The Non-Addictive Food Diet

[UrsusMinor]

Sugar is a food not only for parasites.  It also feeds many other pathogenic infections.  I noticed that I when I went low carb and cut out most processed foods, that I don't get colds, sore throats, or respiratory tract infections anymore. And sugar even feeds abnormal cell growth. A connection between sugar and cancer has been known since Otto Warburg showed in 1931 that cancer cells require glucoses for anaerobic glycolysis, and ketogenic diets have been shown to halt and reverse a number of specific cancers, including brain cancer. 

Yes indeed. PET scans find tumors by adminstering radioactively labeled glucose (usually fluorodeoxyglucose). Because of their appetite for sugar, cancer cells grab it out of the bloodstream, and they light up like Las Vegas at night.

Since this is a well-established technique, it surprises me that many doctors still question the link between sugar and cancer!

[amann4613]

I see this is an old thread, but I find the ET technique to be very novel and potentially effective. The gist I get from reading Heidi's posts is that she was able to control a previously uncontrollable intake of carb/junk/addictive foods in a relatively easy manner leading to the reaching her goal weight. Typically, someone with a strong addiction to these types of foods has considerable trouble controlling their intake; me being one of the them. Hopefully this method will be as efficacious for me.

I've been doing ET for the past couple days. Thus far, it's worked to help me restrict my intake of foods (actually swallowing) to those that I consider diet-friendly (low carb/high protein/moderate fat). The real test would be to see if this holds for at least 10 days/15 lbs weight loss. Typically, I'll lose around 15 lbs (obviously mainly glycogen/water and likely some fat/muscle) within a week or two, but then the cravings kick in hardcore. If I can get past that point comfortably, I may be able to go indefinitely. I'll report back with my progress.

In doing ET, I haven't noticed a decrease in pleasure from addictive food flavors, but I just started. The effect it does seem to have is creates what feels somewhat like a cigarette buzz. Not sure if it from ET or not. It could have been from something else or just how I was feeling at the time. I'm not overly perceptive to these types of things.

One theoretical problem I'm having with ET is that it seems to the opposite of what I thought SGL was (which I believe Heidi states that ET is a sort of extension of). It seems that SGL advocates consuming calories without flavor, in which the idea originated from the study that showed saccharin produced weight gain in rats (flavor without calories). I'm probably messing up of the mechanics of all this, and being that it worked great for Heidi, it seems to have a lot of merit, but if this works, wouldn't using artificial sweeteners work as well? What about chewing sugarless gum? If the ET theory is correct, wouldn't artificial sweeteners subdue the need for carbs/sweets? Wouldn't they quickly become unappetizing (no insulin effect, etc.)? Hopefully, this can be deconflicted.

Naltrexone is also very interesting to me. I've wondered that if neurotransmitter reuptake inhibitors/agonists eventually cause downregulation in the long-term, could an antagonist allowing upregulation be more effective in the long term? Todd and I discussed this in the comments section of his receptor/set-point article. It would seem that LDN might mediate many of the risks of a higher dose.

Just a thought, but I think IF may work well with LDN and help to accelerate upregulation. Here's a potential protocol:

- Take LDN (maybe ~6 mg) a couple hours for bedtime
- Assuming it takes effect within an hour or so, wait until the effect has taken and engage in some addictive behavior you would like   extinguished - i.e. a small/predetermined amount of addictive food
- sleep (hopefully the LDN will promote faster upregulation of receptors during sleep...not sure if that is the case or not as I'm not sure if they are generally actived during sleep or not)
- wake and continue fasting during working hours (hopefully adding to receptor upregulating)
- Evening: have healthy food and exercise. By this time, LDN should be mostly washed out and these actions should be reinforced (4 hour half-life])
- repeat

If LDN promotes upregulation during sleep, with the short half-life, it would allow most of the negative effects of opioid blocking to be only realized while sleeping. So when you eat 18-20 hours after dosing, you don't have to over-eat to realize satiety.

I'm not sure if 6 mg is enough to blunt the effects of addictive foods. If not, then I would attempt to avoid consuming them and ET instead. I may do that either way so to accelerate fat-loss. I'm at 260 and should be about 210 (~190 lean body mass via DEXA scan), so I have a ways to go.

If I can get my hands on some LDN, I'll give this a try.

Heidi mentioned FDA trials on Naltrexone and another drug. Here's the wikipedia link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bupropion/naltrexone

I think it is a bit strange they are combining naltrexone with a dopamine reuptake inhibitor. I believe that would downregulate dopamine in the long run. It seems like contradicting philosophies. Either way, I don't think the results were that impressive relative to controls. I'd be interested to see the rate of weight loss over the year and see if nal/dop is significantly better than control in the later months. That would be a better predictive of long-term weight loss.

[Heidi]

Hi amman, I have been intending to write an update to this thread and in fact I woke up this morning thinking about what I was going to write.  I’m still experimenting with enlightened tasting.  I have learned a great deal from it.  It has been successful for me.  However, the success has been a lot slower than I thought it would be.  Some of the slowness is due to the fact that each food or combination of foods needs to be individually deconditioned.  However, much of the slowness is also due to my problem with parasites.  They are the source of most of my cravings.  Especially when they are dying their cravings (which means my cravings) increase.  I will hopefully write a more detailed post soon.

Initially ET creates an increase in cravings.  It can also create a buzz or increase in energy as you describe.  I can’t remember if I posted a link to this article on a sugar rinse enhancing athletic performance:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode.cfm?id=sugar-rinse-raises-performance-09-04-16&sc=CAT_ES_20090416

Endurance athletes rinsed their mouths with one of the three drinks during a tough workout. Surprisingly, athletes that rinsed and spat out the glucose and maltodextrin performed 2 to 3 percent better than those who got the artificial sweetener. They said they didn’t feel like they were working any harder. Then they had their brains scanned by fMRI. The drinks that had real sugar and carbs lit up areas of the brain connected to pleasure and reward. But the fake sweet water did not.

Perhaps addiction to diet soda and other calorie free substances is an addiction to some other chemical in those substances.  All of my food addiction is to food that is very high in calories.  So I don’t have any experience with this.  Are you also going to try enlightened tasting with diet soda?  I would be curious to hear the results. 

I’m happy to hear that you are experimenting with this.  I think that this technique has great potential.  It has helped me immensely.  However, very few people have been willing to try it.  Keep me posted as to how it goes.

[amann4613]

That's an interesting study and definitely something to ponder. I feel that when I feel like I am in a good mood (either a natural high or adderall or caffeine), I have more energy and much better workouts. When feeling this way, the workouts give me that endorphin effect people describe which adds to the overall feeling. But most of the time I feel antsy and bored (ADD feelings). It seems the displeaure of working out on top of the feelings of boredom is too much. If I push through it, the endorphin effect is pretty minimal.

Going low-carb and doing cold showers has helped, but I am looking to enhance workouts/mood/energy significantly more. Maybe ET can be part of the picture (specifically in relation to better workouts). What I don't want to do is overuse ET as I assume that would cause downregulation if it indeed activates the reward pathway as the study states.

You stated ET causes an initial increase in cravings, so I assume that means you found that the increased cravings subsides? Does it eventually lead to decreased cravings for food in general (not just sweets/addictive foods), and cause and increase in the rate of weight loss? One of my problems is that when I go low-carb, I tend to substitute the carbs for a greater amount of non-carb, calorie-dense foods. So I get less appetite stimulation via insulin/blood sugar, but greater appetite via wanting to stimulate the reward pathway (or maybe low serotonin, but I'm skeptical about that as I have no feelings of melancholy, just boredom and wanting the pleasure of certain foods).

[Heidi]

The increased cravings were primarily for the particular food that I was tasting and spitting.  The increase was brief and only lasted for the first few times that I did enlightened tasting for a particular food.  (I also had cravings early on that I was desperately hungry and was going to starve to death if I didn’t have some addictive carbs.  I finally figured out that a lot of worms were starving to death because they didn’t get the carb fix that they needed.)  

On the whole my cravings have been very significantly reduced by this method.  My goal is to eliminate addictive cravings entirely.  Some of why it is taking me so long is that I am trying to push things towards repulsion as much as possible.  It probably sounds crazy to most people, but ideally I would like to be repulsed by all junk food, baked goods, etc.  Enlightened tasting has enabled me to stick to a very strict diet without cheating and for the most part without feeling deprived.  It would have been impossible for me to stick to these really healthy changes without it.

Does it eventually lead to decreased cravings for food in general (not just sweets/addictive foods), and cause and increase in the rate of weight loss?

I am only eating nonaddictive food that I have no cravings for.  So for me there is a markedly reduced craving for food in general and I eat and desire much less food than I use to.

I can’t vouch for short term weight loss results because my weight loss has been completely messed up by the parasites.  Right now eliminating food addiction and parasites are much more important to me than weight loss.  I find it best to focus on one priority at a time.  However, eliminating all food addiction will be great for maintaining long term weight loss goals.

I am no longer doing the Shangri-la Diet.  But I think that the combination of SLD and ET are especially powerful for weight loss.

One of my problems is that when I go low-carb, I tend to substitute the carbs for a greater amount of non-carb, calorie-dense foods.

What are the calorie dense foods that you are substituting for carbs?  I found that I was addicted to a lot of calorie dense foods such as nuts, cheeses, cream, butter, etc.  I have eliminated all of them for now.

In terms of exercise, right now I am only exercising for pleasure.  It has been a refreshing change.  I only do exercise that I enjoy and only for as long as I am enjoying it.  Exercising this way almost always gives me a natural high and is self reinforcing.  It’s hard to imagine going back to a mode of discipline.  This feels so much better.