Many people I see tell me they have a food addiction, or they may crave sweets. They try to discipline themselves to eat less food or to avoid sweets, but sooner or later they end up breaking their diet and binging on the sweets or overeating the food, even healthy food.
But Ayurveda takes a different approach. As with everything else, we want to get to the underlying root causes of the cravings for foods or sweets, and address those issues so that the cravings go away.
Since all symptoms and diseases begin with faulty digestion, this is where we want to start. We need to fix the person’s digestion so that they can fully break down the nutrients in the food and absorb them into the blood stream. Then the blood circulates the nutrients to all the tissues and cells, and that is how we nourish ourselves.
So common sense would tell us that if we don’t digest and assimilate the nutrients correctly the appetite control centers of the brain will keep firing until enough nutrients are absorbed. Which means that you will keep craving high volumes of food until the brain’s demands for nutrients are satisfied.
Studies were done on mice whose gut micro biomes were disturbed like ours are when we take antibiotics, acid reflux medicines, birth control pills, vaccines, and antibiotics. They had to eat 30% more food just to stay alive. So you can imagine how much we all have to eat after taking a few rounds of antibiotics or some birth control pills or any of these other medications.
It’s also important to have a balanced diet, with a variety of foods. The variety is important for growing several different strains of friendly bacteria in the gut. Besides that, different foods contain their own unique set of nutrients, so if you eat a variety of fruits, vegetables, grains, legumes, good fats and oils, and whole cow’s or goat’s milk you will be much better off nutritionally than if you eat the same foods day in and day out. And your gut will have a more diverse micro biome as a result.
Also, many people decide to give up fats and dairy when they want to lose weight. This is a huge mistake since these two foods pacify the appetite control centers in the brain more than most other foods since they are probably two of the most nourishing foods on the planet.
Since the cows and goats eat hay and grasses we get the benefits of all of the nutrients they eat which is contained in their milk. In the West we have poor quality milk which is homogenized and pasteurized and we take it incorrectly, so it ends up bothering our stomach or creating congestion. But if you fix your digestion, get the non-homogenized A2 milk from grass-fed cows and you boil it and drink it on an empty stomach or cook it into grains, you will nourish yourself more than any other food you can think of. This is because milk creates Ojas in one day. All the other foods take one month to create this life-giving substance. Ojas is our neurotransmitters and hormones and gives us great strength and immunity to disease.
One of the big goals in Ayurveda is to fix the patient’s digestion and teach them how to eat high quality organic foods so that they can make Ojas. But the food we eat has to spend 3-5 days in each of the body’s 7 tissues to nourish them thoroughly and then at the end of the 7th tissue we make Ojas, which give us radiant health.
Again, milk is the only food that makes Ojas in one day – so if you want to overcome your craving for food try adding warm milk to your diet. Goat’s milk is a good option if you want to lose weight since it is lighter than cow’s milk, however both would be great to help you overcome your food cravings. The brain is very satisfied when we add milk to our diet.
And ghee is just as good for food cravings because it is butter that was cooked and clarified. Ghee, the supreme essence of the butter, which is the essence of the milk, has an incredible capacity for nourishing every cell very quickly. The clarification process makes it much more easily absorbed into the bloodstream, taking away our cravings for food as these nutrients easily slide into the cell walls, all of which are made of cholesterol.
Keep in mind that the food you eat doesn’t nourish you unless it gets into the inside of the cells. And the best part of all is that ghee has conjugated linoleic acid in it to help build your muscles. Which is why many people start losing weight from the time they start eating ghee. And it is one of the highest sources of butyrate, the best food for colon cells which help strengthen gut integrity preventing leaky gut, inflammation and food allergies.
And having milk and ghee in the diet takes away the craving for sweets since both of these turn into a sweet taste once we eat them.
And don’t eat refined white flour in the diet as it is so devoid of nutrients. Every grain has 3 parts – the germ, where all the nutrients are, the bran where the fiber is, and the starch. When grains are refined, they discard the germ and the bran, leave the starch and then bleach it, which is basically like eating cardboard. After a meal of white pasta and white bread, notice how hungry you are when you finish the meal. That’s because the brain registers that there aren’t enough nutrients so you start craving food again. White sugar is even more refined from the original sugar cane, so a diet high in white sugar and white flour will make you crave foods big time as your body becomes weaker and weaker.
And watch what happens if you eat lots of fast foods which are also devoid of nutrients – you will be thinking about food all day and continually eating as your body gets more and more malnourished and as your appetite control centers continually demand food throughout the day,
Ayurveda also takes it a step further and states that if either Vata or Pitta go out of balance you can crave sweets. This is because each of the 3 doshas are balanced by the different tastes. Vata is balanced by the sweet, sour and salty taste, Pitta is balanced by a sweet, bitter or astringent taste and Kapha is balanced by pungent, bitter and astringent foods.
By the end of the day most of us have both Vata and Pitta disturbed, so you can see why we begin craving sweets as the stressors pile up as we go through the day.
And also, just because you crave sweets doesn’t mean you have to eat the dangerous refined white sugar. It’s toxic to the liver, can cause diabetes as it spikes the blood sugar, and it can cause heart disease due to the fact that it makes the blood very sticky. In fact, the latest research shows that white sugar is responsible for causing many more heart attacks than cholesterol. Fortunately we have a special tea which contains a variety of herbs which can reduce the craving for sweets.
We also have herbs and other therapies to help you balance the neurotransmitters in the brain. There are even herbs to help bring up the dopamine levels.
And finally, many people don’t have the time or the inclination to cook their vegetables. They try to get by during the week eating large salads they quickly throw together. The chewing process alone isn’t enough to break down the fibers of these raw vegetables, so the net result is that not much of these raw vegetables make their way into the inside of your cells. Which is another reason people still feel hungry after eating a big salad for lunch or dinner.
So don’t be upset if you crave foods or sweets. If you do, it is probably because you aren’t getting enough nutrients to satisfy your bodies’ needs. Pay attention to all the possible causes and seek out Ayurvedic care to fix your digestion, balance your hormones, neurotransmitters and Ojas levels, and learn how to properly cook and eat a healthy diet. It’s very rewarding to watch our patients overcome their food addictions and settle into a nice wholesome diet consisting of home-cooked food prepared from fresh organic ingredients.
I hope this information helps you as you try to overcome your food addictions and sugar cravings.
Thank you,