Carbs for sweets addiction.

[Gwen]

Hi all,
This seems to be a good place to ask questions, so here goes...
In every other eating plan I've tried, even those who espouse a lot of protein, I still have a nagging want for sweets, especially chocolate.
My question is, does eating the complex carb way help with these cravings?
Gwen

[stirFry]

Sweet potatoes certainly help me, but if I drink even one soda I'm hooked again. It's awful and terrible for your body. I'd highly suggest you find a DVD copy of The Pleasure Trap.

I'm able to have an occasional sugary treat now, but I have to be really mindful to not let it get out of hand, otherwise it inevitably leads to sugar cravings and drinking a soda. I can say that I feel quite content on this plan. It takes about 6 weeks from when I cut sugar completely out for the cravings to go away.

[karin_kiwi]

I find it very easy to satisfy sweet cravings eating this way - there's enough kinds of fruit from sharp/acidic oranges to starchy bananas to almost chocolatey fresh dates and everything in between. If I want a treat fruit, I'll add cocoa powder (and make a chocolate/blueberry soup, or a scrumptious 'hot fudge' sauce microwaved with ripe banana - great to dip slices of nashi pear). If I want to take it a step further, I can have some sugar in it (but yes, I know this can trigger cravings in people).

It's the fat/savoury cravings that I find difficult to satisfy. It's all sweet for the sweet cravings, though!

[ParsleyPatch]

It took me a few weeks to stop craving sugary things. What I do now if I start thinking about sweets is to substitute fresh fruit of any kind --- that's my big treat now and it works for me. Best ones are oranges, strawberries, blueberries, melons.

[peasouper]

You can watch Doug Lisle talking about the pleasure trap on this site. It is very informative. http://vsh.voip-info.org/lisle.html

Sue

[pippin]

My experience has been that my sweet cravings have dramatically gone down. I have been doing this for about 9 months now. It took about a month to really stop craving sweets but since then I've been able to just walk away quite easily. If I have a small snack of potatoes or leftover rice and veggies I am happy happy. No cravings.

And walking the hall in my office is like walking the gauntlet, I tell ya. Every step of the way there is a challenge. One person has a huge bowl of chocolates, the next a box of donuts, and so on. Good thing I don't crave that stuff anymore!

[noelalexis2000]

I second the sweet potatoes. I keep them baked in the frig and eat them cold. Yum!

[Gwen]

Thanks everyone. I can see there is hope.
I like the idea of when I crave sweets, to make it an automatic response to choose a fruit. Having a substitute instead of flat out denial will be of help, I think.

[Gwen]

I just watched Dr. Lisle's video....I also have his book, but I read it years ago. Time to reread it!!
A couple yrs ago I was off sugar and unhealthy foods, mostly due to illness where I was afraid to eat much of anything. When I was better, the sugar and other foods crept back in. Watching that video really helped me understand what is going on. Now I have a better chance of overcoming this.
Gwen