“Do you think that food addiction (on a chemical level, like refined sugar and salt and such) is a genuine addiction that would have withdrawal symptoms, or do you think it’s purely psychological?  You say to listen to your body’s cravings, but I can’t imagine Peeps or Twizzlers being something my body would need – rather chemicals I’m becoming dependent on (by the way, both are delicious and I do not plan on giving them up).”

I do not think food addiction is real. And also, the opposite is almost more true: it is incredibly real. Because, as humans, we are “addicted” to food, as we should be. We are wired to be addicted to food. The biggest issue is believing that needing and wanting food is a problem.

YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO WANT FOOD.

(tweet that!: )

The issue that gets in the way of normal eating, just like almost every single post I write will come back to is: restriction. We are WIRED to be addicted to food the more it is restricted. This is a survival mechanism.

There are two definitions of addiction, one involves the word “harmful substance”. And the other one is:

“an unusually great interest in something or a need to do or have something”

We have an unusually great interest in food. Because we need it to survive. And the more we restrict, the more we will be unusually or greatly interested in it.

So, ALLOW IT! Freely. Liberally. And guess what… once you do that, you will eat it… which is the whole point of allowing it! Eat it freely and liberally. People get so freaked out during that phase because they think: “Oh MAN. I have allowed it! But the whole point was so that I don’t eat it! But I’m eating so much! So it is not working!”. Stop and think… that mentality is not allowing it. You can’t allow it for the purpose of not eating it. THAT IS NOT ALLOWING IT! RIGHT?!

The whole point of allowing something is to actually eat it. The point of allowing something is not NOT eating it. Do you follow? When you think like that, you are still having a tiny little freaked out food police controlling you. And so you still have something to rebel against.

REMOVE ANYTHING TO REBEL AGAINST.

As for withdrawal symptoms? For the most part, NO! But you will have negative physical and psychological reactions if you remove necessary amounts of macronutrients OR dramatically restrict your food intake in any unnecessary way. Because we need food and your body is trying to protect you.

As for craving silly or fake-ish foods: When we are talking about cravings for peeps or twizzlers, we are now talking about a mostly psychological addiction to food that is perceived as scarce or restricted. But that is what happens when food is considered out of bounds: your brain gets involved. Your brain is wired to your eating/nourishment/satiation. So, no, eating peeps isn’t a huge body craving. It is a psychological craving. And you’d BETTER give into it! Because it is the only way to make friends with your hunger/desires, and prove to yourself that you are willing to listen to it.

You can’t remove how interconnected your psychology is from your appetite. They are intertwined. So accept it, and give in to your cravings, I promise that it can change your life.

Fuck it.

How many people say: “oh I just lost weight through good portion control”.

A lot of people.

Does it work?

Eh…. for some. And only for a time.

Here is the hard truth:

If you have disordered eating mentality, portion control is just another way of restricting and fearing and obsessing, and feeling like you are doing “the right thing”.

If you have disordered eating you are STARVING! Your brain and your body. You are craving surplus and nourishment. Portion control will NOT CURE you. There will 99% be a relapse into chaos. And rightly so!

The most important thing, is that you are listening to your body. You are going to be so hungry, and need so much food and self-love and pampering during the beginning (and ongoing): portion control is going to mess you up. Seriously.

Even regular joes, with no “history of disordered eating” have a swing back after “good portion control”. Because… why are they doing it in the first place?

Don’t “Do Portion Control”!!!! JUST EAT! Enjoy! Feed yourself. TRUST that you body knows how to regulate and that it will in time.

Then one day, when food is just food, you will find yourself stopping naturally and you’ll realize: Oh THAT is what portion control is supposed to be… natural. Easy…

Don’t force it.

Also fuck it. fuckitfuckit.

Here is a question I received from a reader:

Q: I feel that I still am thinking about food too much. Will this stop at some point? … I don’t have any problem with gaining a little bit of weight, but I just don’t know if I can trust that I won’t continue bingeing. Before I lost weight I was eating chocolate everyday (also overeating), why would that stop now?

A: In my experience, the biggest and nearly only reason for bingeing is restriction, both physical and mental.

If the fixation is eating as much as possible whenever possible- don’t worry. Once you reintroduce food, a free-for-all is to be expected. That is your body’s way of getting you back to normal and out of starvation. It is a survival response.

Our brains are wired to fixate on food, and our bodies are wired to crave it.

This may go on for a while. Until you genuinely know and prove to yourself over time that this isn’t just a fun blip in a lifetime of diets, your body will fixate on eating. That is ok. And for better or worse, eating is your way out. But you have to go through it before you get out of it, and you can’t force it. Slowly but surely you will find yourself caring less about foods you used to obsess over. Slowly.

If your fixation is still on calories and purity, that is your brain holding onto a modicum of control. It is so scary to let go of something that seemed so important before. It is so scary to give up control and not trust or know whether or not you will ever stop eating. You will. You will NOT continue eating for the rest of your life. You are not a bottomless pit, though the fact that you may feel like one right now is ok.

Bingeing is a response to restriction. Once you genuinely have been eating all the foods you want for a good amount of time, the fixation on them and on eating them subsides. I promise. This is both biological and mental.

As far as your overeating before your obsession and so fearing you will after, that is a good question. But you have to know that overeating and bingeing are different. There is a big difference between bingeing on chocolate, and eating a lot of chocolate for comfort. If there is no restriction involved, a binge is highly unlikely, and if you find yourself overeating chocolate once in a while, it is absolutely fine and normal and human. There is nothing to be scared or guilty about and life can continue as usual. “I ate a lot of chocolate, oh well, now I’m not hungry for a little while, maybe I should take down the trash.”

AND if you were genuinely consistently and uncomfortably overeating chocolate before you decided to restrict and lose weight, I would bet you almost anything it was under some sort of denial mentality. Was chocolate restricted? Did you worry about getting fat or eating too much? Did the more you ate chocolate, the more you think you shouldn’t be eating chocolate? I bet a lot that there was still a sense of restriction. That can cause a fixation and a hoarding/bingey mentality.

I promise you, chocolate is just not THAT exciting once you have full reign. Once you can eat chocolate for breakfast lunch and dinner and snacks and desert, there is no pull. It is unremarkable. Sure it is still good at specific times and can really hit the spot. But once you know you never need to stop, magically, you begin to stop.

I promise this is true. These days, I forget to go grocery shopping and forget to eat dinner before I leave the house. Of course, that is it’s own problem, and now it is highly probably that some good old fashioned grocery shopping and food planning and vegetable roasting may do me some good, but my days of fixating over food are GONE!

Fuck It.