"We’ve Got Your Cravings Covered"
by Tricia Burbank, Clinical Hypnotherapist
I was reading the back of a popcorn box this morning while cleaning up after my late night movie indulgence, and emblazoned across the back of the box was “We’ve got your cravings covered”. Underneath was a list of all the fat, sugar and salt popcorn varieties that were available from this manufacturer. I thought, “they should cross out cravings and write addictions above it, because they had covered the full range of food addiction.”
This thought led to further contemplation about how insidious these readily available fixes are. If you are a drug addict, you have to search out and purchase your fix from illegal sources. You know for certain that what you’re doing is not only illegal but also harmful to you, despite the rationalizations that make it “necessary”.
With our food addictions, however, the availability of a fix has become so commonplace that we accept it as a normal part of our diet. Yes, there is often a small nagging voice that prompts us otherwise, but when half the super market aisles and most all of the convenience store offerings contain a ready supply of our “drugs of choice” we lose perspective. We have so adapted to our environment that we consider these foods normal. They must be okay as everyone else is eating them. Already prepared, easy to eat on the run, they taste really, really good and there is such an abundance of them!
I am continually stunned by the massive amount of candy that greets me at the entrance to my supermarket months before an impending holiday. The sheer volume is staggering and when the holiday arrives, the shelves are nearly empty. It must be “normal” to buy it for the family and consume it as a “celebration” even if you’ve replaced it 3 or more times before the holiday arrives.
Even if you are not an obvious over consumer of sugar and refined carbohydrates, are you aware of how much sugar you are innocently taking in? There seems to be much controversy over the amount that is deemed healthy. The World Health Organization says that people should get no more than 10 percent of their calories from sugar, in a major new report on how to stem the global epidemic of obesity-linked diseases. The food industry immediately decried the document, insisting more exercise is the key to ending obesity. The experts said people should restrict their consumption of added sugar not naturally present in honey, syrups and fruit juices, to below 10 percent of calories. In the United States, which leads the world in obesity, the government’s Dietary Guidelines for Americans advise only that sugar should be used in moderation. The Institute of Medicine, part of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, recommended in September that sugar could make up to 25 percent of calories.” Is it any wonder that Americans lead the world in the obesity arena?
Do you read the label on the products you purchase? Consumers have been obsessed with fat gram counting for years and more recently with carbohydrate counts. The carb counting is heading us in the right direction but beware. Did you know that 4 grams of sugar equals one teaspoon? For years, I have been buying low fat salad dressing. Upon examination of the labels, you’ll find low fat products contain more sugar, which of course turns promptly into fat in the body. Think about it. For example, if you use the recommended serving size of 2 tbs. of dressing and there are 4 grams of sugar in it (how big is a gram anyway, it sounds so insignificant) then 1/6 of the serving is pure sugar. Can you imagine dumping a teaspoon of sugar on your lettuce?
The average can of Cola, one of America’s major addictions, contains 39 grams of sugar, which is equal to drinking 12 oz of chemicals and 10 teaspoons of sugar. Ann L Gittleman, author of “Get the Sugar Out” states that soft drinks are the greatest single contributor of sugar to our diets. “Soft drinks are harmful to your health in every way, shape and form, whether you’re talking about the 39 grams of sugar in one can of Coke, the phosphoric acid that throws your calcium out of whack, or the caffeine that continually stresses your adrenal glands.”
With so much “added sugar” in all of our products, it take great vigilance to stay within the 10 % recommended allowance for good health. Add to that our ever-increasing addiction to sugar and refined carbohydrates and you have a population that is already in a health crisis and shows no signs of healing itself short of a major revolution in thinking and habit.
Perhaps the biggest crime of the food industry is being perpetrated against our children and our own rush to keep up with a busy life has made us accomplices. Do you know that the Diabetic risk for U.S. children is now 1 in 3 and that among the black and Latino community it increases to nearly half the children? According to scientists with the Center for Disease Control, this is the fate for children born in 2000 unless they begin eating less and exercising more. The article from the associated press goes on to say “The 33 percent lifetime risk is about triple the American Diabetes Associations current estimate. The implications are frightening. Diabetes leads to a host of problems, including blindness, kidney failure, amputation and heart disease.”
Are your children addicted to sugar coated breakfast cereals or pop tarts? Do they have one or more sodas or sugared drinks a day? Do they spend their allowance on candy, cookies or other sweet treats? Do you know what they’re buying from the vending machines at school? Ann Gittleman tells us “at the beginning of this century, two-thirds of the carbohydrates eaten by Americans came from complex sources such as potatoes, vegetables, and grains. Today, amazingly, half of all carbohydrates consumed come from simple sugars. These statistics confirm what we already know: We are becoming sugarholics.” Americans are now eating their weight in sugar. She states “with lots of calories but no nutrients, sugar is the number one cause of America’s weight problem and lack of nutrition – a combination known as over consumptive malnutrition.”
In a recent study published in the Lancet Medical Journal, scientists estimate that 24 percent of American children are obese. The study was researching the effects of soft drinks on children and concluded “each sugared soft drink the children consumed each day inched up their Body Mass Index by 0.18 points. If they increased their daily soft drink intake, each extra soda made them 60 percent more likely to become obese, regardless of how many sodas they were drinking before. Only 7 percent of the 548 children did not change their soft drink intake over two years. Fifty-seven percent increased their intake, with a quarter of them drinking two or more extra cans a day. What the article does not go on to conclude is that the increased consumption is due to sugar and caffeine addiction. (As a former addict of “Diet Coke”, I will write more on this subject in future articles)
Much of the research I have done has concluded that over consumption of sugars and refined carbohydrates lead to obesity and obesity is the cause of most of our life threatening diseases including the increase in Diabetes. The possibilities to get our food addiction fixes are increasing as our supermarkets continue to expand the selections and the food industry makes them even more attractive to our children and us.
To increase our own health levels and assure our children a healthy future, it is imperative that we fully understand our current food addiction problems. We then need to overcome our addictions, setting positive examples and guidelines for those we love. We need to end the “mindless cravings” and the compulsive behaviors that are driving us to obesity and illness.
It is my conclusion that to end our addiction to refined sugar and carbohydrates, it will be necessary to have a radical shift in consciousness. In order to facilitate this shift I have designed a 6-week series of classes to address this situation. I feel there is a need first for education about the real effects of these refined products on our body and our well-being. Second, we need to understand why it is we continue to indulge in them. Is it habit, convenience, addiction or emotional or psychological dependence? Next, it will be necessary to form a plan that will work for you, not all of us are alike. Curing addictions and habits is not a one size fits all solution. The final stages will be working with your subconscious mind through hypnosis to make a permanent change where the behaviors, habits or dependencies originated.
To determine whether you or your children are addicted to sugar and/or processed carbohydrates and/or sodas, go to my website at www.sugarfreeU..com and take the addiction test. There you will find additional articles and information about the perils of obesity and sugar addiction, as well as some facts about hypnosis. You will also find more specific information on “Sugar Free” classes and the included private hypnosis sessions.
I would enjoy hearing your comments, concerns and your own stories. Please feel free to write to me at tjb@triciaburbank.com
Tricia Burbank is a Clinical Hypnotherapist and the originator of the “Sugar Free” program. She has been a Hypnotherapy practitioner for 15 years specializing in educating and helping clients overcome the limitations that affect their quality of life. Her own struggle with sugar and diet soda addiction as well as that of her many clients and her observance of the increasing ill health and obesity prevalent in our society has led her to create an innovative program to help people release their addictions. Tricia is in private practice in Nevada City, California and is available for private appointments, lectures and special workshops. For more information about the “Sugar Free” program please go to www.SugarfreeU.com
