Food Addiction & Rehabilitation

Food addiction is the compulsive desire to eat food beyond satiety.

Compulsive overeating can be a response to specific stimulants in the food such as sugar, fat or salt that act like drugs.

Fat and white sugar are the most addictive substances found in food. They cause overstimulation of the taste buds. They appeal to the ancestral brain that remembers times of deprivation when it was important to stock up on rich foods in prediction of times of famine.

Salt, a non-food item is another very addictive ingredient. The food industry knows it and makes use of this property in most processed foods.

Food addiction is the underlying maladaptive behavior that leads to overeating and weight gain. The long term results can be obesity and more complex eating disorders. Overweight and obese individuals are at increased risk for many diseases and health conditions, including the following:

• Hypertension (high blood pressure)
• Osteoarthritis (a degeneration of cartilage and its underlying bone within a joint)
• Dyslipidemia (for example, high total cholesterol or high levels of triglycerides)
• Type 2 diabetes
• Coronary heart disease
• Stroke
• Gallbladder disease
• Sleep apnea and respiratory problems
• Some cancers (endometrial, breast, and colon)

Our Raw Food Detox Diet and Natural Detoxification program is an excellent way of disrupting unhealthy patterns of eating. The reason for this is that raw foods contain very few of the addictive substances that are present in many standard diets.

These refined substances, such as salt and sugar and monosodium glutamate are often added to foods for the purpose of increasing sales. The problem is that this creates a population who no longer can hear the natural cravings of their bodies, because the addictive cravings are louder. This dissociation is what allows us to overeat, gain weight and have chronic digestive disturbances.

Oftentimes processed foods are what we were raised on from infancy. This can result in the situation that many people find themselves in, where they have never known what it is like to eat wholesome foods and experience the freedom from the food addiction cycle.

Our program for healing food addiction involves looking at many areas including biochemical factors such as allergies and deficiencies, as well as psychological factors such as anxiety, fear of being alive or sensual, and of course family issues.

Our raw food detoxification program addresses all of these issues. Our diet is specifically designed to contain a high level of nutrients and no stimulants. Our food does not contain white sugar, white flour, salt or processed oils. Our food is naturally delicious, using the freshest locally grown vegetables and herbs, whose balanced composition does not lead to overeating.

Food addiction must be treated differently from drug and alcohol addiction. Obviously complete abstinence is not an option; one must transform one’s relationship with food to overcome the addiction. In food addiction, one uses food as a drug to induce a certain state of mind, to cover unpleasant feelings or for comfort. A simple weight loss program that does not address the underlying issues of food addiction will not be successful in the long run.

For successful weight management at home, lifestyle changes will have to be made, and maintained. In our care you will get started on an exercise routine and a satisfying healthy diet. We will help you to find appropriate responses to the stressors in your life and unveil your motivations for overeating. Your part is only to recognize your food addiction and have a sincere desire to change.

Food Sensitivity

Food sensitivity is a very important area of analysis for overall health and ease of living. Many of us unknowingly have reactions to foods that we commonly eat. These reactions are described variously as “allergy” or “sensitivity” depending on what area of the immune system is stimulated by the offending food.

There are various ways to test food sensitivities and allergies. An easy way is to perform blood tests or a saliva tests.

Another way is to challenge foods during the course of the raw food detoxification program. This process of challenging food sensitivities involves avoidance of the most common allergenic foods and periodically eating them in large amounts and analyzing the reaction. This is a long process because only one food can be tested at a time. The most allergenic foods such as wheat, dairy and soy are excluded from our diet at all times.

If we decide on this procedure we will first test foods that you suspect to be problematic and then send you home empowered to complete the process.

Food Sensitivity and Food Allergy Resources

Coca Pulse Test Form – Allergies

The Pulse Test book by Arthur Coca MD

NTA – Food Allergy Coca Guide

Weight Loss

Food Sensitivity and Food Allergy Resources

Coca Pulse Test Form – Allergies

The Pulse Test book by Arthur Coca MD

NTA – Food Allergy Coca Guide

Weight Loss

Food Addiction Presentation

The following presentation is relevant for food addiction, addictions in general and eating disorders. It was presented in 2013 at the International Congress of Naturopathic Medicine (ICNM) in Paris by our Medical Director, Dr. Nicole Baylac.

Food Addiction And Cooked Foods

Food Addiction, Food Allergy and Overweight

By Stephen A. Levine, Ph.D.

Have you ever eaten something- a bowl of ice cream, a piece of cheese, an orange- and felt hungrier than before? Do you have urges for a particular food and find it hard to satisfy your craving unless you eat that particular food?

If the answer is “yes” to either of these questions, then you have a food allergy. If you are also fat, then chances are your food allergy is making you fat.

Food sensitivities may cause allergic people to crave those foods to which they are allergic. Just as a drug addict suffers withdrawal symptoms when the drug is withdrawn, allergic people experience discomfort when they lose access to a particular food.

Obese people can testify to the overwhelming power of food allergy addiction. Compulsive eaters crave and continue to eat those allergenic foods to which they are addicted day-after-day. The obese person has no idea that his daily food cravings or eating habits are based on a physiological need to stop withdrawal symptoms caused by food allergy addiction.

The phenomenon of simultaneous allergy and addiction to both foods and chemicals is now well accepted by doctors specializing in the diagnosis and treatment of allergies. These specialists, known as clinical ecologists, believe that many chronic health problems, such as migraine, fatigue, depression, and arthritis are caused by allergies to foods and chemicals and affect approximately one-third of the population living in industrial countries.

It is commonly observed that the same food may cause different reactions among different people. An individual’s genetic predisposition to allergies will determine which part of his body will become the vulnerable target organ or tissue. Any major organ may become involved: the symptoms of cerebral allergies include hyperactivity, depression, irritability, headaches, and some forms of schizophrenia: hypoglycemia is a manifestation of pancreatic malfunction frequently caused by allergy; while in other cases, the blood vessels may be the target organ with the resulting signs of vasculitis and edema. The symptoms are compounded and are generally more severe following frequent contact with allergy provoking food.

Water retention, or edema, is particularly common among allergic individuals and is an important contributing factor to obesity. The removal of an offending food will often result in a rapid water loss of five to ten pounds within a week’s time, all without the use of a diuretic.

Michael Rosenbaum, M.D. who practices preventive medicine in Mill Valley, California has observed this water-retention phenomenon frequently among patients in his allergy clinic. He found that following the initial water loss, the person tends to lose fat more easily, even without dieting. Rosenbaum states, “Food sensitivities can cause the body to retain both water and fat.” Often, Rosenbaum believes, the big weight loss that occurs when someone follows a low-allergen diet has nothing to do with the quantity of calories in the diet.

The following scenarios by Dr. Rosenbaum illustrate the dramatic weight loss achieved among patients following the elimination of allergy-provoking foods from their diet: “One of my patients who was found to be sensitive to dairy products decided to substitute bread and beer to make up for the removal of milk and cheese from his diet. He was probably consuming even more calories and still managed to lose ten pounds in the first month without even trying. The next time I saw him, his pants were falling off.”

“Another one of my patients, a woman in her early thirties, was undergoing a stressful period when she came to my office. She had sensitivities to wheat and dairy products and adopted a ‘what-the-hell type attitude,’ continuing to eat these foods regularly. Besides seeing her weight balloon from 140 to 180 pounds, she developed a gnawing depression and irritability.

“Finally, after several months of self-abuse, she stopped eating wheat and dairy products. Her subsequent diet contained the same amount of calories as the diet containing wheat and dairy products. After a few months on the allergen-free diet, she is back to 140 pounds. Her friends have remarked about her wonderful transformation and were amazed at the way the weight had just come off by itself.”

Dr. Rosenbaum believes that food sensitivity exerts its most profound effect on the limbic portion of the brain. This section of the brain houses the control centers of our emotions as well as memory and vegetative functions, including body temperature, sexuality, blood pressure, sleep, hunger and thirst. Food allergies seem to affect most of these vital functions.

This neurophysiological analysis is shared by William Philpott, M.D., a clinical ecologist from Oklahoma City, who has written extensively on the subject. Dr. Philpott speculates that frequent contact with allergenic foods triggers a rise in the brain opioid enkephalin. The enkephalin is a narcotic product produced by the body that is as addictive as externally supplied narcotics.

The primary food allergens are coffee, dairy products, wheat, eggs, and corn. In Oriental countries, rice is a prominent allergen. Among vegetables, white potatoes and lettuce are potent allergens. Marshall Mandell, M.D. of Norwalk, Connecticut and author of Dr. Mandell’s 5 Day Allergy Relief System, found that 92.2 percent of hospitalized schizophrenic patients were allergic to one or more common substances. When Dr. Mandell tested a group of patients diagnosed as hard-to-treat neurotics, he found that 88 percent of them were allergic to wheat, 50 percent to corn, and 60 percent to milk.

Charles McGee, M.D., who practices clinical ecology in C’oeur D’Alene, Idaho, and is the author of How to Survive Modern Technology, was asked whether in his opinion, food and chemical allergies could be a major cause of obesity, he replied: “There are so many people who are addicted to all sorts of foods. The ones who are addicted to coffee do not necessarily get fat, but the ones who are addicted to sugar or wheat, they may end up running around with candies or wheat-containing crackers in their pockets to satisfy the craving. What’s most important is that it’s extremely difficult for these allergic individuals to lose weight unless they ultimately gain control of their food allergies. They must identify the particular allergens, break the craving, and then eliminate the chemical or food.”

To understand both allergic and associated addictive phenomenon we can look at the two conditions, both as aspects of food intolerance. In allergy-addiction, there are three principle stages: the first stage is characterized by an acute allergic reaction to a toxic substance. Recall the first time that you, or someone you know, smoked a cigarette.

Most frequently, the individual will find the smoke distasteful and may even have clinical symptoms such as coughing, sore throat and dizziness.

This acute reaction can be taken as evidence that the cigarette smoke has some toxic effects on the body. After smoking becomes a habit, the symptoms are no longer noticeable. Your body gets used to the smoke and the symptoms are said to be “masked,” or hidden. The masking can be considered an adaptation by the body to tolerate the poison with which it comes in frequent contact. Even though there are no overt symptoms, the adaptation to this obvious toxin takes its toll in terms of chronic body stress.

During this period, the adaptation is so strong that you become dependent on cigarettes, or in other words, “hooked.” You must smoke at regular intervals to avoid withdrawal symptoms. When you try to quit, your body craves the cigarettes: you are addicted in the truest sense of the word and you will experience the addictive aspect of the “allergy-addiction syndrome.”

It is significant that all addictions are similar in this regard- whether cigarettes, coffee, heroin, wheat or milk products. The final stage occurs when the body fails to maintain adaptation and experiences the allergic and addicted symptomatology simultaneously. This is the stage in which chronic symptoms of the disease emerge.

Now just about any clinical symptom can result from the allergy-addiction syndrome. Dr. Ellen Grant reported in the medical journal, Lancet, that 85 percent of migraine sufferers could be rendered symptom-free when they followed a diet excluding the ten most common food allergens. Some of the most provocative agents were cigarettes, coffee and birth control pills. The evidence is also strong for the allergic causation of arthritis, asthma, and diabetes.

The allergic reaction itself can result in a drastic reduction in blood sugar with the accompanying symptomatology: weakness, hunger and irritability. Allergic hunger is pathological in that it does not respond to the normal satiety control center in the brain when food is consumed in normal amounts, so both the addictive and allergic responses to allergy can cause uncontrollable eating behavior.

In one case history a 37-year-old woman who had trouble with many different weight reduction programs, including the HCG (human chorionic gonadotrophin) diet, the drinking man’s diet, the Stillman diet, it became evident that after each partially successful episode of weight reduction she would regain her weight.

The reason for this lady’s difficulties was later found to be food allergies. In the 6-hour oral glucose tolerance test, we found a marked hypoglycemic curve: the blood sugar dropped from 220 at 1 hour to 45 mg percent at 3 ½ hours. At this time she experienced severe shakiness, giddiness, nausea, and shortness of breath as well as other symptoms. She was assured that once the food allergen was determined and eliminated from her system, the symptoms of hypoglycemia would disappear.

People who are allergic to sugar experience a craving for sweets. One patient ate 50 twinkies a day and although her stomach would hurt, she would keep on eating. When her husband left for work in the morning she would take a tablespoon of sugar as soon as he was out the door, because it would make her feel good.

She would actually get high on sugar. Three or four hours later she would go into a depression and had attempted suicide several times. Her suicide attempts were prompted by withdrawal symptoms. The woman didn’t get well until a conscientious physician wrestled with the etiology of her problem, namely food allergy. Now she realizes that she must read all food labels for ingredients.

Patients afflicted with allergy-addictions will usually experience a sense of well-being after a month on an allergen-free diet. Many individuals lose excess water from their tissues and achieve a weight loss from 10 to 15 pounds.

Dr. Rosenbaum, as well as other nutritionally-oriented allergists rely on other methods besides avoidance of the allergenic foods. Vitamin C and mineral bicarbonates are used extensively in allergy clinics throughout the country. The mineral buffers should not include sodium, which is a hypertensive agent and can make a person more prone to edema, but instead the minerals calcium, magnesium and potassium. These buffers will neutralize the acidity caused by the allergic reaction and alleviate stress, thereby inducing symptomatic relief.

As little as one teaspoon of this combination of nutrients can totally knock out hunger cravings caused by food allergies as well as eliminate the withdrawal symptoms caused by exclusion of the addictive foods.

This is symptomatic relief, but works dramatically and also gives a clear indication that the symptoms were caused by allergenic phenomenon. If the nutrient combination eliminates your hunger then you can be sure that your hunger was induced by some aspect of the allergy-addiction syndrome.

Functional food and chemical allergies have been largely ignored by most medical doctors. One reason for this is that there has been no miracle drug that can be heavily promoted by the drug companies, so the doctors would not be encouraged to diagnose the disease and then treat it. Until now there has been no simple easy cure for allergies. Nutritional treatment in the form of vitamin, mineral, amino acid and glandular supplements accompanied by avoidance of allergenic foods offer the critical answer to this problem.

Certain aspects of nutritional medicine can fall under the heading of what the author calls, “Nutritional Pharmacology.” The most striking example of this in regard to food allergies and weight reduction is the success achieved in combining buffers of mineral bicarbonates and Vitamin C. Through readjustment of the normal pH balance in the body one can eliminate many of the symptoms of food allergy, especially hunger. The simple test, using a highly buffered Vitamin C solution and observing whether it controls your appetite is an excellent diagnostic procedure for the determination of food allergies. Patients with multiple and severe allergies are well advised to visit a clinical ecologist or nutritionally-oriented allergist.

Steven A. Levine, Ph.D., biochemist from UC Berkeley, co-author of Antioxidant Adaptation.

Weight Loss

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