Spiritual Adrenaline is a nutrition and exercise based lifestyle that is practiced along with the twelve steps of recovery.

Recovery Nutrition

roundProf.png

The Many Faces of Addiction

For most of my life, I disregarded my mother’s advice. You know the saying “You are what you eat.” As usual, Mom was right, as much as I hate to admit it. Mom was always telling me to eat my green vegetables and cut back on the sugar and fried foods. When I was a kid, I would finish an entire chocolate cake in one sitting. No exaggeration. I could finish the whole thing. I loved chocolate more than anything. I loved candy so much that I wound up with eleven cavities on one visit to the dentist. From my point of view today, sugar was my first addiction.

deathsugar.png

Your Metabolism

If you are anything like me, you understand the behaviors I just described and likely engaged in similar behaviors. Generally speaking, many people in their teens and twenties eat and drink whatever they want, irrespective of the potential future consequences. If a parent or authority figure tells them not to do something, that creates even more of an impetus to do it. To some extent, it doesn’t matter in our teens and early twenties, as our metabolism is churning, we are burning whatever we eat, and we have boundless energy.

 

It strikes me as consistent with my behaviors later in life with alcohol and then drugs. One slice of chocolate cake was never enough. I wanted the whole thing, and if there was more, I wanted that too. Looking back, it’s a clear pattern, and, I believe very much connected to the addictive nature of the substances in the candies, cake, and other snacks that I loved so much. It set the pattern for later on in my life, and it really should have been a red flag regarding how I react to and behave with these substances.

 
xray.png

Drugs and Alcohol

Alcohol, drugs and other substances we ingest take a dramatic toll on our bodies and our relationship with food. For example, alcohol is rich in calories but not nutrients. Alcohol slows the metabolism by causing stress to the liver, which in turn makes proper digestion of nutrients very difficult. Instead of processing food and retaining the nutrients, often the food we eat passes right through and our bodies are deprived of the nutrients needed for proper function. Stimulants such as cocaine and nicotine suppress the appetite control center which in turn deprives the body of much needed nutrients. Instead of healthy sources of energy, substance abusers tend to gravitate to sugar and caffeine for an immediate but unsustainable source of energy. Blood sugar spikes and drops, mood is altered and the vicious cycle of substance abuse and addiction ravages the body.

The natural cycle of aging, long-term substance abuse, and poor eating habits throws the body into chaos. The organs primarily affected are the brain, liver, kidneys, heart, pancreas, and lungs. Yes, all the critical ones. We need each of these to live. Even if we cannot see the damage on the outside, the chaos on the inside cannot be disputed.

 Watch What You Eat

People in recovery, even more than the general population, must be aware of the chemical composition of food and balance their nutrition. This means taking responsibility for our long-term bad habits and adding appropriate counterbalances to our present diet to compensate.

burger.png

“The good news is our body has an amazing capacity to heal if we focus on proper nutrition as part of our overall recovery plan.”

-Tom Shanahan