Foodie Walks and The Sweet, Sleek, Fit & Fun Weight Loss Tool Kit

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It was at an Overeater's Anonymous meeting, in the late seventies, where my friend heard someone say that sugar was to a compulsive overeater what alcohol was to an alcoholic. After hearing that and studying hypoglycemia, nutrition, and vitamins, for the first time in my adult life, I was able to get to a normal weight and maintain it for years.

However, after several major losses, a major car accident, two surgeries and other various health problems, I had stopped exercising and gotten back into my sugar addiction. I was almost 100 pounds overweight! How had this happened?

I had regularly lead five and ten-mile beach walks for the Sierra Club. My finest exercise accomplishments were a 20-mile walk-a-thon and a 3 1/2 hour aerobic marathon - not on the same day! I went to national Jazzercise Conventions. I LOVED exercise. I was not a lazy person. I was not a weak-willed person. Why couldn't I stop eating the sugar and refined carbs that were making me fat and miserable?

I knew about hypoglycemia and had since found out about Candida Albicans but it seemed to go beyond that - WAY beyond that. The deeper I got into this, the more it seemed like I was fighting a raging addiction! How could I sacrifice my health, my active lifestyle, and trade being treated well to sometimes being treated like a third-class citizen - all for a nightly "sugar-fix"? This didn't make any sense - or did it?

Was it possible that some (maybe a lot of) people had a specific body chemistry that allowed sugar to alter the biochemistry of the brain just like alcohol or drugs? Could THAT explain the withdrawal that seemed to occur when I tried giving up sugar and the "drivenness" to get more and more?

I remember seeing a research scientist on a TV news magazine show - possibly 60 Minutes. He had worked for one of the major tobacco companies. He caught my attention because he said he had experimented with lacing cigarettes with sugar. Ironically enough, about a year later, he was brought into my workplace to speak at the kick-off for an anti-smoking campaign. During the question and answer period, I asked him if he had experimentally laced cigarettes with sugar in order to increase the impact of the nicotine. He said, "No, I was trying to introduce a second addictive agent!"

I recently found a website on addictions that listed things that we typically think of as "drugs" and how they effect the neurotransmitters in the brain. What I found interesting, is that right there with the "drugs" was sugar. It effected four of the five neurotransmitters listed.

I believe that for SOME people, sugar is an addictive substance. I believe that the real reason people are overweight is not because they are weak-willed or lazy or because they secretly want to be. I believe the REAL reason people are overweight is due to biological factors and a biochemical imbalance in the brain.

The main emphasis of my book is on the biochemistry of weight gain/loss, although it contains, what at times may seem to be, unrelated articles like Guacamole Facials and Going to Beautiful places. However, having fun, laughing, being with people you love, healthy eating, FUN exercise, prayer, having great plans/a hope for the future, as well as many other things, either stabilize blood sugar and /or increase the neurotransmitter, serotonin, in the brain which gives a sense of calm, well-being and supresses the appetite.