“I don’t want to offend you,” my friend said apologetically, “but isn’t it just a matter of having self-control?” We were talking about the struggles some people, including me, have with food. My friend is one of those people who never had a weight problem. She “watches what she eats” and exercises every day. To her it is like brushing her teeth.
“I’m so glad you asked!” I told her. “Willpower and self-control are enough for some people, but some of us have more going on.” Let me tell you about the rats. Scientists got some lab rats addicted to cocaine. Then they let them choose cocaine or sugar water. Nearly all the cocaine-addicted rats chose sugar.
In another experiment, rats were fed the yummy white filling from Oreo cookies. After they got used to eating it, they were offered food with no sugar. Those rats refused to eat — at all. They preferred to starve if they couldn’t have Oreo filling.
It turns out that sugar is eight times more addictive than cocaine. You can see the addiction in brain scans. People had their brains scanned while they drank a chocolate shake. A normal person’s brain lights up when they consume sugar. The brains of people who are addicted to sugar light up much less because they have developed tolerance.
The area of the brain that lights up is the same area activated by heroin and cocaine. It is the reward and motivation center of the brain, which runs on the neurotransmitter dopamine. The dopamine circuit has been key to our evolution. It tells us when something we do, like eating, is worth repeating. But we did not evolve consuming sugar every day, let alone many times a day. People started cultivating sugar cane 10,000 years ago. Our species had been evolving for over 1 million years before that. Our brains were not designed for the tidal wave of dopamine that is triggered by eating sweets.
When we are exposed over and over and over to a substance that causes a huge dopamine surge, our brains say, “Enough!” We start to lose the receptors for dopamine. The fewer receptors we have, the more of the substance it takes to get the high. That is “tolerance.” A heroin addict needs to inject more and more heroin to feel the same buzz that a small amount used to give. Similarly, a sugar addict needs more and more sweet stuff.
“Moderation doesn’t work for addicts,” according to Dr. Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse. I tested this on myself. After not eating sweets for a year, I thought I could eat one piece of cake on my child’s birthday. One piece became two, and the leftover cake was gone by morning.
So how do you stop eating sweets once you are addicted? First, you have to recognize that you are addicted.
Second, you have to really, really want to be free of the compulsion. Maybe your health is deteriorating. Maybe you want to go for a walk without gasping for breath.
If you take those steps, it is possible to kick the sugar habit. I will give you more information in future columns. In the meantime, be kind to yourself. None of us want to be addicts. We have been hijacked, but we are going to get off this train.
— Laura Wishik is the volunteer coordinator for Shape Up Vashon and teaches Food for Life, a class on developing healthy relationships with food. She is also chair of Vashon’s school board, an attorney for the City of Seattle and mother of two.
