I’ve been eating the healthiest! There’s something else going on. Counselors have told me to substitute my art hobbies for eating when I’m stressed, but it’s not the same, not even close.
@GrilAnne, I hear you. I have tried just about everything. I go for walks, I’ll call a friend, heck at one point in time I even bought some coloring books and crayons. What I think folks have a hard time understanding is that once our minds begin to fixate on satisfying the growing, overwhelming urge to eat, it just gets worse and worse…until we satisfy it. I’d love to find something that would work, and am still certainly open to trying different things, but it’s just such a *deep* compulsion. Unless a person’s been there themselves, which it sounds like you have, I don’t think they can begin to understand what it’s like. I’ve literally had moments where I’m sitting at my desk at work, and the urge to eat/binge becomes so strong that I can’t concentrate on anything but that thought. Crazy, isn’t it?!
Lol… the desk scenario is ALL too familiar! I’ve found my new policy that I implemented in January when we came back to the office in the new year has worked (and, unbelievably, I’ve stuck to it)… NO WORK FOOD! If I didn’t bring it or go buy it, I don’t eat it! Now, I’ve tried this policy about four times before, but something this year has clicked. I think it’s the focus on my health related to rheumatoid arthritis and wanting to get pregnant again… and that I have made public proclamation in the office about how I won’t eat anything in the office (which people still try to get me to eat what they bring in). I still have cravings and am so annoyed when someone brings in chocolate chip cookies (my favorite) and puts it out where I have to pass by them a gazillion times a day.
I equate it to a drug or alcohol addiction. Our minds become so obsessed, it’s truly a full blown addiction.
Jennifer, I’ve found that there’s help from technology that “soothes” the brain. The device that works wonders for me at the neuro’s office, alas, costs about $3000!
I’m looking at seeing if there are less pricy alternatives (even ones you cobble together) that work for me. Will share here if I find some I like!
@Beth, you definitely have me intrigued! I wonder if a machine, like the one you’re talking about, would be covered by insurance in any way. Itching to read more…you’ve been teasing us all day! ;-)
@GrilAnne, the process you’re talking about does work. It worked for me for for almost nine months, during which I lost 75 pounds, and kept the majority of my urges under control. Unfortunately, about six months in, the urge to eat/binge started getting stronger, and stronger until I snapped. And once I started, I couldn’t stop…for five months. I’ve now gained 40 of those pounds back. Talk about frustrating! Anyway, I completely encourage you to keep your policy in place. It helps…immensely. As long as everything is in harmony, eating just whole foods-especially in the form of lean protein (meat and dairy), fruits,and vegetables-you’ll be able to keep the binge monster fast asleep. Now if we could just figure out what causes us to occasionally snap *even* when we’re doing everything right! Now THAT would be a major cause for celebration. Maybe one day, eh? A girl can dream…
Jennifer, we’re like leading parallel lives! The reason I’m doing the neurofeedback is that last year, I lost 50 lbs staying on track til I “snapped” at Xmas. Took me a month to get back on track, then I lost it again at Easter. I was off track for six months.
For me, it’s not really a mystery what causes the triggers. For one, part of me talked myself into how hard it would be to stay on plan during the holidays. For another, that kind of family togetherness pushes old buttons.
These days, I let off steam occasionally, but I pretty much try and keep it to one day off plan. I like Allen Carr’s pitcher plant analogy. For me, stringing more than a day (or two tops) together of off-plan eating is asking for trouble!
Re the neurofeedback, it’s not covered by insurance for this (yet). It’s not inexpensive (about the same as therapy), but it’s also much shorter duration, about 40-60 sessions on average. I looked into it after reading about it in Nora Gedgaudas’ Primal Body, Primal Mind. It’s an accepted treatment for ADHD, depression, and anxiety, and Nora said that combining neurofeedback and a good diet makes both work better. There’s also been some research into treating alcoholism with neurofeedback (especially a protocol called “alpha theta”). I figured it it was useful for alcoholics, it might work well too for compulsive eating. So far, I’m very pleased.
I’m definitely fascinated by this! May have to look into it further myself. Thankfully, I am seeing a wonderful doctor who understand this whole issue as well as anyone possibly can, and is up for trying different things, including medication (which I’m still not horribly keen on), to keep the monster asleep for good.
We are leading parallel lives though…no doubt about it! My first full snap occurred during the Jewish holidays last year. The combination of holiday foods and having to spend too much time with in-laws was just too much for me to deal with. Heck, just interacting with them can trigger a binge even on my best days! So you combine that with putting me in awkward situations (including sitting in a synagogue I can’t stand for a slew of reasons), and fasting! Oh boy. Looking back on it now…total recipe for disaster! Then, once I had that binge, I did manage to get back on track for a week or two at a time. Then I’d snap again, and this cycle went on and on til we went on a cruise after Thanksgiving. It was the perfect storm, really, that led to a five month long binge.
So our conversation is bringing up some interesting thoughts for me, including:
- If-in a “perfect” world-we followed our eating plans and could avoid all of these triggering situations, could we continue to stay on plan? Is that the perfect antidote, so to speak? (Of course I realize this isn’t possible…but just for demonstration’s sake, bear with me! ;-) )
- Would we want to, or be able to, ALWAYS stay on our eating plans for the rest of our lives, with NO transgressions? I don’t know about you, but even knowing that certain foods awaken the monster I still struggle a little bit, mentally, with the idea of NEVER being able to eat certain things again. I guess it’s because for 30+ years I more or less did eat what I wanted when I wanted and, as a result, have formed associations with some of those foods (think holidays, vacations, other good times, etc.). I guess I just feel sorry for myself/feel sad that I won’t get to eat things like fish and chips or a scone with clotted cream on my upcoming trip to the UK, for example.
- Along those same lines, can we get to the point where our long-term health (both mental and physical) out weighs the desire for these short term indulgences? That leaving the monster fast asleep is THE most important driver for us, and we learn to find other, new pleasures and ways to carve new neural pathways in our brains so that eventually those become more deeply grooved than the old ones that dictate our patterns and habits now.
Very much looking forward to your thoughts on this…and am thoroughly enjoying our conversation. So glad to have “met” you! :-)
You said, “Along those same lines, can we get to the point where our long-term health (both mental and physical) out weighs the desire for these short term indulgences?”
This is my main focus these days and it’s a struggle. Getting out of the car at work this morning, I turn to my husband and say, “Gee… I really want some frozen yogurt!” I’ve been doing pretty good with those cravings since I’ve moderated sugar and artificial sweeteners, but that caught me off guard. It wasn’t even 8am.
I’m really working on impulse control. It’s the torture of having a craving and being in between of not acting or acting on it which drive me crazy.
My strategy is working now because I’m only three weeks into my weight loss plan. I do fear that I’ll flip out again at the next stressful event.
However, I have to say that I am much different than I used to be. I used to be a big binger, especially through college when I depressed. I would literally eat an entire batch of brownies or cookies and then more. I don’t do this kind of thing now. Probably a few reasons, I’ve learned how to deal with my problems in other ways (talking, etc.), I realized that most of my problems are not on the grand scale that I used to think they were (no boyfriend is NOT the end of the world), and I’m not alone enough (I have my husband and daughter always around to keep me in check). When I do happen to be alone for an extended period of time, though, I do sort of feel like I’m going to go crazy in the kitchen. That scares me, because it reminds me of how bad I used to be and that I could possibly slip back to that at any time.
I want to hear more about the neuro feedback thing! Have either of you tried hypnotherapy or acupuncture?
On another post here, I linked to a Michael Prager post about how it never really ever goes away. But I think it becomes far more manageable. I likened it to grief. It hurts like hell at first, but over time, you adjust.
I did try hypnotherapy years ago without much success, though perhaps things are different now. Never tried acupuncture.
What I’m doing now with the neurofeedback — plus some other activities on my own — are to build up what I’m calling “reserves” so that I have more capacity to fend off big slips. More later (sorry … sux having a day job ;), but I do think that building in meditation-oriented activities are key. Something to do with spending more time in the parasympathetic state rather than the sympathetic state maybe.
What I’m getting *really* good at now is what I think of as “assisted” meditation … I basically plug in the headphones, tune in some classical, and watch a Flickr slideshow of nature photos. I do this for at least 5 minutes each morning and night, and sometimes longer. There are some devices you can use for feedback (I’ve used both the HeartMath emWave handheld at home and the Resperate breath trainer at the neuro’s) that I like.
Re eating the trigger stuff, I don’t think it needs to be like alcohol abstinence. But for me anyways, it’s clearly a short trip from “indulge” to six months of out of control. For now, I keep the indulgences infrequent (maybe once a week at most).
Last time though I paid for it. I didn’t overeat, just had stuff I wasn’t eating (wheat, sugar, veggie oils) and was grumpy *and* stiff the next day. So I suspect that over time, I’ll actually want to do this less if there’s such a clear connection between the two!