Eating junk food makes you sick. As soon as you finish off a plate of french fries or a pizza, you know you’ve done it to yourself. The stomach pains, lethargy, and digestion problems are just beginning. Most people eat junk food multiple times a day, and they eat it so often they lose touch with their body’s signals. When you eat too much junk you no longer feel the stomach pain and discomfort. A new study on rats may help explain why*.
I’ve been guilty of a french fry bender, but now instead of repeating the behavior when I’m sick the next day, I strive to eat as much healthy food as I can.
Junk Food Drug Addict
Even worse than no longer feeling the negative signals from your body, you also lose touch with the reward signals in your brain! Just like a drug addict, pleasurable foods are no longer as good. Eating fresh, warm, ripe strawberries on a summer’s day is marvelous. However, if you eat junk food constantly, your experience of strawberries is greatly diminished.
Rats fed a high fat, junk food diet for 40 days not only ended up fat, but they also had a greatly diminished reward mechanism. The study actually found that rats would ignore pain to continue eating junk food in the same way that cocaine addicted rats will.
Eating a wholesome plant-based diet not only tastes delicious, but it helps you lose weight, regain energy, and feel marvelous.
*note: I disagree with most uses of animals for research, but I won’t ignore the findings. This study in particular was one that could have been done on humans, it would just have taken more effort.
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Comments About Eating Junk Food
// 2 comments so far.
Chandelle // March 29th 2010
I am constantly amazed by what I used to eat – what I grew up eating – without any symptoms. How could I have eaten Pop-Tarts for breakfast every day, ramen for lunch, fish sticks with HFCS ketchup or fluorescent sausage and boxed au gratin potatoes for dinner, with something from the -ito family for snacks, and never have headaches, digestive problems, mood disturbance? It blows my mind. I’m so hypersensitive to things like this now; if I ever partake, like at a party, I have an immediate reaction. And I could think, wasn’t it better when I had a resistance to it? It would certainly make my life easier. But I think we SHOULD have a reaction, especially to actual neurotoxins like MSG. My kids have that reaction – they’re not saturated with junk food and accustomed to it, so they experience what they SHOULD experience when they eat something ill-fit for human consumption. Really, we should all be so lucky.
Greg // March 29th 2010
I have hazy memories about my reactions to food as a kid. But, when I was about 8 or 9 my father figured out that I got stomach pains many hours after eating heavy fried food. I’m so thankful I’ve been addicted to oatmeal, spinach, salads, fruit, and broccoli my entire life. No matter how much junk I ate, I still liked vegetables.
I think a lot of people just stop listening to their bodies. It’s the same with alcohol, if you drink often enough, for long enough, the hangovers aren’t nearly as bad.
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