Fen-phen, or fenfluramine plus phentermine, was the "miracle" diet drug of the 1990's. Until it was found to be potentially lethal and removed form the market. Is there anything to be learned from that experience? To discuss, please follow past the housekeeping.
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This evening, we're continuing a group review of David Kessler's The End of Overeating, started by Edward Spurlock, whose last contribution, on Ch. 27 -- with links to previous installments -- is here.
Here are the scheduled WHEE diaries that I'm aware of, as copied from the previous WHEE diary. Please let me know to add you if you've been left off (louisev, maybe?) or would like to volunteer.
December 2
Weds AM - ???
Weds PM - Edward Spurlock
December 3
Thurs AM - ???
Thurs PM - ???
December 4
Fri AM - ???
Fri PM - ???
December 5
Sat AM - ???
Sat PM - Edward Spurlock (Kessler, Ch. 29)
December 6
Sun AM - ???
Sun PM - Holiday Fit Club - kismet
December 7
Mon AM - NC Dem (A look at your butt...I mean glutes)
Mon PM - ???
December 8
Tues AM - ???
Tues PM -- Clio2 (Kessler, Ch. 30)
In Ch. 28, "What Weight-Loss Drugs Can Teach Us," Kessler suggests that we can indeed learn from the fen-phen fiasco.
The combination, it seems, damped down the reward system in the brain. Food -- even very palatable, normally rewarding food -- became less reawrding and therefore less of a behavior driver.
The result: people felt less driven to think about food and to eat. Many reported that they "felt normal for the first time." Doughnuts ceased their perpetual whispering of sweet nothings from behind plate glass shaop windows. Chocolates no longer bound them in invisible lassos. Food was just nourishment, pleasant enough but not compulsive.
What this means, according to Kessler: one more proof that -- just as he argued based on rat studies in Part I -- is that for some of us, "hyperpalatable" food acts much like an addictive drug. It is the same principle, Kessler avers, as dosing someone with serotinin and thereby reducing the urge for cocaine.
The lesson, again: those of us who are susceptible need to stay the heck away from "hyperpalatable" food, which means items spiked with high concentrations of fat, sugar and salt (and in my opinion, there is a fourth substance of concern, free glutamate).
Another short chapter, so to fill out with mere chit chat:
I was sent home from a family Thanksgiving with leftovers. Aware that these foods were not ideal, I nevertheless put them in the fridge and have been eating some of them along with other parts of a more normal diet.
The experience has reinforced my Kessler lessons and my impressions at the original holiday dinner: Compared to the raw and simply prepared foods I've been emphasizing for the last 3 months, all these dishes were very salty. The corn-bread dressing was sweetened. The sweet potatoes were very sweet, with added honey. Even the cranberry sauce was way sweeter than I make it. Other added seasonings were blaringly strong, eclipsing the natural tastes. And as might have been predicted from my past experiences of vulnerability, I've still been eating more than I plan of those things, even though I'm not crazy about them.
It starts with hating to waste food. I do think it's horrible to waste food. Unfortunately, it ends with eating twice as much as I think is reasonable. I'm just not out of this pattern.
Another thing that came up over the holidays: it seems like every other person I know who struggles with overweight is being sent for gastric bypass surgery. The latest is an acquaintance who had the surgery after her doctor and she concluded she had an "addiction" type problem around food, just as Kessler describes. Her weight range apparently was up where it is considered a danger to health. I wouldn't say anything, as it is too late and not my business anyway, but I wished she could have read Kessler first (and some of the diarists here) before making a decision. I can't help wondering if this surgery is going to be the fen-phen of the 2000's.
My own experience with artificial aids to weight loss is limited to having tried some things labeled "weight loss candies" in the 1970's. Of course I ate the whole bag in one siting and probably gained a pound!
That happend in the one short period in my life, about a week, that I experienced something that resembled how people describe bulimia. For that period of time, I literally could not walk across campus without needing to stop in the bookstore and buy a candy bar. And the minute that was eaten, I would be heading for the campus restaurant for a sandwich. And the minute that was gone, obsessing about the next meal in the dining hall...a nightmare.
I finally "cured" myself that time by fasting on nothing but tea with saccharin for about 3 days. Why it happened like that then, I have no idea. Dark winter days in a more northern clime? Bitter winter weather and holes in my shoes? Academic stress? Some kind of one-off hormonal or neurolological hiccup? I'm just very grateful not to have had it happen quite like that ever again.
Do please check out the poll. BTW, if anyone has tried hypnosis, it would be interesting to hear about that...I don't think it has ever come up in WHEE, has it?