One more cookie then… Oh, the pack is suddenly empty! What a mystery. Does this happen to you more often than you would like? And do you then defend your snacking behavior with ‘I can’t help it, I’m addicted to sugar’? Do you tell the truth, or do you lie to those around you and to yourself?
When are you addicted?
Let’s start at the beginning: Addiction is a mental illness. According to it international manual for diagnosing mental disorders, the DSM-5, there are eleven criteria for addiction. Two or three criteria indicate a mild disorder. If you meet more criteria, you can be categorized as moderately or severely addicted.
For example, continued use of an addictive substance can cause problems at work or at home, in your relationship or during social activities. And that you continue to use the drug despite the knowledge that this can endanger yourself and others.
These addiction criteria mainly apply to the use of substances such as alcohol or drugs. Also one of the characteristics is a strong desire to consume the drug in question again and again. That seems to happen with that uncontrolled chocolate binge, right? That’s just a bit different.
This is what sugar does to your brain
Every time you eat a chocolate, cookie or sweet with (a lot of) added sugar, something happens in your brain. The reward center in your brain is activated, releasing the substance dopamine. Sounds familiar? That may be true, because drug use also activates dopamine and gives you a feeling of happiness in the short term.
This happy feeling makes your brain want you to keep eating that sweet junk. But is that really a sugar?addiction? No, not that. The difference, for example, lies in tolerance. With drugs, alcohol or other stimulants, you need increasingly larger amounts to experience the effect of dopamine. That is not the case with sugar.
Is sugar really not physically addictive? No, you will not experience physical withdrawal symptoms when you stop eating sugar, such as shaking or sweating. This does happen when (trying to) quit alcohol or drugs. These symptoms will only diminish by using more of the drug again. You can also get withdrawal symptoms from coffee, but that is mainly in your head.
Myth debunked: sugar addiction does not exist
No, we cannot really speak of a sugar addiction. It checks too few of the eleven boxes. But why is it so difficult to stop at just one cookie? We can blame our primal brain for that. Sugars and fats, both of which provide a lot of energy, are not commonly found in nature. Our distant foraging ancestors were smart enough to gorge themselves when they came across sweet things, such as honey. After all, they never knew when the next opportunity would present itself.
So you will really have to do your best yourself sugar cravings to keep under control. You have to know what all that sugar is mainly in. Find the sneaky sugar bombs with the Quest test: Which contains more sugar?
Another persistent sugar myth: does sugar really make children so busy? And good question: if you don’t eat sugar, do you no longer have to brush your teeth?
2023-11-03 16:16:49
#Food #myth #sugar #addictive
