Excellent point, Mike.

sawdust is a good substitute for sugar...full of fiber and doesn't convert
into pesky glucose (although there is growing evidence that through
fermentation cellulose is partially broken down in the intestines)

seriously though...foods have a powerful psychogenic effect on many of us
and this must be greatly responsible for bingeing. Not the taste but the
effects on our brains and our bodies.

--Richard

----- Original Message -----
From: "Mike MacLeod" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, November 15, 2000 3:24 PM
Subject: [P-F] Food cravings (was: Anchell, etc.)


> >>
> >> Bottom line: it makes life a battle of both stoic self-denial,
unceasing
> >> wondering (should I have just a piece? just a chip? etc.) and selective
> >> caving in with resultant guilt feelings.
> >
> >for some of us it's more then just guilt feelings. yesterday I was at a
> >party and had a small handfull of potato chips and about 4 or 5 grapes
and
> >today I'm paying for it with GI discumfort. when you have crohn's you
> >clearly see the benefits of not cheating. even so I still went for it -
> >pathetic.
>
> Those who don't experience food cravings for biological reasons, or who do
> not eat compulsively for comfort, or use food as a mood-changing drug (and
> these may or can be aspects of the same phenomenon), probably find it
> strange to hear of how people can eat what they know will make them ill
> later after making them feel better immediately.
>
> There are a number of nutritionists whose relations to food and taste are
> so (by my way of thinking) bizarre that they come up with the admonitions
> that applesauce is a good substitute for butter, or that prune sauce is a
> replacement for chocolate syrup.  These people's taste buds reside in some
> other spacetime continuum than mine.  (The above examples are from my
> girlfriend's involvement with the Jenny Craig people; their secret weapon
> seems to be undigestible polymerized fats in their foods, which resulted
in
> the appalling side effect of fecal incontinence...)
>
> Add the enormous variability in people's metabolisms, abilities to digest
> various foods, and so on, and you get the chaos that sustains a
> multibillion dollar dietary/nutrition industry year in and year out.
>
> Mike