Diet Rehab: 28 Days to Finally Stop Craving the Foods That Make You Fat (19 page)

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Authors: Mike Dow,Antonia Blyth

BOOK: Diet Rehab: 28 Days to Finally Stop Craving the Foods That Make You Fat
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Later, in college, Michaela felt lonely away from her family, even though she was also glad to be on her own. At this point, she acquired a taste for the banana-nut and chocolate-chip muffins in her local coffee shop, where she’d go to study and hang out so she wouldn’t have to sit in her room alone. She eventually made friends, found a boyfriend whom she later married, and felt as though her college years had been a success. Still, she had also created a potential addiction to sweet and fatty foods.
Michaela put on a little weight after her two children were born and she had less time to play sports and work out. But things didn’t start to spin out of control until her mother got sick—really sick—with a heart condition that required an operation and then a series of hospital stays. Although Michaela lived in a different city and had a family of her own, she tried to handle her mother’s care long-distance when she could and would fly in when she had to. Around the same time, one of her daughters started having trouble in school and the other one broke her leg in a gymnastics accident. The daughters’ difficulties plus Michaela’s absences naturally put a strain on Michaela’s marriage and on the relationships at her job. By the time she came to me, Michaela felt that her life had spiraled completely out of control.
“I’ve gained fifty pounds in the past six months,” Michaela confessed as she sat restlessly in my office chair. She was a study in contradiction—fidgety and agitated one moment, listless and exhausted the next. “I can’t keep up with anything, my whole life’s falling apart, I’m a total mess—and look how fat I am!” She started to cry, trying to gulp out an apology through her tears. “I’m sorry, Dr. Mike, I don’t know what to do, but I can’t believe how badly I’ve screwed everything up. . . .”
Michaela was clearly struggling with multiple problems. She needed to figure out how to set boundaries with her mother, how to resolve things with her husband, and how to reconnect with her daughters, both of whom felt abandoned by what looked to them like their mother’s preference for her own mother over them. She also needed to regain control of her relationship with food. It looked to me as though she had developed addictions to both high-fat and sweet, starchy foods in a desperate attempt to replenish the serotonin and dopamine that her high-stress, crisis-ridden life had depleted.
Michaela started the Diet Rehab program like anybody else: adding booster foods and activities without taking anything away. Because she was so depleted, I would have liked her to add as many boosters to her life and diet as possible, but I also saw that Michaela felt too overwhelmed even to do what my other patients had done. Suggesting a version of Cindy’s nightly bath to her would have felt as out of the question as asking her to run a marathon. Mentioning Jim’s hiking club would have been an insult, showing just how little I understood about how stressed, exhausted, and overwhelmed she felt. “You don’t understand, Dr. Mike,” she kept saying. “I can’t do
anything.
I could barely make it here!”
So we started small. We added just a five-minute walk to her afternoon or a cup of hot water with lemon when she felt like she couldn’t take one more minute of work. And she agreed to try driving a new way home from work, which added a little dopamine-boosting newness while also helping her to avoid the fast-food restaurants that were habitual and mindless traps. Of course, I made sure to reassure Michaela that she was not going to have to even consider giving up a single bite of muffin or a single order of french fries until she could do so without feeling the pain of withdrawal.
Michaela’s road back to health was a long one, and it involved making a series of changes in her life, her mantra, and her relationships, as well as in her diet. But by day twenty-eight of Diet Rehab, without giving up anything she wasn’t ready to let go of, she had lost eight pounds and was beginning to feel less out of control. A double deficiency is a powerful challenge, but Michaela proved to be a powerful woman. By taking small steps at first, she got herself on the road to recovery. I was proud of her—but more important, she was proud of herself.
Feeding Your Brain to Control Your Life
 
It’s a terrible feeling to be starving for everything. It’s hard not to blame yourself for your predicament, even as you feel too depressed, insecure, and confused to take steps to change it. If you are starving for serotonin and desperate for dopamine, I feel for the discomfort you are in—but I want to assure you, there is a solution to your problem. Commit to the first day of the 28-day Diet Rehab program, and then, when that day is done, commit to the second day, and then the third, and then the fourth. Maybe it will be easier to make the commitment knowing that you don’t have to give up
anything
until you’re ready to do so. When the time is right, you’ll take the next step—and regain control of your life.
PART III
 
Free Yourself From Food Addiction
 
7
 
Obsessive Eating: Seeking Security
 
When Jennifer first walked into my office, no one would have pegged her as an insecure woman whose mantra was
I’m not safe.
She was dressed beautifully in designer clothes and had a chic Beverly Hills haircut. Recently divorced, Jennifer was frustrated by the unsatisfying relationships she kept entering and by her ongoing tug-of-war with food.
Just as no one could have seen through to Jennifer’s insecurities, no one would ever have suspected her addiction to food. Yet for Jennifer, each day was one long battle. At every meal, she fought to restrict her diet to the number of calories she had determined was appropriate for the weight she wanted to maintain. In the morning she struggled to keep from picking up snacks at the newsstand in her building’s lobby. On her way home from work, she fought to prevent herself from stopping at the doughnut shop. Although Jennifer was slender and fit, she was anything but comfortable with food.
As I got to know Jennifer, I discovered that in middle school she had been mildly anorexic, followed by bouts of bulimia during high school and college. Now her anxieties took the form of constant diets and obsessive exercise. If she gained so much as a quarter pound, she began to panic. If she missed even a single day at the gym, she was sure that she was on her way to “looking fat and ugly.” And if she ever did slip and violate her strict regime, she starved herself for days afterward, desperate to make up for what she saw as lost ground.
Jennifer’s anxiety and her obsessive relationship to food were characteristic of someone who’s short on serotonin. I encouraged her to consume more serotonin booster foods and tried to help her change her mantra. But the key for Jennifer was to tackle the addictive habits she developed. She needed to prove to herself that food was safe for her—indeed, that the world was safe.
As a cognitive-behavioral therapist I am fascinated by the interaction between behavior and attitudes. I know that the route to changing your thoughts and feelings is often to change the way you act. Actions can actually lead us to think differently—or they can reinforce the thoughts we already have.
Jennifer experienced the world as a frightening place and, consequently, she was continually anxious. She experienced food as a powerful force that could disrupt her body and her life, and as a result, she feared that, too. My agenda was to help her prove to herself that she could give up some of her obsessive behaviors and take steps toward changing her thinking without risking her safety.
Obsessive Eating and Serotonin
 
People who show obsessive eating behaviors usually also have a serotonin deficiency. So if you scored high on the serotonin-hungry quiz in Chapter 4, you may find that you’re also trapped in obsessive behaviors. This can be one of many unique presentations of low serotonin. If you did not score high on the serotonin-hungry quiz in Chapter 4 and also do not score high on the obsessive eating quiz below, feel free to skip to Chapter 8.
Obsessive behaviors usually appear as an effort to regain a sense of control and safety through our actions. We’re seeking security, predictability, and stability, hoping that if we control our food intake, we can control our lives.
The serotonin booster foods listed on page 204 in Chapter 12 will help reduce your anxiety, which should automatically help you let go of obsessive behaviors. You will also find some great serotonin booster meal and snack suggestions on page 243. In this chapter, I’ll give you some additional support in overcoming food-related obsessions. Let’s start by learning whether you
are
an obsessive eater. Take the following quiz to find out.
 
Am I an Obsessive Eater?
Take a look at the following list. Circle every item that applies to you.
1. I need to eat the exact same thing every day.
2. I feel extremely out of sorts, moody, or anxious when I can’t get my usual choice of breakfast, lunch, or dinner.
3. I must sit and eat in the same spot every day.
4. I often turn down restaurant invitations because I prefer to eat a particular food at a particular time.
5. I have to have my own set of cutlery.
6. I can’t eat certain colored foods.
7. I tell people I have an allergy when I’ve never been tested and there’s no physical evidence I have one.
8. I don’t like different foods to touch on my plate.
9. I have a way of eating that other people consider strange.
10. I weigh my food (and have not been told to do so by a professional).
11. I get very anxious if I can’t complete my exercise routine every day.
12. I keep a calorie count in my head all the time.
13. If I eat something on my “forbidden” list, I starve myself for a while or double my exercise routine.
14. When I see someone in good shape, I have to find out what they eat.
15. I sometimes crave foods so badly I cry.
16. I don’t allow myself to eat until I’ve showered/finished work/ cleaned the house/done my rituals.
17. I like to go on juice or supplement-based fasts more than once a year.
18. I think the key to weight loss is eating no fat or carbs whatsoever.
19. I hide the evidence of my eating (packaging, dirty plates).
20. I prefer to cook for others and watch them eat rather than eat myself.
21. I often try to push food on my friends so I feel less guilty.
22. I bring my own food with me on occasions because I am fearful of new foods.
23. I have suffered from some form of anorexia or bulimia.
24. I have other non-food rituals I have to perform to feel safe.
25. I am extremely adamant about my foods being a certain brand or from a certain restaurant.
If you checked any of these, your eating behavior has some obsessive qualities, and the interventions outlined in this chapter will help you to gradually let them go. If your compulsive rituals take up a significant amount of time, if you find yourself unable to make even slight changes to them, or if your obsessions are extremely anxiety-provoking, consult a psychiatrist for screening and possible treatment of obsessive-compulsive disorder. If you are currently suffering from anorexia or bulimia, these are potentially life-threatening disorders that need immediate, professional treatment. See a mental health professional or go to my website—
www.drmikedow.com
—for treatment referrals.
How Do I Let Go?
 
The good news here is that, just as you gradually learned these obsessive rituals around food, you can also gradually unlearn them. If you have gravitated toward obsessive patterns around food, then we look at that as information indicating that you need more stability, predictability, or peace in your life. Luckily, the serotonin boosters listed on pages 204 and 208 will help you to put the source of stability, predictability, or peace where it belongs: in your relationships, your sense of purpose in your life, and confidence in yourself. These changes will take place as you embark on your own Diet Rehab, and they will also make the following obsessive-busting interventions more and more achievable.
As you now know, the most effective way to create change is through changing your experience. Even if you have specific food rules, such as foods not touching each other, you already
logically
know that your health would not be in jeopardy if you did not stick to this rule. But
emotionally
, it still feels scary. The following interventions will gradually teach the emotional part of you that you are, indeed, going to be okay, even if you take a more relaxed attitude toward food.

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