Holy Toledo, Batman, It's a New Addiction

Program start: Aug 6, 2006
Lost to date: 46 lbs

Well, actually, it's not a new addiction. It's just an addiction I never realized I had till very recently. Talk about a light bulb going on over your head!

I have had a weight problem since approximately age 7, when in the space of two years I went from looking like a slightly malnourished skinny preschooler to a pleasantly pudgy first grader to an out of control 7-year-old. So after all those decades of struggling with weight, what did I think my food issues were? Well, during the many wasted years of low-fat dieting, I would have told you I couldn't stay away from fats. Turns out I didn't need to, Wilbur.

Then I realized, during a massive Blue Bell Ice Cream binge, that I was addicted to sugar. I would start something sweet -- or bready or both -- and couldn't stop.

So, in August, when I started my Last Diet Ever--because low carb is not really a diet but a changed way of eating, I thought--I started trying to listen to my body, to discern physical hunger from "head hunger."

Then I rediscovered low-carb snacks. There are some really fine ones. And as I calculated which ones I could eat the most of without overdoing it on carbs, the light bulb went off.

I am addicted to overeating--not food, not carbs (though they are the major triggers) but overeating. The sensation of being full.

I realize that, even as I have a ways to go with the weight loss, this is a food issue I absolutely MUST address if I'm to take it off and keep it off. Yes, you can binge on low-carb just as you can binge on high-carb (though, theoretically, it wouldn't be as harmful as all that sugar--ick! Yum! Ick! Yum!

Oh well. All that to say that I've picked up a copy of Linda Moran's book, How to Survive Your Diet and Conquer Your Food Issues Forever. You'll be hearing more about it as I work through the book on this blog. Cognitive therapy techniques, here I come.

I promise not to post anything too Freudian, though!