Teri K. (schnauzer-mom) - , reviewed on 1/29/2016 + 16 more book reviews

I certainly had my eyes opened! I mean, who doesn't know that while sublimely satisfying eating a triple cheeseburger, salty fries and a mocha frappe is not healthful eating? But do you really know why, beyond the obvious? From one point of view reading this book made me feel that there is a huge conspiracy afoot to make becoming overweight inevitable. The author explains how our brains can be trained or "conditioned" to want to eat certain types of foods containing fat, sugar and salt....insatiable cravings for MORE. The disturbing part is where the manufacturers seem to be well aware of the consequences of creating a nation of overeaters....and they continue to look for more ways of hooking the consumer. We are bombarded every minute with cues and temptations to have foods such as a burger, fry and shake (fat, salt and sugar.) Americans are as conditioned to overeat as Pavlov's dogs. I understand why there are 12-step groups focused on overeating because food CAN be addictive, in fact, it is designed to be. Shouldn't that be a crime? To deliberately, knowingly lure people into an addiction? For money. We put drug dealers behind bars for the very same thing!

To quote the author, "Chronic exposure to highly palatable foods changes our brains, conditioning us to seek continued stimulation. Over time a powerful drive for sugar, fat and salt competes with our conscious capacity to say no" He advocates "Food Rehab." Mr. Kessler maintains that the cycle of food addiction can be broken following these steps:
1. Figure out your cues. Food cues, situational cues, all of them.
2. Refuse everything you can't control.
3. Create an alternate plan with a specific behaviour to adopt in place of what normally would be conditioned hypereating.
4. Limit your exposure.
5. Remember the stakes. When faced with a situation that may involve conditioned overeating ensure that your visualization takes you all the way through to the inevitable end of the eating episode where you acknowledge that following momentary pleasure may come the pain of guilt or depression or the simple fact of it being counterproductive to your health.
6. Reframe things in terms of you vs. them. Kessler calls this active resistance. Recognize that Big Food is out to get you and try to see food in those terms.
7. Thought stopping. Try to stop your food related thoughts dead in their tracks.
8. Add negative associations to your normal cues.
9. Talk down the urge. Approach it with rationale thoughts. "Eating this will only satisfy me momentarily", "If I eat this I'll demonstrate that I can't break free".

Bottom line, though, is that even though "Big Food" created and sustains the problem, it is ultimately our own responsibility to stop it, or at least control our own addiction.

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