Trauma trigger warning: In this vlog, I talk about topics that may be triggering if you come from a background of trauma.

A food binge is when you eat more food, in a shorter period of time, than someone would typically eat, all while feeling out of control. 

A mental binge is similar, but in the mind. It’s when we let our thinking run away with us, like a runaway train. We catastrophize and freak out. We get stuck in our heads, obsessing over something. I’m seeing it happen a lot to those I love, and in our Bright Line Community—and even myself. 

There’s an example I want to share with you, about a dear friend of mine. She visited recently and stayed in our home. She has experienced abuse since she was an infant. Mental, emotional, sexual, and physical abuse. 

My family and I have begged her to move near us. Her tiny hometown is not safe for her. She finally committed to moving. Then the other day she encountered one of her abusers, and it didn’t go well. She spun out, and fell into a mental binge. She started believing she didn’t deserve to leave and couldn’t make enough money for the move—she just went around and around in her head. 

So how do you get out of a mental binge? The first step is to identify it. If you’ve been here a while, you know about the Authentic Self. Think about the Eight Cs. You know you’re in your Authentic Self when you are:

If you are not experiencing the Eight Cs, and you’re all up in your head thinking about something, you might be having a mental binge. It may take one of two forms: litigating or catastrophizing. 

Litigating is when it’s fueled by self-righteous anger, where you’ve got your jury assembled and you’re making your case in your head. There are often kernels of truth embedded in the binge. 

My friend who needs to move, for example, noted that apartment owners sometimes want you to have an income of three times the monthly rent. She’s a freelance copywriter and her self-worth is so low she only charges $15 an hour. She’s worried about finances, although she knows I’ll help her. So the kernel of truth is that her finances are challenging. But the litigator in her is seeing everything going wrong. 

She needs productive action, which comes from the Authentic Self. Reactive action, from within a mental binge, doesn’t work. So even if the litigator is right, you need to be in a place of less urgency and more compassion. 

A mental binge comes from a part of us that wants to be heard. This catastrophizing part wants to be able to explain to you what’s wrong. So your Authentic Self needs to tell it: I’ve got this. I hear you. Let’s take a break and then we can talk about it… 

The antidote is to recognize you’re in a mental binge. And then, listen to the part of you that wants to be heard about what it’s scared of.

When I’m in a mental binge, I BFF. First I breathe. I feel my body, find my feet. I might do a see, hear, feel meditation to get me grounded. 

I was at a session with Amanda Leith from Shift Recovery by Acorn recently, and someone in a group session had a mental binge. She thought everyone was against her. Amanda had her look around and make sure she was safe. Then she had her check verbally with everyone there, with Amanda’s help, to see what people were thinking of her. People were compassionate with her, and the whole situation de-escalated. 

Once a situation has started to de-escalate, turn to the next right thing. Maybe you need to weigh and measure a meal. Maybe you need to go to the grocery store. Maybe you need to go back to work. 

Then, if there’s something to be done about whatever you’re spinning out about, you can come to it from a place of calm.

Sometimes, you can’t avoid mental binges. But it pays to learn not to believe them, and not to take action while in that state. 

FOR THIS EPISODE and MORE: https://ble.life/mf5eve 
Avoiding the Mental Binge | Bright Line Living | The Official Bright Line Eating Podcast

Today I have some interesting research to share with you, and a big announcement.

We know that carrying around excess weight is problematic on every level. That’s not to say that every person living with obesity is unhealthy. But the excess weight a person carries is a very strong predictor of general ill-health, from cancer to mobility issues to psychological challenges.

Healthcare providers know that. So when the weight loss drug revolution happened, with drugs like Wegovy and Ozempic changing the landscape, it was a huge relief for them, because now they had something actionable they could tell their patients.

But there’s some interesting new research coming out. First, people aren’t staying on the drugs. After two years, 85 percent of people are no longer taking them. And after discontinuing the drug, two-thirds of the lost weight is regained within just the first year.

Could it be because of side effects? I don’t think so. A study that just came out used four years of data on more than 17,000 people. Only 16.6 percent of people using the drug had to get off because of adverse side effects.

There must be other reasons to stop taking the drug. Let’s look at how much people are losing. The drugs typically produce a 15 percent weight loss after a year or two.

So you start taking the drug, and the weight loss phase lasts for roughly one year and three months. At that point, you stall out. You plateau. Imagine you’re on the drug, and paying $500 a month for it. You’re happy with the weight loss, but then it stops. You’re still paying $500 every single month, but now you’re not losing. At all. How do you feel? Not so great about that, right?

After a while, you’ll likely see some weight regain, while you’re still paying $500 every month.

On average, between two and four years, people REGAIN one-third of the weight they had lost. This phenomenon is due to downregulation of the GLP-1 receptors, very similar to the dopamine downregulation that causes addiction. Can you see why people go off the drugs at two years?

So what does this mean for healthcare providers? Well, Bright Line Eating just finished its own study. Our data shows that weight regain does not happen for people doing the Bright Line Eating program, even after six years. People are maintaining their weight loss.

Now we have data that shows that long term, Bright Line Eating works better than weight loss drugs. Which brings me to my announcement: We’ve put together a process for medical professionals to partner with us. Now they can give their patients a way to lose weight without drugs or surgery.

Here’s how it works: click the button below to go to the website, download our flyer, and take it to your next medical appointment. This could be with anyone: your doctor, your nurse, your acupuncturist, your chiropractor, your nutritionist, your health coach, your personal trainer, or any health professional.

The flyer explains what Bright Line Eating is and gives them a link to their own BLE website where they can opt-in and become a partner with us in offering Bright Line Eating to their patients.

This is the biggest win-win-win I can imagine. You and I win, because we’ve experienced the magic of Bright Line Eating. And now we get the satisfaction of helping more people. Healthcare providers win because they finally have something to offer that works, long term. And the people who receive the information win because they have the opportunity to be free of the albatross of weight loss obsession.

So click the button and download the flyer. You’ve been asking for this for a long time, and now we have the data to back it up. There’s never before been a study showing weight loss that works that well, for that long, without drugs or surgery—just by becoming a person who knows how to live Bright.

Tell Your Doctor About BLE

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Let’s Support Our Healthcare Professionals | Bright Line Living | The Official Bright Line Eating Podcast

Before I go to bed at night, I read from a book called A Year With Rumi, by Coleman Barks. The introduction to this book is incredible. It’s called “The Love Religion, Wild Soulbooks, and What Is.” In it, there’s a beautiful little three-line poem by Galway Kinnell called Prayer. When I first read it, it just soaked into me. Here it is:

Whatever happens. Whatever
What is is is what
I want. Only that. But that.

There’s a falling in love with the present moment, with what actually is, with all the wild twists and turns that life takes sometimes. So many days plod along, same-old, same-old. And then something will happen and everything changes.

Then you assimilate, adapt, the days plod along, and then something else happens. There’s a synchrony between creating it, watching it, and experiencing it. And somehow along the way I have mostly avoided fighting it. 

The deeper I’ve thought about meaning, the more I’ve come to believe that at the very least, the value of a life—my life, your life—is in getting to live. The experience of life itself, for its own sake. 

It’s such a privilege to experience life! I remember learning in fifth grade health class that sperm are so numerous, that the odds the sperm that was going to be you would reach that egg, and the odds that that particular egg would drop and be there—that those two met and conceived—is so radically improbable. You have better odds with the powerball lottery.

Bright Line Eating allows people to do work that frees us up to get to a place where we can hear a poem like Galway’s and go, yes. Out of all the possibilities of what could be happening in my life, this is what I choose. Not because it’s the greatest I can imagine, but because it carries with it the brilliance of what is true. That richness is gobsmacking.

There are many moments on my Bright Line Eating journey that I cherish. One that I don’t talk about often is when I was working on the proposal for the first book, Bright Line Eating, and was uncertain about whether to share my history of prostitution. I knew I’d share my drug addiction because that had a clear link to food addiction—but not the prostitution.

I had a moment of clarity, though, when I realized if I didn’t share this part of my history, someone else would. What I saw as a flaw needed to be shared as a feature. It was an empowering choice. 

I’ve processed everything I’ve lived through. I have no traumatic samskara, which is a Sanskrit word that means residue. Sticky, gummy residue. I cleaned it up. Being Bright allows me to do that. I put it all in its place: food, drugs, cigarettes, alcohol. All of it.

What’s left when you work through all that samskara is freedom—freedom, and what is. 

I have no fear of death. I’m excited to die. It’s going to be so much better on the other side. But I love my life and want to live till I’m over 100. One day I was considering the perspective of a friend who doesn’t believe in an afterlife. What if this life is all there is? Suddenly, every breath was even more precious, because I do love this life. All of it. It’s so amazing. Whatever happens. Whatever what is, is—is what I want. Only that. But that.

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WHAT IS | Bright Line Living | The Official Bright Line Eating Podcast

I have a provocative question for you: Is Bright Line Eating your new addiction? If someone says they’ve switched out their eating addiction for an exercise addiction, is that possible? And who is saying you’re addicted to Bright Line Eating? Is it you, or is someone close to you? Someone who does—or doesn’t—support your Bright Line journey? What does it mean for Bright Line Eating to be an addiction?

Let’s break these questions down. First, I don’t believe that everyone has an addiction. Addictions are very specific things. They are patterns of use or behavior that cause clinically significant impairment or distress. 

There are symptoms associated with addictions. Using more than you intended to. Trying to cut back and not being able to, or not being able to stay stopped. Having significant impairments in your life or in your ability to function. Experiencing withdrawal if you quit. 

You don’t need all these symptoms, but you must have some to be addicted. And there must be clinically significant impairment or distress, meaning it’s got to be distressing you and/or impacting your life. When I was eating pints of ice cream with tears streaming down my face wondering why I was doing this—that was addictive eating. 

So is Bright Line Eating your new addiction?

Someone who says it is might be noticing your passion for it. Some people are super into it and very motivated. But that’s how anyone who is passionate about doing something they love feels. There’s nothing dysfunctional about being super-passionate about something. It happens when you live life to the fullest. It’s not an addiction.

It might be the case that Bright Line Eating is disrupting your relationships a bit. You’re eating differently, after all. There are shared norms about how you spend time with those around you, and now you’ve changed those norms. 

And if you’re spending lots of time talking about Bright Line Eating, it might be disruptive. Does that mean it’s an addiction? Or just a new passion?

The disruption to your relationships will settle down if you’re mindful and work to set new norms with them. You can find new ways to bond and connect—just not over food, or not over food the same way. Have a conversation with them. Discuss how to co-create the bond you both desire.

I wanted to shoot this vlog to discuss what addiction is and to encourage us to be mindful about how we use that word. Addiction is a beast, and throwing that word around lightly can be harmful.

I’m not the language police, but I wanted to share this with you based on my life experience. Think about the criteria we use to judge addictions. 

Is Bright Line Eating your new addiction? It’s possible. But you would have to identify that it wasn’t good for you, and you would have to be trying to cut back or quit. Your inability to do so would have to be causing you clinically significant distress. Your functioning would need to be impaired. It would need to impact other areas of your life. 

But if it’s just something that you love, and maybe you’ve annoyed your friends by talking about it, then—no. You’re finally free, and you’re not addicted. You’re joyous, and I’m thrilled for you.

FOR THIS EPISODE and MORE: https://ble.life/ltcbzg 
Is Bright Line Eating Your New Addiction? | Bright Line Living | The Official Bright Line Eating Podcast

I want to talk to you today about DEI. DEI has been a hot-button topic lately. My friend Eric, a dedicated Bright Lifer, recently told me he had felt like he was on a DEI journey inspired by, and in parallel with, ours. But now, he felt confused about where we stood. And I suspect he’s not the only one. 

What happened to bring this about? We have two platforms for our online support community, and one is on Facebook. Social media doesn’t always bring out the best in people, but we have Community Guidelines. Those guidelines stipulate that we don’t talk about politics and religion, but suddenly, those broad directives weren’t clear enough.  

Our primary goal is to help you live Bright. But what happens if someone has a problem related to identity and food? Like a trans person going on a trip, who is a mess about managing her food on a last-minute trip while also handling security concerns about her passport, which shows her as male. Or a Latina Bright Lifer who needs to talk about how stress is sabotaging her food after her uncle disappears, possibly deported. 

We realized that these types of posts, from people who genuinely needed help, bumped up against our community guidelines. It wasn’t clear what people could and couldn’t say.

So our team got together and crafted a new set of guidelines. We wanted to keep incendiary, hostile speech out of our community while allowing a personal sharing of each person’s life and how it related to their food journey. We still ask people to avoid political terms, but sharing your heart and soul with us is fine.

Then Eric looked at the new guidelines and noticed that there was a paragraph that had been taken out. He asked me to reconsider. It used to say: “BLE does not accept any type of hate speech or bullying, including anti-blackness, homophobia, transphobia, classism, antisemitism, fatphobia, etc. Practice love, kindness, and support in your comments to others.” None of that was allowed in the new guidelines, but the language had changed. 

So we worked out a new one. Here’s what it says now: “BLE does not accept any type of hate speech or bullying, including statements or actions that are disrespectful to people based on their age, race, ethnicity, sex, gender identity, sexuality, religion, lack of religion, ability, nationality, political affiliation, background, size, economic status, or ideology. All people are welcome here. Practice love, compassion, acceptance, and support in your comments to others. And where you and others differ, be kind, and keep your eyes on your own plate.”

I feel great about that paragraph. The difference between old and new is that the rewritten version specifically focuses on people’s behaviors. Ideologies are one thing, but what we can legislate in our community guidelines are not allowing actions or statements that hurt people. 

So what about DEI? We did intensive DEI work in the company starting in 2019 with an amazing consultant named Trudi Lebron and I released three vlogs about it, but during our big layoffs and massive restructuring of the company starting in 2022 there was a hiatus. 

Recently someone sent me an article that several big meta-analyses that show that DEI workshops and the like don’t work. I was blown away, and called Trudi. She told me that that research is true…but that DEI isn’t a workshop. “DEI” refers to outcome measures. 

In any given group of people, you can look at diversity on any number of measures, such as age, nationality, or cognitive capacity, and measure how much diversity there is. E is equity. You can review how equitable the division of resources is in a company. For inclusion, you can look at whether people feel like their voices are heard. Are their ideas valued? Those are all outcome measures.

That makes sense to me. I want those outcomes. I want to live in a world where the extremes of wealth and poverty aren’t as dire as they are today. I want our community to feel welcoming to all people. That may not be possible, but that’s what I want to aim for.  

I know that for members of our community, seeing the language change in our guidelines, at this particular juncture in history, was very destabilizing. If you felt that pain, I am sorry. 

I realize that some people don’t feel safe in the large Facebook group right now. And I have some thoughts about not feeling safe. I do think that “not feeling safe” is a feeling. (Unlike “feeling fat” which isn’t a feeling.) But not feeling safe can mean a large number of things. 

Not feeling safe could mean that you’re in a good place in your environment, but others need to change. It could mean you need to leave the environment because it truly isn’t safe (think of a dark alley at night). It could mean there’s nothing wrong, but you just need to do some work to feel safer, or even just endure it (think of people who don’t feel safe flying on an airplane). 

One option is to consider moving from Facebook, which is often not a safe place, to our own support community, the BLE Community Circle. That is a very safe forum. Or maybe the large group online support communities will never be your safest place in BLE. You might do better with a Mastermind group, a Gideon Games team, buddies, and attending accountability calls. You might want to partake of the thousands of hours of incredible courses we have and find a few friends to work through them with.  

If you’ve written in, know that your voice has been heard. You have had an impact. We’ve been reading your messages and really internalizing them. Thank you for letting us know what you think and how you feel. 

You may not have been aware of any of this coming down. Or it may have been a very big deal for you. I know that I cannot have recorded a message here that will hit the spot for everyone. I don’t know everything and I make mistakes. But I care about this community, and though it took time for me to sort through what I had to say about this, perhaps too much time, I hope that the hours my team and I have been working on this topic have value for you.

FOR THIS EPISODE and MORE: https://ble.life/1zgrtr 
DEI Update | Bright Line Living | The Official Bright Line Eating Podcast

A few people have written in with questions about a topic I’m excited to cover. Dana wrote, “I have lipodystrophy, an autoimmune disease, and cancer. I need to maintain or gain weight. Can this work? I’m a 10+++ on the Food Susceptibility Quiz.” Linda wrote in: “I’ve been listening to your vlogs, and they’re helpful even for someone like me who has no need to lose weight. Can you do a vlog on how meal plans can be a means of self-care and better health?”

The X-factor here, which Dana addressed, is the Food Addiction Susceptibility Score. To what extent does a person have food addiction? Some have none, some have a little, and some have full-blown food addiction. Any of those three states can be present in a person who has no weight to lose, or someone who has weight to gain. 

In my first book, Bright Line Eating, there’s a table that shows the relationship between BMI (body mass index) and the likelihood of being high on the Food Addiction Susceptibility Scale. The two BMI categories that are most likely to be high on the Food Addiction Susceptibility Scale are those with Class 3 or 4 obesity—serious obesity—and those who are underweight. Those who are underweight are more likely to be high than those with Class 1 obesity. 

Being underweight is the other side of the coin when it comes to food addiction. Research shows that a high percentage of people with anorexia nervosa or food restriction issues have an underlying food addiction. 

And then, of course, there are people who are just naturally skinny and may want to gain weight. 

If you need to maintain or gain weight, you can use Bright Line Eating by starting on a maintenance food plan. You’ll need to figure out what works for you. Some people need to eat the weight loss plan plus two or three “adds”—which are components of food that you add to the basic plan on a regular basis. So if your weight loss plan had no fruit or grain at dinner, you might add it in, and that would be an “add.”  

Some people don’t need adds to maintain their weight. Others, such as athletes or people who are very active, could have 20 or 25 adds. 

Maintenance plans vary widely, so if you’re trying to maintain your weight, make your best guess with the plan, then weigh yourself weekly. If you’re losing weight, add more food. 

What about if you’re trying to gain weight? I have an old friend who is naturally very tall and thin, who wanted to add weight and asked for my help. He was eating based on his natural feelings of hunger and satiety, and that kept him thin. He was also a vegan. 

I told him that nuts, grains, and seeds were his best friends, in consistent, steady quantities. I put him on a plan that had 10 or 12 adds, and he started gaining weight. 

So if someone wants to gain weight, the trick is the consistency and reliability that Bright Line Eating offers. If you do have food addiction but don’t need to lose weight, you’re going to be doing Bright Line Eating not for weight loss, but for the peace, freedom, and feeling of agency.

Once you find the food plan that keeps your weight where you want it to be, you’ll be like the rest of us in maintenance. You’ll weigh and measure your food, weigh yourself once a week, and tweak your food plan if your weight trends up or down from your target range.

This food plan can be a form of self-empowerment. Bright Line Eating is for those who need it, but it can also be for those who choose it. Doing Bright Line Eating, regardless of your weight status, is going to help with your health. It’s going to ensure that you’re eating way more vegetables. And not eating sugar and flour is one of the linchpins of health. 

It’s also amazing for time management. When it’s streamlined and automated, you’ll save so much time. It will become the scaffolding that makes the rest of your time management so much clearer. 

Finally, doing Bright Line Eating contributes to a feeling of mastery. Mastery is one of the linchpin components of flourishing, according to Self Determination Theory. The three components are Autonomy, Relatedness, and Mastery. The standard American diet is so defeating and deflating. Eating out of a vending machine, or succumbing to yummy but less-healthy foods, is defeating. Doing BLE gives you a feeling of mastery over the domain of nutrition and health. That lifts your self-esteem, and it spreads out into other areas of your life. 

In our society, we don’t take good care of ourselves. Swimming upstream from that toxic flow is empowering. So Bright Line Eating can work for anyone, even if they don’t have weight to lose.

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Bright Line Eating to Maintain or Gain Weight | Bright Line Living | The Official Bright Line Eating Podcast

I have a provocative topic today, and it’s something I’m dealing with myself right now. My friend Sage Lavine has noticed that I’m often super vulnerable with my community and tend to talk to you when I’m in the middle of the river and am not sure if I’m going to make it through. She said I should wait until I get across the river, and I see her point. But sometimes I like to talk to you from the middle of the river, when I’m still vulnerable.

This topic may resonate with some of you: What if you are not fully satisfied with your weight, and you’re in maintenance? What if you have weight creep? 

Here’s my situation: I’m 21 years into maintenance. I have a normal BMI and am a size four. My weight isn’t as low as it used to be, by as much as 15 pounds. I’m 5’ 3”, and have a small bone structure. For most of the past 21 years, I’ve been between 110 and 119 pounds. Lately, it’s hovering around 120. I definitely don’t want to be as thin as I once was (down below 110 pounds), but it feels to me like I’m five to ten pounds above my ideal weight.

I’ve been lifting weights and can do four pull-ups now, so I’ve added some muscle, but my waist measurement is up, which is key for me. I haven’t done a body composition test, but I have taken food out of my food plan. Lots of food. In fact, I’m hovering around a weight loss food plan, give or take.

I only have one fruit and one grain a day (both at breakfast). My vegetables are 12 at lunch and 12 at dinner (6 oz cooked and 6 oz raw for both), and I have half an ounce of ground flax seed at breakfast, in addition to the one other protein. Other than that, it’s the standard BLE weight loss plan. 

I’m not hungry or tired. I’m not sleeping poorly, I am menstruating regularly, and I have no other signs that anything is off. I feel great! And I feel like I look good. 

In order to succeed long-term at weight loss MAINTENANCE, you need to undergo three essential identity shifts. This is what my fifth book is about. It’s called Maintain, and it will be released on April 21, 2026. It talks about the three identity shifts you need to succeed in maintenance long-term. The third one is that you’ve got to be willing to be someone for whom the food and weight problems are solved, and you’ve got to move on.

I’ve done that. And I’m hesitant to pick that up as an issue again. When I was in Maui with my daughter recently, I lost three pounds. My food was simple and clean. So I know there are ways I could clean up my food. 

If you’re experiencing weight creep, the first thing to do is to take out food. My mom, who is quite small and slight, eats little portions. Maybe I need to do the same. But do I want to cut back my food plan any further? I don’t know. 

My weight creep is more of a plateau at the moment. It’s crept up to five or seven pounds over the ideal, and now it’s hovering there. Several times, I’ve resolved to clean up my food plan and get the weight off. But then I don’t do it, because I’m at peace with my food. And I guess I just don’t care enough.

You could adapt the Four Questions to this: Do I have peace with it? I do, mostly. Is it healthy? Yes, it is. Is it escalating? Not anymore. If it was continuing to creep, I would take out food. If you experience steady, continuous weight creep, my advice is to get really Bright and clean up your food plan. And, finally, is it messing with your weight? For me, yes, it is. But just a little. Not a lot.

If you are struggling with this, I feel you. It’s hard. I don’t have a lot of scale chatter now. I see the number each week and move on. Almost no food chatter, either. My life is full, and I don’t want to pick up this problem again. 

My family and I are going on a Disney cruise soon, and I will be putting on a smoking hot dress and enjoying myself. I’ve got so much life to live, and that’s how I’m framing this. Perhaps this is my new normal—but I’ll update you as we go along. 

I hope that something I’ve shared has been helpful. I know there are many people who love living Bright but aren’t happy with their weight. I shot this vlog for you. You’re not alone. Some of us are still wading through that river with you.

FOR THIS EPISODE and MORE: https://ble.life/uyev57 
Living with Maintenance Weight Creep | Bright Line Living | The Official Bright Line Eating Podcast

Today I have a topic that’s central to our ongoing discussion on getting food addiction listed as an official diagnosis in the DSM-5 (The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) and ICD-11 (International Classification of Diseases). Those efforts are ongoing. There is a proposal currently under review by the American Psychiatric Association for inclusion of ultra-processed food use disorder as a substance-use disorder in the DSM-5, and other proposals are in the works.

Something that was a focus during the first International Food Addiction Consensus Conference (IFACC) in London last May was the need for research on withdrawal symptoms when you stop eating processed foods. So I wanted to update you on this research.

I belong to a group called the Food Addiction Professionals Network (FAPN). We have a journal article reading group there, and we recently reviewed and discussed an article called “Development of the Highly Processed Food Withdrawal Scale.”

The article was from 2018, and I hadn’t read it before. I didn’t know about this scale. It was created with 31 questions that measure physiological and psychological withdrawal symptoms. 

Physiological withdrawal includes things like nausea, flu-like symptoms, shaking, joint pain, insomnia, and muscle aches. Psychological symptoms include feeling stressed, depressed, or anxious, having cravings or food thoughts, feelings of distress, or being overwhelmed or unable to cope.

Physiological symptoms come in two kinds: acute and long-term. Many people experience flu-like symptoms—headaches, muscle aches, and more—during the first four or five days of withdrawal. After that period, you go into another, longer phase where your leptin resistance starts to fade away and your dopamine receptors replenish and repopulate, which takes place over one to eight weeks. It could be longer. 

Psychological withdrawal tends to peak early. In the first hours or days after giving up processed foods, your cue reactivity is high, which means that anything that reminds you of food is going to be distressing. The cues may hit you hard—for example, if a tv commercial comes on with images of food, it’s going to be attractive to you. 

Cue reactivity goes up in the first days and weeks of abstinence—or longer for some people. If you’re not being fully bright, if you are intermittently reintroducing addictive foods, it could cause symptoms. But even if you abstain completely, in some very rare cases it could be a couple of years before it resolves. The clinicians in my article study group said they generally see a peak at around seven days, and then people turn a corner. I think it’s comforting to know that it doesn’t last forever. 

For me, when I was in the worst throes of food addiction, I couldn’t get seven days Bright in a row. I could manage one or two days, but never seven. Seeking relief from withdrawal symptoms can drive us back to the food. Getting through the first week is really critical.

Currently we’re working to fill the gap in the scientific literature, putting out good studies using this validated scale. We need studies with a control group, daily measurements, and careful controls (like making sure people aren’t also withdrawing from caffeine and alcohol, for example). We need scientists doing careful research, and I want to be part of that group. 

Right now, I’m writing up two papers to submit to the journal Frontiers in Psychiatry, for their special issue on ultra-processed food addiction. We are also retooling our own research program so that everyone in the Boot Camp can be included in the research voluntarily if they want to be. 

If you’ve started Bright Line Eating, or have tried it before and experienced withdrawal symptoms that led you back to the food, just know that it passes. Keeping that in the forefront of your mind can be useful. Know that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. You will feel Bright and free if you just hang in there.

FOR THIS EPISODE and MORE: https://ble.life/upyojd 
Withdrawal from Sugar and Flour | Bright Line Living | The Official Bright Line Eating Podcast

This week I address two related topic suggestions from Bright Lifers. Nena asked, “Does a cluttered house contribute to weight gain? Or does it make sticking to the Bright Lines more difficult?” Meanwhile, Sarah wrote in: “I’m doing a week’s focus with my Gideon Games team on decluttering our mind and environment. Can you speak to how decluttering leads to clearer thinking? I find that the longer I’m Bright, the more I want to declutter my space.”

I’ve been decluttering for 15 minutes a day for several months now. I’ve learned that going slow and steady and doing something for 15 minutes a day is freeing, comforting, and effective. 

I use tracking sheets so I can monitor my decluttering. My new year’s resolution is to declutter 15 minutes a day for 75 percent of the days each month. In January, I did 76 percent. And you better believe I was keeping track and making sure I hit that mark!

Research shows that decluttering matters—a lot. It impacts our mood and our sense of well-being. A tidy environment is conducive to rest and happiness and impacts our parasympathetic nervous system. A pleasing environment leads to an elevated mood. A cluttered environment is stressful.

It also affects cognition. It impacts reaction time, memory capacity, focus, and more. It’s hard to think and perform well in a distractive environment. If you’re trying to get work done in your office, for example, tidying up your desk is a good first step. 

As to whether it can impact your Bright Line Eating journey—yes, it can. I once worked one-on-one with someone who was a hoarder. She had little space to weigh and measure her food or to chop vegetables. She had nowhere to sit and eat. It was difficult for her to execute the functions of Bright living, and she did not stay Bright.

Even a small amount of clutter can make it difficult to establish Bright habits. I have a friend who says, The way you do one thing is the way you do everything. There’s truth to that. It’s going to be harder to have order in your meal structure and routines if you don’t have order in your physical environment.

So what can you do if you feel cluttered? There’s the “Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up” method. Marie Kondo, the author, recommends doing your decluttering all at once. There are lots of videos on YouTube if that method sounds good. 

If that doesn’t work, try the FlyLady approach and do 15 minutes a day. My daughter Maya and I made a list together of decluttering projects. We listed the spaces in our home to declutter: the gift wrap paper area, the medicine cabinets, the kitchen catch-all drawer, the mud room closet. 

We tackled these areas one at a time. We sorted and organized, wiped down surfaces, and put things back. It was very satisfying. We also noted expiration dates and tossed expired items. 

I’m also decluttering my email and voicemail, which will easily keep me occupied for a whole year.  I’m not good with mail. When we moved to Australia and were selling our furniture, we found behind my desk an envelope addressed to me with a check in it that I’d ignored for several years. 

My 15 minutes of decluttering may mean just keeping up with stuff. Before I first stopped eating sugar and flour, my habit was to let my laundry pile up until everything was on the floor waiting to be washed. I would go three months without doing laundry! That was my relationship with my physical environment. That was my food addiction.

So now I am motivated to spend 15 minutes handling stuff that needs to be handled. I feel so much freer when I do it. I use the Marie Kondo method, where she asks, “Does this bring me joy?” If my heart doesn’t leap when I hold an item, I get rid of it. Now I’m getting a positive energy exchange with my belongings, and it’s so satisfying.

It’s true that less is more, and, equally so, more is less. Getting on top of decluttering is amazingly liberating, and it will help keep you Bright.

FOR THIS EPISODE and MORE: https://ble.life/ybl2fx 
Decluttering | Bright Line Living | The Official Bright Line Eating Podcast

On today’s vlog, I was honored to have Amanda Leith, owner-operator of SHiFT Recovery by Acorn, as my guest. Amanda is a dear friend who is a foot soldier in the battle to help those with food issues. She shared her inspiring story and gave us a glimpse of what SHiFT Recovery does. 

Amanda was first attracted to drugs and alcohol as a teen, but then food became the primary issue for her. No matter what she tried, she couldn’t fix the problem. Until about ten years ago, she did everything she could to deal with her weight problem. She took medicines, invested in program after program, did therapy, and even had weight loss surgery.

Despite this, by her 30s, she weighed more than 300 pounds. She had diabetes. Diets didn’t work for her. Even the surgery only led to a 25-pound weight loss. She was facing serious health consequences, and was depressed, too—understandably. She was working as a drug and alcohol counselor but was unable to help herself with her food addiction.

Then she heard about a program called Acorn. It was short-term and reasonably priced, so at first she thought it wouldn’t work (because it wasn’t expensive enough to be any good). But she ended up deciding to give it a try anyway, and finally she was diagnosed properly with food addiction. Always before, her symptoms—high blood pressure, obesity—were treated, but not the root cause. With the proper diagnosis, she got treatment and found recovery. She lost over half her body weight and is no longer diabetic. Her high cholesterol, high blood pressure, and depression are gone, too. And she gets to live her life freely, without food obsession.

After starting her recovery at Acorn as a patient, she began working there part-time, and when the founders retired six years ago, she bought the business. She vowed to help others have the same kind of recovery she had found. 

Amanda believes that the people who succeed with Bright Line Eating are a slightly different demographic from those who find help at SHiFT Recovery by Acorn. Both programs serve food addicts, but she believes her program is a good fit for those who are further along in their disease, late-stage addicts needing a higher, more intense level of support. 

Her food plan is a little different from ours, too. They’re both weighed-and-measured food plans, but hers is four meals a day (which we know is good for people who struggle with binging). Her plan is definitely sugar, flour, and artificial sweetener free, like ours. But it goes a bit further to take out any substance that could elicit a craving, which includes caffeine. Since certain textures may trigger binge responses from food addicts, such as crunchy/salty and sweet/smooth, foods that fit this profile are off the table, too, including peanut butter, rice cakes, and crackers. Also, no nuts, seeds, or cheese (except feta). 

What does the SHiFT program look like? Amanda filled us in: her basic program is a residential or virtual eight-day program (if it’s in person, it’s usually in Florida, but sometimes they’ll host an intensive at another location). During those eight days, people detox, get information on food addiction, attend counseling, and do 12 Step work. 

It’s followed by ten weeks of aftercare, which includes three-hour Zoom meetings weekly, one-on-one sessions with a counselor, and daily email check-ins with counselors. These programs are offered six times a year, with the next one starting on March 19. 

There are also programs for alumni. There is a six-week program called “The Practice,” which gives people practice living in recovery. They also have a six-week online program called “Emotional Sobriety,” which covers relapse prevention, codependency, and more. 

It's possible for people to be members of both the close-knit SHiFT community and the Bright Line community. DO WHATEVER WORKS, says Amanda. Any way people can have long-term food addiction freedom is wonderful. 

And what excites Amanda most in the food addiction community? She loves the fact that more and more people are finding out that food addiction is real—and getting treatment for it. Her dream is that food addiction help will be available in every doctor’s office. 

I agree with her completely, and am so grateful that Amanda joined us on the Weekly Vlog!

Schedule a FREE 30-min consultation with a SHiFT Counselor today at foodaddiction.com or https://calendly.com/shift-one-on-one/30min. 
Learn more about the next SHiFT Intensive at foodaddiction.com. 

FOR THIS EPISODE and MORE: https://ble.life/se8qb7 
SHiFT Recovery by Acorn | Bright Line Living | The Official Bright Line Eating Podcast