The Family Addiction Tree

Hi,

Going through the book "Anatomy of a Food Addiction: The Brain Chemistry of Overeating" by Anne Katherine, is like reliving my childhood. After doing the assignment of recalling my family members and ancestors and what addictions they had, I can see it kind of runs in the family. We have a couple of people who were alcoholics or drug users. We had some who were obese. We had some who were diabetic or had chronic illness. So, while I don't blame them, I don't have to blame me, either.

I also like that the book does not stop with the explanation of how sugar and starches affect my brain chemistry making me, driving me, to over eat. At first glance it seems that the way around the addiction is by giving up the sugar and then life will be grand. So sorry, it does not work exactly that way. That would be the "diet mentality." Dieting does not actually work for a food addict either, because there are other things going on than just food chemistry.

At some point we (addicts) learned to sacrifice our emotional needs for our physical well being. The adults we were around were not very skilled at cuddling us or paying attention to us or teaching us the skills to deal with the emotions of life. They are not to blame. They were not taught these things either. They were doing the best they could.

Nonetheless, in my own family, there were some forms of abuse going on. Striking anyone (a child or teen) with a belt, or punching them in the face is abuse. Not providing the affection they needed or teaching them how to deal with their inner nature is also abuse, of a different kind. Some people in other families suffered even worse. Those children went to certain adults for physical affection and cuddles and got sexually abused. So very sorry for those this happened to. Glad to say that did not happen, as far as I know, in my family. I know it did not happen to me. There were one or two odd instances of sexually inappropriate behavior (we had many kids in our family) but they were not abusive, were not repeated, and were not ever mentioned again. I don't consider those to be too important or life changing, although there may have been an affect of which I am unaware.

All these kinds of things happening to a child shapes how that child deals with life. They learn how to survive but they do not learn how to enjoy being alive. They learn that they are supposed to know things they don't know. They learn to not get too close to the edge of a cliff or they might just fall over and then be berated for being stupid. They become very responsible. They learn that there are times when they might need a cuddle but they have also learned they are not supposed to ask for what they need.

They discover that food can be comforting when they need comfort. Their adults are very busy taking care of what is important to adults... like work or cleaning or whatever they are occupied with. The child learns to keep things hidden from their adults and they may turn to food (or other substances) which actually does give a real and physical kind of comfort, if only for a short time. They learn to trust the process of eating, even after they begin to understand it also does them harm.

The generic descriptions I was reading actually brought back specific memories of my own. Little instances that verified what the author was saying about how the addiction grows. I remember when I was a young adult wishing that I had had the opportunity to go to "charm school" because I had such a rough time with relationships.

This is not a book about wallowing, or blaming, it appears to be simply a way to open my eyes a little so I can begin to learn how to deal with things another way. It is pointing out the need. The promise is that I will learn a much more healthy way to deal with the stresses of life.

I am intrigued and hopeful. I'm also a little scared, but, I shall forge ahead. I want to get beyond this over eating thing once and for all. I know I will have to continue to exercise my new skills for the rest of my life, because, from experience, and from the author's writing, I already know my brain acts differently and that may not go away. But hopefully, I'll learn some new skills and go on from there.

Looking ahead,

Be back soon,

Marcia