Can Workouts Hide a Sugar Addiction? by Joan Kent, PhD
Can Workouts Hide a Sugar Addiction?
By Joan Kent, PhD
“I don’t understand. She trains well.”
The program manager made that comment when a participant in our athletic training and weight loss program didn’t get results. I was both an athletic coach and the lead nutritionist.
His comment exasperated me. Of course she trained well. She was an expert at that because of her food issues. She’d junk out, then “train well” to burn off the unwanted calories.
It wasn’t always the same ‘she’ – but she was typically a sugar addict. Sugar addicts don’t necessarily have difficulty training.
Training is the easy part. Getting to the gym for early classes, hitting the weight room, weekend runs, core strength, scheduling with a personal trainer. No problem.
They don’t refuse to cooperate with the instructor. Workouts don’t threaten their addictive behavior.
The sugar addict wants to eat junk, use workouts to compensate for it, and keep the addiction going.
Nutrition Rules Can Push Buttons
Food guidelines, on the other hand, meet with stonewalling. My nutrition program – highly successful with most participants – annoyed the major “resisters.”
I’ve posted about resisting weight loss, but one client kept demanding more and more specific instruction. Our guidelines were never good enough.
First, she claimed not to know what to eat. She wanted menus. When we provided those, she wanted more: exactly which foods to eat, exactly when to eat them, and precise quantities for her calorie and weight-loss needs.
I immediately recognized this for the smokescreen it was, but the program manager saw it as our problem. “Until we provide those things,” he said, “she feels as if her program hasn’t begun.”
His comment was profound – but not in the way he thought.
Registering for a robust weight-loss program looks like a sincere desire to lose weight. Asking for more specifics seems like part of that sincere desire to lose – if you don’t know the games people play to avoid doing the necessary work.
I’ve been around the defiance of resistant weight-loss clients a long time and see it differently.
As long as we didn’t give her what she requested, that was her excuse not to change her eating. Not to give up pizza, margaritas, wine, or nachos. (All of these were in her seldom-kept food log.) Not to move forward – to any degree – until things suited her to a T.
If we had done everything she wanted, she would have had more complaints and more demands.
Bottom line? She saw the lack of personalized info as the chink in the armor, her point of attack. A good friend of mine who works as a life coach said, “It’s better for her if the program fails than if she does. Again.”
This life coach friend said she disliked many of her weight loss clients because of the games they play. Guess I’m not the only one who has noticed this nonsense.
So how can we make this reader-friendly? You’re probably not coaching weight-loss clients. You might be interested in weight loss, or even addicted to sugar. So here are a few suggestions.
• Be honest about what you want.
Assess your weakness – sugar, alcohol, butter, whatever. Keep it to yourself if you prefer, but be crystal clear on your goal.
It’s no crime to decide you don’t want to lose weight or end your food addiction.
• See the finish line with no time element.
I learned that from my ultra-endurance athletic coach. Don’t worry about fast results. These days, some people push rapid weight loss. That’s fine if you prefer, but there’s no race.
If it’s more comfortable to “set it and forget it”, decrease your calories by, say, only 200-300 per day. It will take longer to reach your goal, but that’s the only drawback. So what?
Do it daily, forget about it, and let the pounds melt slowly while you go about your business.
• If you’re addicted to sugar or other food, concentrate on the addiction first.
Don’t self-sabotage by taking on too much at once. Dealing with addiction first is a strong, solid step toward a weight-loss goal. Once your eating is under control, the other goals will fall in place.
• Get past your sugar addiction with qualified help and a proven system.
Everyone seems to have ideas on how to get rid of sugar cravings and addiction. Some of them are almost ridiculous. With the right help, it’s a straightforward process. With the wrong advice, it can be agonizingly difficult.
Find a solid system. Stick with it. Celebrate the result.
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If you’d like help with sugar addiction or another aspect of your nutrition, I’m dedicated to helping you with that. Please visit Coaching on the Home page and sign up for a FREE Food Breakthru Session. No obligation!