Sara Hauber Coaching
  • About Sara
    • Contact
  • Coaching
    • The Coaching Cycle
    • Life & Work
    • Love & Relationships
    • Health & Fitness
  • Hauber Methodâ„¢
    • Students Say...
    • Past Events
    • Get Notified!
  • Articles & Videos
    • Blog 2011-2019
  • Book Now
    • FAQs

Overcoming sugar addiction: Uncovering pain

7/7/2017

0 Comments

 
I could have called this post so many things:
  • Desperate times call for desperate measures.
  • Now I understand what crack addicts feel like in rehab.
  • Mourning the loss of German Black Forest Cake.
  • My husband and I can no longer eat the foods we love together, and that sucks.
  • Please, gawd, make this torture stop. 
Sugar addiction
This used to be lunch.
But the truth of the matter is, I am hopeful that the process I am going through right this minute (and have gone through about 43,200 minutes already) will cease to feel desperate, not remind me of crack addiction, no longer have me mourning, allow me once again to eat meals with my husband, and have me not feeling as though I am being tortured most hours of most days of the week.

I’m hopeful that I will, indeed, overcome the sugar addiction that I have been unconsciously feeding for over a decade now. It went into overdrive when I met and married another sugar addict (isn’t that how it always goes?) and discovered I needed to drop sugar to heal a damaged gut (more on that later).

The funny part to me is that I never realized I was actually dependent on sugar.

Is this true for other addicts? I mean, do smokers not realize they need nicotine? Do drinkers not realize they need alcohol? Is that how it works? Denial writ large, every time?
 
All addictions—whether as destructive as crack or as seemingly benign as exercise—serve one purpose: to cover up any emotions we perceive as negative (anger, rage, guilt, fear, sadness) and prevent us from feeling and/or expressing them and their attendant shame.
 
And being 4 weeks into my withdrawal from sugar, I can say, holy shit, did I have far more negative-perceived emotions than I ever thought possible. And this, from someone who has practiced and tried just about every possible healing modality and self-help process on the planet to heal my longstanding wounds!
 
The crazy thing is, I went easily and happily without sugar for many years. But during those years, I was exercise addicted. I’d get physically and emotionally agitated if I could not exercise, and it had nothing to do with blood sugar (good excuse!) and everything to do with the fact that the exercise—as all addictions do—prevented me from feeling the emotions I did not think I was allowed to express. Sugar, exercise, crack—all the same in the eyes of the emotions. All willing to give us poor, mortal people an easy way out as we struggle to (unsuccessfully) cope with all the trauma and drama of being born, being brought up by imperfect people, and becoming adults in an emotion-retarded, addiction-overloaded world.
 
I’m not sure what the point of this post is (maybe it will reveal itself). All I know is that I felt it was important to share a few insights and then ask some questions of my fellow addicts in recovery.
 
First, the insights:
  • Sugar addiction is subtle and very, very real!
  • Living without sugar is extremely hard in a country where cake is a national specialty.
  • Living without sugar is easier when one eats enough fat (especially saturated fats).
  • Eating a LOT more fat and NO processed sugar or grains makes my body leaner, happier, more energetic, and without inflammation or painful/crunchy joints. I had been wondering where those fun physical symptoms had come from, and now I know.
  • I still crave and imagine eating cake almost every day. Despite the above-listed benefits of not eating it. Which explains why many alcoholics in recovery go to an AA meeting every day, no matter where they are. Daily support when recovering from addiction is really a must.
  • My negative emotions are finally allowed to surface, and man, do I need EVERY one of those modalities and self-help processes I have previously learned and practiced to safely let them out. Recovering is a daily practice that requires focus, sometimes extraordinary effort, time, and intention. In healing addiction, there are no shortcuts. And did I mention that patience is not really my forte?
 
Now, my questions for fellow addicts in recovery:
  • Does it ever get easier? [Updated Feb. 2018: Yes, it does!]
  • Did you have to stop and start when you first tried to quit your thing, or did you stick to it at the first go?
  • How did you find support for staying off the thing?
  • Did you ever notice, once you committed to recovering, that you had been addicted to more than one thing in your life? And how long did it take you to stop just trading one addiction to another? (Only took me about 20 years…)
  • What daily practices do you do that help you not get overwhelmed by your cravings and their real cause (our deep desire to not express the “negative” emotions we need to feel)?
 
Anyone else silently struggling with addiction, even to something as benign-sounding as sugar, I hope this post lets you know that you are not alone. I am willing to bet that the vast majority of people we encounter on a daily basis are addicted to something. Yeah, there are that many negative emotions being repressed in all of us—and that many great addictions (coffee, anyone?).
 
Addictions are so easy, and none of us needs to be ashamed that we have succumbed. Even if you’re not ready to quit whatever it is you’re addicted to, and not ready to face whatever emotions you’re avoiding feeling, at least know that you do have the option to quit hurting yourself, and you will find support. I’ll be posting my strategies for dealing with my negative emotions and resisting my addiction in the coming weeks. And maybe some of my fellow addicts in recovery will be so inclined to share theirs below?

0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Archives

    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    February 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    July 2013
    May 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    June 2012
    April 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011


    Clicking the Category links below will show you only the blog posts from 2011-2019 that pertain to those categories.

    To also find newer articles and videos about these topics, use the search bar at the top of the page.

    Categories

    All
    Addiction
    Back Pain
    Back Surgery
    Big Magic
    Body Image
    Brene Brown
    Coaching
    Deepak Chopra
    Eat Pray Love
    Elizabeth Gilbert
    EMDR
    Emotional Pain
    Emotional Well Being
    Fitness Industry
    Fitness Over 40
    Fun
    Goal Setting
    Gratitude
    Healing After Surgery
    Healing Without Surgery
    Healing With Yoga
    Health Behavior Change
    Italy
    Jillian Michaels
    Kat Robichaud
    Love
    Marriage
    Massage
    Meditation
    Mindfulness
    Myers-Briggs
    Myofascial Release
    Personal Growth
    Personality
    Practice
    Pranayama
    Puglia
    Recovery
    Relaxation
    Rotator Cuff
    Self Care
    Self-care
    Self Love
    Self Massage
    SMART Goals
    Spinal Flexion
    Spinal Fusion
    Spiritual Practice
    Stages Of Change
    Strength Training
    Styles Of Yoga
    Sugar Addiction
    Support
    Teaching
    Therapy
    Trullo Solari
    Vulnerability
    Wellness Coaching
    Women And Fitness
    Work Life Balance
    Work-life Balance
    Writing
    Yoga
    Yoga And Back Pain
    Yoga For Beginners
    Yoga In Puglia
    Yoga Poses For Back Pain
    Yoga Retreat In Italy
    Yoga Without Back Pain

    RSS Feed


    Click the button below to go to my Facebook page, where you can click "Like" and "Follow" to get notified of all my new posts.
    Picture
    And follow these handy tips to make sure you actually see notifications in your Facebook timeline. It's easy!

To search all website content, use the search bar here.
This entire website and all of it contents are copyrighted to Sara D. Hauber.
If you would like to use or reproduce any of the materials here, please contact Ms. Hauber for permissions.

Terms of Use and Privacy Policy
  • About Sara
    • Contact
  • Coaching
    • The Coaching Cycle
    • Life & Work
    • Love & Relationships
    • Health & Fitness
  • Hauber Methodâ„¢
    • Students Say...
    • Past Events
    • Get Notified!
  • Articles & Videos
    • Blog 2011-2019
  • Book Now
    • FAQs