Been hearing a lot about David Kessler's new book, "The End of Overeating." One major point he makes is that neural paths in our brain are permanently wired to desire specific foods that deliver combinations of salt/fat/sugar. So we instantly drool at the site of a chocolate chip cookie or a french fry like a Pavlov dog.
If "re-programming" the brain is the ultimate goal, it seems to me the obvious solution is to create an odorless spray mist out of something like diluted ipecac that induces a slight sense of nausea when combined with food. (Note--it needn't induce vomit, just the feeling of slight nausea.)
Spray it on french fries. Then let yourself eat as many as you want, whenever you want. If you start feeling sick every time you put a french fry in your mouth, pretty soon you're body will want to stop eating fries.
I went from 190lbs to 150lbs in three months living in Mexico because everything I ate made me sick there. Even after returning to the US, it was a year before I could look at a taco without my stomach churning.
Obviously, losing 40lbs in three months isn't the goal. Re-wiring the brain to hate foods which are unhealthy is. Why not fight the food industry by creating a Pavlovian revulsion to the truly damaging foods?
I love chocolate chip cookies. The smell, the taste, the warm chocolate combined with a cold glass of milk...ahhhh. But if they made me feel like I did when I was in Mexico, you couldn't force me to eat them.
I guess this comes across as an endorsement of bulimia, which it isn't. Unlike bulimia, the nausea spray I'm describing would have to be nearly instant (within a minute or two) so that it reaches the brain before feelings of satiation do. (Bulimics experience the joy of eating, enjoy satiation, then induce vomiting quickly afterward.)
Ideally the nausea would last from a minute after eating until about 20 minutes later.
It'd be critical that the spray is odorless. Otherwise the brain would just be wired to reject the scent of the spray instead of the smell of the food you wish to eliminate from your diet.
Is this kind of aversion therapy ever done? I know in the past people have done some crazy things to treat alcoholism/heavy drug use.
But what about training the mind (and therefore the body) to have a slight sense of revulsion every time a specific "bad" food is near by?
If "re-programming" the brain is the ultimate goal, it seems to me the obvious solution is to create an odorless spray mist out of something like diluted ipecac that induces a slight sense of nausea when combined with food. (Note--it needn't induce vomit, just the feeling of slight nausea.)
Spray it on french fries. Then let yourself eat as many as you want, whenever you want. If you start feeling sick every time you put a french fry in your mouth, pretty soon you're body will want to stop eating fries.
I went from 190lbs to 150lbs in three months living in Mexico because everything I ate made me sick there. Even after returning to the US, it was a year before I could look at a taco without my stomach churning.
Obviously, losing 40lbs in three months isn't the goal. Re-wiring the brain to hate foods which are unhealthy is. Why not fight the food industry by creating a Pavlovian revulsion to the truly damaging foods?
I love chocolate chip cookies. The smell, the taste, the warm chocolate combined with a cold glass of milk...ahhhh. But if they made me feel like I did when I was in Mexico, you couldn't force me to eat them.
I guess this comes across as an endorsement of bulimia, which it isn't. Unlike bulimia, the nausea spray I'm describing would have to be nearly instant (within a minute or two) so that it reaches the brain before feelings of satiation do. (Bulimics experience the joy of eating, enjoy satiation, then induce vomiting quickly afterward.)
Ideally the nausea would last from a minute after eating until about 20 minutes later.
It'd be critical that the spray is odorless. Otherwise the brain would just be wired to reject the scent of the spray instead of the smell of the food you wish to eliminate from your diet.
Is this kind of aversion therapy ever done? I know in the past people have done some crazy things to treat alcoholism/heavy drug use.
But what about training the mind (and therefore the body) to have a slight sense of revulsion every time a specific "bad" food is near by?