Apology for Regretful Headline & Analogy re Sugar-Can-Be-Addictive Post

I admit it: Looks like I really put my foot in my mouth.

Please accept my formal, profuse apology for the badly chosen headline and analogy for my recent blog entry, entitlted "Sugar Can Be As Addictive as Heroin, Diet Expert Says."

Witchlin and others who commented on the Low Carb Newsline website (where my posts also appear), I’m truly, truly sorry if my analogy and headline offended you.

I do not mean, in any way, to minimize the intense suffering experienced either by those with a drug addiction or the family members.

It must be simply beyond awful to to be in either shoes, and clearly having a heroin addiction is a horrific nightmare far, far worse than having a "sugar addiction." I can understand how you feel that comparing them is simply unfair.

Again, writing the headline I did was a very bad judgment call on my part and being on a tight deadline is no excuse for the insensitive error I made in drawing a close analogy to heroin addiction and "sugar addiction."

Having said that, I’d like to point out that, if you’ll note, I basically used a very similiar headline to the one that ran on this TV news story.  The KCAL Channel 9 news piece that I singled out bore the headline: "Diet Expert: Sugar Can Be As Addictive as Heroin." (Feb. 13, 2006). I then unthinkingly wrote a headline using the same angle. (Perhaps you might like to write to them, too, with your justifiable complaint.)

Alas, in my haste to post something so that people could hear this interesting TV news story, I made a horrible mistake. 

But, while it may be  unfair to compare having a heroin addiction with the nightmare of "sugar addiction" and I’m embarrassed that I presented it the way that I did, allow me to explain, however, that in my work with thousands of people who claim to be "hooked on sugar," the common complaint is this: "I have no control. I feel just like a drug addict.".

There is some literature on the subject that repeats this refrain. In fact, in Sugar Blues by William Dufty, he writes:

"I knew enough about junkies to recognize reluctantly my kinship with them. I was kicking cold turkey, the thing they talked about with such terror. After all, heroin is nothing but a chemical. They take the juice of the poppy and they refine it into opium and then they refine it to morphine and finally to heroin. Sugar is nothing but a chemical. They take the juice of the cane or the beet and they refine it to molasses and then they refine it to brown sugar and finally to strange white crystals."

Experts such as chemical dependency specialist Kathleen DesMaisons, Ph.D., CEO of Radiant Recovery (The Sugar Addict’s Total Recovery Plan, Little Sugar Addicts, Potatoes, Not Prozac, etc.), Dr. Rachel F. Heller and Dr. Richard F. Heller (Carbohydrate Addicts books), Julia Ross (The Mood Cure) and others also use this analogy, comparing sugar addiction to drug addiction.

While drug addiction is clearly so much more dangerous and potentially life-threatening  than "sugar addiction," it could be helpful to know that I’m merely echoing statements repeatedly in my free, online KickSugar support group, in my various tele-seminars, and interviews I conducted with wanna or successful "Sugar Kickers." 

When "sugar addicts" are in the throes of a sugar craving, they often say that they "fell off the wagon" — again, they use the language of alcoholism and drug addiction.

In addition, these sugar-sensitive people often bemoan the fact that whenever they have one bite, it leads to more — comments that are reminiscent of drug addiction or alcoholism.

As for whether I’ve had personal experience in this area, which someone wondered, yes I did. Back in 1998, I was a hopeless "sugar addict" — in utter agony much of the time with 44 symptoms, including crushing fatigue, ferocious headaches, mood swings, heart palpitations, and an obsession with candies. You can read my story here.

Of course, I concede that what I went through pales in comparsion to someone with a heroin addiction, but at the time I felt completely lost and hopeless until I kicked sugar, suffered horrific withdrawal symptoms and then emerged feeling reborn.

Also, some fascinating research studies have recently come out, which show that rats became dependent on sugar, that sugar can stimulate similiar sections of the brain, that rats had withdrawal symptoms akin to those of drug addicts, etc. I delve into this topic in my upcoming book SUGAR SHOCK!

Again, I admit that I was wrong to draw the analogy that I did, and I hope that you will accept my apology and my best wishes.

But I also ask that you have some compassion for self-described "sugar addicts," who feel depondent, desperate and dismal and who do, unfortunately for you, liken themselves to drug addicts and alcholics.

I look forward to hearing from those of you who objected to my initial post, and I invite you to reply to me here.

In fact, I do hope that my readers know that I always welcome comments, critiques, suggestions, because I feel that they just make me a better journalist and blogger.

Again, I apologize and I thank you for your understanding.

FYI: This posting was prompted by the following comment:

witchlin from Windsor, MI writes:

Could you please not use a very serious drug addiction that not only kills and cripples mentally and physically but also destroys families and communities as an analogy again. This is very insulting to the families and loved ones who suffer daily as a result of someone’s Heroin addiction.

I am quiet aware that people can crave sugar and the body can crave sugar and the brain can crave sugar but to compare to Heroin addiction; PLEASE get a reality check !!!

I invite you to become a heroin addict immediately and rewrite your article !!!! 

FYI!