Some Things About Food and Addiction

October 4, 2023
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Is food addiction a disease? Is there enough evidence to justify calling it that? If ever there was a multifactorial problem, addiction is it.

To Build Consensus, Part 4

October 3, 2023
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Eating itself can be addictive. Displacement is the brain’s goal. Nevertheless, cues (stimuli) are essential to trigger the displacement mechanism.

To Build Consensus, Part 3

October 2, 2023
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Our modern environment, especially because of omnipresent media, is jam-packed with cues that say “Eat! Eat! Eat!”

To Build Consensus, Part 2

September 29, 2023
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To Dr. Pretlow’s mind, the universal source of addictive behavior is displacement, an “innate, instinctual biobehavioral mechanism.”

To Build Consensus

September 28, 2023
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Not all foods are associated with addictive-like eating, but some foodstuffs are literally addictive substances. It’s a matter rife with controversy.

Selling Crap to Kids, Part 4

September 27, 2023
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The average American child absorbs around 16,000 TV commercials per year, a great many of them featuring food — and not good food.

Selling Crap to Kids, Part 3

September 26, 2023
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In protecting children’s health, is encouraging the food industry to market healthful food to kids important, necessary, or even ethical?

Selling Crap to Kids, Part 2

September 25, 2023
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Our goal should be to help children develop a healthy relationship to food. Foisting character-branded products on them undermines that effort.

Selling Crap to Kids, Part 1

September 22, 2023
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One study showed that children who are already obese are more vulnerable than normal-weight children to the blandishments of TV food ads.

Displacing the Displacement, Continued

September 21, 2023
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Rechanneling a displacement activity into another displacement activity instead is not an ultimate cure but can be extremely helpful.

Displacing the Displacement

September 20, 2023
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Maintaining a habit is quite stressful, and addiction inevitably causes even more problems and more stress the person is trying to alleviate or avoid.

Feed the Enthusiasm, Part 2

September 19, 2023
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For many of us when experiencing a problem, “Eat it into submission” is the answer. Rechanneling overflow mental energy to a non-destructive behavior can help.

Feed the Enthusiasm, Part 1

September 18, 2023
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Finding higher-quality, productive, creative, attractive, meaningful displacements that give you a chance to use your skills can be life-saving.

Nurture the Enthusiasm, Part 2

September 15, 2023
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In addition to dealing with the sources of the displacement, it also is possible to replace the displacement with another displacement that is less destructive.

Nurture the Enthusiasm

September 14, 2023
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It’s a good idea for parents to let a child follow an enthusiasm, no matter how silly or useless it might seem.

Strike a Spark

September 13, 2023
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One of the purposes of Brainweighve app is to teach users how to rechannel the overflow brain energy to non-harmful displacement behaviors.

Everybody’s Got ‘Em

September 12, 2023
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The Brainweighve app can help silence the “food noise,” the annoying and omnipresent background chatter that can plague those trying to lose weight.

Shushing the Food Noise, Part 2

September 11, 2023
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There are other ways than drugs to stop intrusive thoughts, including “food noise.” Dr. Pretlow has one solution, an app called BrainWeighve.

Shushing the Food Noise

September 8, 2023
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The new weight-loss drugs are good at silencing “food noise.” But there are other ways to make that intrusive voice shut up, no medication needed.

Food Noise Cacophony, Part 2

September 7, 2023
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The consensus seems to be that when a person discontinues taking -tide drug, the weight returns quicker than it was accumulated in the first place.

Food Noise Cacophony, Part 1

September 6, 2023
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Food noise is a newsworthy subject right now because so many people are taking the new GLP-1 weight-loss drugs. So, what is it and what causes food noise?

Do Drug Makers Tell It Like It Is? Part 3

September 5, 2023
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Many articles about the GLP-1 drugs share a similar trait, namely the invention or use of verbiage that doesn’t quite mean what it seems to. Read the samples.

Do Drug Makers Tell It Like It Is? Part 2

September 1, 2023
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Giving a break to the weight-loss drug makers is not the most effective incentive, and is not conducive to real progress.

Do Drug Makers Tell It Like It Is?

August 31, 2023
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Promotion of new weight-loss drugs includes using some intentionally confusing language to obscure such facts as the potential severity of side effects.

Personality, Behavior, and the New Weight-loss Drugs, Part 3

August 30, 2023
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Some people carry on eating after they’re full, which may be a clue as to how much compulsive eating is accounted for by behavioral addiction.

Personality, Behavior, and the New Weight Loss Drugs, Part 2

August 29, 2023
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Like many other things in life, obesity is multifactorial. One factor is, some folks are not reachable by logic, or even by an appeal to their self-interest.

Personality, Behavior, and the New Weight Loss Drugs

August 28, 2023
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Here are some interesting results of a brand new multi-author meta-analysis of information on personality traits associated with childhood obesity.

Behavior, a Big Word

August 25, 2023
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One problem with people is: Often it is not that difficult to put a finger on What Is Wrong, but sometimes people want to take a deep dive into the cesspit and spend a monumental amount of energy, endlessly elaborating on what is wrong. Another way to …

The -tide Drugs: Enthusiasm Runs Hot and Cold

August 24, 2023
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For the past few months, the -tide drugs (GLP-1 agonists) have dominated obesity news. The debate over the new weight-loss drugs is ongoing.

Enhancing the Language With Drugs

August 23, 2023
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First came the “Ozempic face.” Predictably, the “Ozempic butt” was not far behind. Then, there is the term “Ozempic shaming.”

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Profiles: Kids Struggling with Weight

Profiles: Kids Struggling with Obesity top bottom

The Book

OVERWEIGHT: What Kids Say explores the obesity problem from the often-overlooked perspective of children struggling with being overweight.

About Dr. Robert A. Pretlow

Dr. Robert A. Pretlow is a pediatrician and childhood obesity specialist. He has been researching and spreading awareness on the childhood obesity epidemic in the US for more than a decade.
You can contact Dr. Pretlow at:

Presentations

Dr. Pretlow’s invited presentation at the American Society of Animal Science 2020 Conference
What’s Causing Obesity in Companion Animals and What Can We Do About It

Dr. Pretlow’s invited presentation at the World Obesity Federation 2019 Conference:
Food/Eating Addiction and the Displacement Mechanism

Dr. Pretlow’s Multi-Center Clinical Trial Kick-off Speech 2018:
Obesity: Tackling the Root Cause

Dr. Pretlow’s 2017 Workshop on
Treatment of Obesity Using the Addiction Model

Dr. Pretlow’s invited presentation for
TEC and UNC 2016

Dr. Pretlow’s invited presentation at the 2015 Obesity Summit in London, UK.

Dr. Pretlow’s invited keynote at the 2014 European Childhood Obesity Group Congress in Salzburg, Austria.

Dr. Pretlow’s presentation at the 2013 European Congress on Obesity in Liverpool, UK.

Dr. Pretlow’s presentation at the 2011 International Conference on Childhood Obesity in Lisbon, Portugal.

Dr. Pretlow’s presentation at the 2010 Uniting Against Childhood Obesity Conference in Houston, TX.

Food & Health Resources