For years, I used sweets to numb my bipolar mood swings. Here’s how quitting sugar helped me find true stability.
“Would you like a piece of cake?” a coworker asked as she thrust a chocolate square dripping with frosting at me. My response of “No, thank you” was met with a quizzical look.
Being able to “Just Say No” to chocolate cake was once impossible for me. For much of my adulthood, my reflex move for overwhelming feelings was to numb them with sugar and other mood-altering substances.
Sugar Became My Childhood Survival Mechanism
Sugar and I began our dysfunctional relationship when I was five years old. My world turned upside down when my gentle, playful mother died two years earlier, and my new living situation with relatives proved traumatic. Looking through old photos of myself, I can see a carefree three-year-old morphing into a haunted kindergartner.
The way I was treated in that household cost me my appetite. After months of tea, toast, and little else, my bones protruded. Then, while visiting another family one day, I ate an entire sponge cake — one crispy, airy, perfectly not-too-sweet, slender slice at a time.
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After the first serving, it was as if someone had turned up the volume. I suddenly felt alert and in tune with my surroundings. Bye-bye, self-starvation. Sugar, in the form of a homemade cake, saved my life.
Sugar, my elixir, became something to look forward to. It soothed my feelings and revved up my senses. I used it to coat over whatever ugliness I experienced at home.
The Dangerous Cycle of Starvation and Mania
My relationship with food got more complicated in adolescence. When I was 16, a relative noticed that I had gained a little weight and taught me how to fast. As a freshman in college — the year I experienced my first immobilizing depression — I began bouncing between compulsive overeating and crash dieting.
Every summer, the arrival of bikini season became my cue to deprive myself of sustenance. I’m sure the stress on my system contributed to a cycle of manic episodes and hospitalizations.
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Thankfully, at 26, my last hospitalization broke that seasonal cycle. The program there provided me with comprehensive treatment and outpatient therapy — and weaned me off various prescription tranquilizers that had become another self-soothing addiction.
Not all my issues were magically resolved, though, and I returned to sweet indulgences and food binges.
The Final Breakup at Age 40
After umpteen attempts, I finally broke up with sugar for good at the age of 40. Desperation, ignited by a health scare, motivated me to seek the support of a 12-step community.
The physical side of easing off sugar was excruciating at first, but I trusted those who said the cravings would pass. They did.
Sugar may not be inherently harmful, but it can become problematic when consumed without moderation or used as a way to soothe emotional distress.
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Within a few months, the overwhelming longing had subsided to mere desire. Oatmeal with fresh fruit, walnut bits, and a sprinkling of cinnamon replaced apple pie, brownies, cinnamon rolls, ice cream, and the rest of my sugar fixes.
Yet getting myself emotionally in order took longer. Life without overindulging in sugar meant learning how to feel emotions in the moment, rather than using sugar to silence them completely.
Feeling the Feelings Instead of Feeding Them
Embracing 12-step-based recovery principles gave me tools for sorting out my feelings, which helped me fight self-disapproval, anxiety, and mild depression. I learned how to reframe, step back, examine my part, focus on the solution rather than the problem, practice acceptance, and much more.
I also learned that I feel things more deeply than most. Unless I channel that empathy into my paid work, volunteer work, or writing, I get knots in me that grow tighter and tighter until double-fudge brownies start up their siren song with the promise of relief.
Giving up sugar as my primary coping mechanism eliminated one major trigger for mood swings. Moderating my relationship with sugar was part of a broader shift in my approach to nutrition, which also benefited my overall physical health.
Even better, the fact that I finally overcame this particular addiction opened me up to take on other challenges, such as performing stand-up comedy, playing soccer, and learning to like myself — though that last one is a work in progress.
UPDATED: Printed as “So Long, Sugar,” Winter 2020