Question: I believe I am a food addict and addicted to sugar. I eat too much of everything but it is cakes and candy and cookies and even bread and pasta that I really crave and eat way too much of. If I cut out all sugar and simple carbs from my diet how long will my sugar cravings last for? I have tried to cut out sugar before and made it for as long as 11 days one time but every minute of every day I was dreaming about food.

Jill Edwards Says...:

There are lots of us who have become used to eating way too much sugar, and too much of the things that can quickly be converted to sugar in the body. Much of our food is converted into simple sugars and it is able to pass through the stomach wall and have an immediate effect on our energy levels. It is this quick effect which is so nice. The trouble is that if the body feels there is too much it shuts down the levels of sugar in the blood so quite quickly we can feel that we have no sugar at all and then we want more quickly. Our brain panics when there is not enough sugar in the blood.

Learning to beat this one is all about timing. We need a slow release kind of sugar just like some medicines are provided in slow release ;tablets. In order to have slow release sugar we need to eat more proteins and fats and the carbohydrates we use need to be the more complex kinds like whole grains, rather than flour, bread and cakes.

You will be amazed at how much more in control you feel if you increase the protein (meat, eggs, fish, cheese, tofu etc) you eat, and if you eat balanced meals with protein, carbohydrate, fats and vegetables. Eating all those together will be much more satisfactory for you.

The other side of the story is to get your life focused on things you like to do, rather than just on food, so more ;exercise, more interesting activity of all kinds, redecorate the house, get out and about, join the gym, go swing dancing...any kind of busy, structured activity which is not eating based will support you. Best wishes

Question: I have a bad habit of snacking at night. I am overweight and I want to lose weight. When I try to cut out the snacks I just crave them all the time and eventually I get so tired of fighting my hunger for snacks I just give in and its almost like I eat even more because I am so worn down by fighting against the urge to snack all night. What can I do to tame these cravings? I do not think I can ever lose weight if I have to fight against cravings that are this strong every night. I have been snacking at night for decades so my habits are very ingrained.

Jill Edwards Says...:

I have a bad habit of snacking at night. I am overweight and I want to lose weight. When I try to cut out the snacks I just crave them all the time and eventually I get so tired of fighting my hunger for snacks I just give in and its almost like I eat even more because I am so worn down by fighting against the urge to snack all night. What can I do to tame these cravings? I do not think I can ever lose weight if I have to fight against cravings that are this strong every night. I have been snacking at night for decades so my habits are very ingrained.

There are some things you can do. You can eat more protein, that is meat, eggs, fish and cheese for your evening meal. That will help you to be less hungry at snacking time. You can actually eat less carbohydrate or sugars, particularly in the evening, as when you eat carbohydrates or sugars, your body will pump in insulin and this will drop the sugar level and you will end up feeling that your sugar levels are going down and you will want more food. So in principle, you would wanting to keep your blood sugar levels more even, which you can do by eating protein foods and foods with a low glycaemic level. This would be the more complex carbohydrates like whole grain rice and some of the newer grains, like quinoa and so on. You could snack on fruit and yoghurt, which is sweet and not so sweet.

Because this is a long established habit, you may have to work first on the kind of food you eat as snacks, the healthier the snacks the better, so sardines or scrambled eggs on toast might be a good snack, because the sardines will satisfy the hunger for longer. Bananas might make good snacks and they have the added benefit of improving mood. Work first to get the overall eating to a place where you are eating more protein than carbohydrate. Focus on the protein content of the evening meal and then work out protein based snacks for the evening. This will help to reduce the bingy aspect of your midnight feasts.

Because it has gone on for so long, you may need to talk to a counsellor about any night fears you may have, or anything like a feeling of having been abandoned or neglected in the evening. These issues may underly your habit.

You may have a metabolic system that requires small meals regularly and it is not wrong to eat in the night, it is the same for all periods of the day, you need to eat the right overall amount of food spaced to suit you.

Basically my answer is not to fight the cravings, but to give your body healthier more protein based alternatives, which do not drive on to further cravings!

Question: Can I be a food addict even if I am at a healthy weight? I obsess about food constantly and sometimes I eat until i get sick but because of my very physical job and a lot of exercising I have so far avoided getting fat.

Jill Edwards Says...:

Can I be a food addict even if I am at a healthy weight? I obsess about food constantly and sometimes I eat until i get sick but because of my very physical job and a lot of exercising I have so far avoided getting fat.

Just listening to you, I am pretty sure that you know that there is a problem here for you, but I would like to talk about what lies behind it. I hear from you that you make big efforts, big efforts to work very hard physically, and that you spend a lot of time thinking about how to eat right, whatever right is for you in that moment, sometimes it is eating a lot and sometimes eating a little, but you work hard at everything you do and you would like a good result. Usually the good result you want is something that you can see and that can be recognised by other people. It is not unusual for you to be very strict about what you want to achieve and you may even be quite punishing if you do not achieve it.

So you have got a lot going for you in the way of doing well at things, but this good thing has gone wild. So what you want to do is "eaten up" by the fear of failure and some pretty bad thoughts about how you currently are. These are so bad, that they tend to drive "binge eating" and sometimes "binge exercising".

You will be helped by some counselling, which will raise you understanding of who you are, so you do not always use appearance as the benchmark, and in which you will learn what these negative and positive voices in your life are and to begin to challenge, the "requirements of how you have to be", and with some personal freedom, you will have the ability to grow a bigger life, put eating into a necessary but not pre-eminent position in your living and move on to other enjoyable life experiences.

It cannot be done in a day. I really suggest you find some counselling support, and if you cannot afford it or get it paid for, then you could consider contacting Overeaters Anonymous. I congratulate you on having the insight to see that this is something that you will really benefit from tackling. You may contact me if you wish.