Day one, both scared and excited to get sober

[Ravenscallingme]

Day one, both scared and excited to get sober

Okay, I've got a problem here.

I don't want to get too much into gory details of reactive hypoglycemia. I think there are probably a lot of hypoglycemics here already, as I've read that many many alcoholics are also hypoglycemic. But I've got a big problem in that my hypoglycemia is making it damn hard for me to quit.

Binging and high-carb crappy food and caffeine all make my hypoglycemia worse. But hypoglycemia also creates EXTREMELY powerful cravings for.. yup, you guessed it, binging and crappy high-carb food. So it's a vicious cycle. I relapsed today and yesterday and pretty much right away. Because my blood sugar is short-circuiting my brain. I literally CANNOT think straight when my blood sugar crashes. I can't seem to protect myself against the impulse to binge because low blood sugar muddles my thinking so much.

I don't know how to get out of this vicious cycle.

I feel overwhelmed by this low blood sugar trap AND the psychological addiction AND the habit AND trying to fight it all with a body and brain that's getting constantly battered by my unstable blood sugar.

All I can think of to do is to just really focus on monitoring my blood sugar and just going to bed- making NO decisions- when my blood sugar crashes.

It's the binging and crappy carb food that's keeping my blood sugar so unstable. It's like a fire with gasoline thrown on it right now. It's roaring. But if I can just STOP long enough, it will settle down... and stop smacking me with these brutal brain-destroying impulses to EAT SUGAR NOW NOW NOW.

But I need to be able to stop.

Sigh.

I guess all I can do is just monitor my blood sugar closely and keep a couple of glutamine pills in my back pocket for four days or a week or whatever it takes.

[Ravenscallingme]

Day one, both scared and excited to get sober

Hi AFM, nice to see another Vancouver Island/Gulf Islands resident here. Thanks for stopping by.

[Ravenscallingme]

Day one, both scared and excited to get sober

Well, I guess all I can do is manage my blood sugar.

Julia Ross says:

-small frequent meals
-watch the carbs, watch the fruit carbs (these can definitely crash my blood sugar)
-lots of protein
-B vitamins
-glutamine
-keep an eye on your blood sugar so you can intervene with glutamine BEFORE it crashes and your brain falls apart.

[Ravenscallingme]

Day one, both scared and excited to get sober

It's clearly going to take some habit change and strategy to quit here.

It's a mix of physical and emotional triggers. Because the physical stuff makes me dizzy, braindead, unable to reason clearly and basically crams toxic carbs (my 'booze', I ought to just CALL IT booze xD), so crams booze down my throat before I can even think clearly about how.. oh right! I quit! or at least I meant to quit!... then yeah. I need to deal with the physical issues first.

Becuase if the physical stuff isn't dealt with, I literally can't remember to quit. My body is so used to medicating hypoglycemia and low dopamine/endorphin/serotonin etc with binging on carbs and puking. (And starving and drinking coffee!) that if I don't fix those problems, it will just fall face-first into what it's done for 20+ years.

So.

Basically I need to:
-PAY ATTENTION to how I feel. Intervene with supplements before things escalate.
-take amino acids for neurochemistry.
-WATCH THE CARBS. Even too many vegetable carbs crashes my blood sugar
-glutamine for blood sugar flickers BEFORE they turn into disaster crashes
-don't forget your vitamins! Vitamin depletion causes sugar cravings too.
-stay away from allergy foods, these make all the other problems much worse.
-and obviously stay away from caffeine, aspartame, stevia etc as well as the obvious toxic foods like sugar, flour, etc.

Letting myself REST is key too.

It seems complicated, but I can do it. I'll just keep at it, trial and error, until I can.

When the physical stuff is all in hand, I'll have the brainspace to be able to apply Easyway, NLP, etc to the psychological addiction.

[Ravenscallingme]

Day one, both scared and excited to get sober

I suspect a lot of alcoholics are in a similar situation to me. I know most alcoholics are thought to be hypoglycemic to some degree. I'll have to look around the forum to see how other people managed their physical issues v. psychological issues.

But I know, for me, the physical barriers have to come down first, and THEN I can get at the emotional stuff.

[Samantha T.]

Day one, both scared and excited to get sober

Hi Raven!
:welcome:

I am new myself here. Alcohol is the problem but like you I also suffer with bad food allergies (with anaphylaxis at times) and sensitivities to processed foods.

I bought the supplements (because I really believe in the power of amino acids (found in the All One powder) to help restore brain chemistry. And the other supplements like the Kudzu and L Glutamine to help with cravings. If the physical cravings are minimized, that just leaves the mental ones :H

You are fortunate because you already have a great understanding of nutrition, good, whole foods, etc., so you are way ahead of the game. You just have to stick to the plan, which is the part that can be challenging! I have found sticking to the plan easier by staying close to these boards. It is an immense help to have the support of people in the same boat. There is a lot of kindness and compassion here, so take advantage of it! Many people are turning their lives around here ... no reason you can't be one of them

Best to you and look forward to following your journey!

[Samantha T.]

Day one, both scared and excited to get sober

Raven,
A GREAT sweetener, that will NOT mess with your blood sugar and it actually has probiotics in it is RAW honey. Important that you buy raw as it has not lost its probiotic values from heating and pasteurization.

Also, this may be helpful to you. It has opened my eyes wide about what "real food" is (recommended to me by my osteopath who I see for my food allergies)....a book called Nourishing Tradtions. It is chock FULL of the best nutrition info I have ever read (and I have been all over the map with my crazy diet plans - only raw food; vegan, etc.

After reading that book I have come full circle (and actually lost weight in the process) to eating, really, only "real food"; i.e., no vegetable fats (you will be fascinated by the info on today's "modern fats" that are wreaking havoc on all of us; eggs from pastuered chickens (chickens who run wild on farms and eat insects, not "vegetarian cage-free hens"; raw milk (pasteurization kills all of the vital nutrients); grass-fed beef; pastured chicken, etc. In other words, clean protein sources not laced with growth hormones and antibiotics; and lots of freshly juiced (in the juicer, not from the store because once again its pasturized) vegetables and fruits.

Buy no store-bought sauces b/c they all contain sugar and bad oils (it's easy to make your own and there are simple recipes in the book).

By cutting out all sugar and wheat, etc. it will eliminate the cravings altogether.

I think all of the imbalances in your body are working against you at once, but the one thing they all have in common is processed carbs. It seems like once you have the nutrition under control, a lot of it will turn itself around, including the binging/purging. As Allen Carr mentions, our bodies naturally seek balance, so it stands to reason that those behaviors can have as much to do with being physically out of balance as well as mentally.

You are already on your way there! Somebody told me today, something that I found very helpful and that is that it is not a "bad thing" when we find ourselves "in crisis" and freaking out about the fact that we need to change. He said that is how we can know we are at the beginning of great things to come

Best to you....and see you around!

[Ravenscallingme]

Day one, both scared and excited to get sober

Ready to try again!

I'm quitting now. I'm REALLY unbalanced right now, I'm underweight and so vitamin, neurochemical and blood sugar stability depleted that my body just wants to binge on sugar ALL DAY and EVERY DAY.

But I have tools to address this physical stuff and I know I can quit.

I moved out to the Gulf Islands to be in nature and GET BETTER. The city was keeping me sick, keeping me eating food that's toxic for me, keeping me binging and purging and trapped where I was.

I've been here for six months and I've been so brain-addled by sugar and aspartame and BOOZE that I couldn't, like I said, seriously, I couldn't remember to quit. It's like Susan Juby says (in her really funny book Nice Recovery, she's an ex-alcoholic so people here might want to check it out).. 'I couldn't remember to not drink!' She also couldn't remember to like, not hit people, not get in fights, not drunk dial people, etc. etc... lolol

WELL, I can relate! lol.

Anyway, today I have finally remembered to quit! So I'm going to quit eating food that I KNOW is super-toxic to me. And I'm going to quit responding to my hypoglycemic drops with binging (and purging, needless to day.)

The thing with me and food... I feel like the SAD (standard american diet) is toxic for EVERYONE. Even if I were an alcoholic, wouldn't I just quit booze to get on sugar? And just switch one addiction for another? I feel like I've just taken on my replacement addiction early and skipped the alcoholism. Efficient of me, I guess.

But the fact is, I'm just more sensitive than most to crappy food. The crappy food we eat in North America is shite for EVERYONE. Like Allen Carr says- don't envy those so-called 'normal drinkers', alcohol is dangerous and toxic for EVERYONE, someone who's an alcoholic is just lucky enough to KNOW how bad it is, they're lucky to be sensitive enough that the harm is OBVIOUS.

So anyway.

I know I'll be happier on a clean, yummy diet of animal and fish protein, fresh fruit and veggies, healthy omega 3 fats, herbs and spices, herbal and green teas, etc. This diet makes anyone feel great because it's REAL FOOD, super-nutritious and easy on your body after all that yucky sugar and caffeine and refined white carbs and toxic transfats and YUCK.

It's actually easier for me to just drop the toxic yucky food. It's my blood sugar that's the REAL beast here.

But when my blood sugar crashes or drops out... instead of binging, I can just take glutamine and eat protein and fat- NO CARBS- until it evens out.

I know that if I eat NO CARBS, I don't binge. Period. Carbs are the binge connection for me.

So, time to get sober.

[Ravenscallingme]

Day one, both scared and excited to get sober

Hey there, Samantha. How's the weather in California? It's snowy here, I'll bet it's sunny and nice there. xD

Thanks for all the advice.

[Ravenscallingme]

Day one, both scared and excited to get sober

Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew is on! Synchronicity. D I love it when the universe gives me early sobriety trashy tv. I don't know why, but I always feel like watching either this show, or Sober House, or Intervention when I'm early on in the quitting process. It keeps my head in the right place, I think. At least, it keeps my head in that recovery space where I want to be.

9:30pm- I'm doing a megadose of Vitamin C to start out. I've got some powder I want to finish off because it has stevia in it. I want to just eat a simple meat, fish, shellfish, veggies and fruit diet to start out, worry about testing things like stevia MUCH later, when I'm stable and sober. But right after eating so much SUGAR, my blood sugar is so dazed that it doesn't react to stevia. But I'll be more sensitive again tomorrow, so I'm getting this Vitamin C into my system right now, lol.

[Choochie]

Day one, both scared and excited to get sober

Ravens - I love these shows and watch them too. I swear they help me stay sober! Good for you on your healthy foods - great plan to save you from yourself!:H Best of luck!!

Choochie

[Samantha T.]

Day one, both scared and excited to get sober

Hey Ravens....yup, sunny here! But honestly, I'd rather live in a place like you do with SNOW! My dream is to live in the mountains. I'm probably the only person in "sunny Southern California" who would rather live in snow :H