Anti-Stress Nutrition Programme to Improve Mood,
Health, Behaviour and Learning
By Brenda Sampson
OVERCOMING ALCOHOL/TOBACCO CRAVING
There is a saying that "addiction equals allergy"; meaning that all addiction is linked with allergy. Craving is a symptom of allergy, and can be cured or improved by allergy treatment.
Tobacco and alcohol used in pregnancy can have a devastating effect on the baby's health and behaviour. Tobacco increases the likelihood of hyperactivity, cot death, asthma, ear infections, glue ear. Alcohol in pregnancy can cause brain damage, and a particularly difficult form of hyperactivity, which according to the American Feingold Association does not seem to respond as well as usual to the Feingold programme. In case there are women addicted to alcohol/tobacco who would like to stop using them in pregnancy, or before, here are a few hints to help.
There is a small book entitled "The easy way to stop smoking" by Allen Carr. I showed it to my brother. He said, I don't want to stop smoking; it's my only pleasure". I felt sad; if people are healthy, everything they do is a pleasure. He read the book for half an hour and then threw it down irritably. But when I saw him next, a month later, he had stopped smoking. I lent it to a woman who wanted her mother to stop smoking. When she returned it after a month, she said, "Three people have stopped; my mother, my sister and her boyfriend. He is a truck driver and used to smoke two packets a day."
Allen Carr's theory is that nobody enjoys smoking. The first cigarettes smoked in childhood cause nausea. If one stops because of an illness, and then starts again, the first cigarettes cause nausea. What people enjoy is cessation of withdrawal symptoms. As soon as a cigarette is stubbed out, withdrawal symptoms begin to build up. Withdrawal symptoms of tobacco are so terrible, that it is heaven to cancel them with another cigarette. It is like wearing shoes that are too tight, and hurt one's corns, just for the pleasure of taking them off.
Carr says, read this book to the end; then say, "Thank God I never have to smoke another cigarette as long as I live," and stop! Probably the same is true of alcohol. The withdrawal symptoms are so unpleasant that the addict craves another fix to cancel them.
Help with Craving
An alcoholic realised he was hooked, and stopped drinking. He said that for six years he suffered from terrible craving; also from constant rages and aggression. Then he read "Are you allergic" by William Crook. He stopped eating wheat products, and the craving and the rage both left him.
It is thought that alcohol addiction is linked with allergy to the substance that the alcohol is made from; probably grains; maybe grapes. If the problem food is identified and avoided, the addiction is easier to overcome. Alternatively, neutralising drops can be used; they diminish allergy symptoms including craving; they can be obtained from an allergist. Read "A little of what you fancy" by Richard Mackarness; he explains how to make the neutralising drops by serial dilution. They are safe; like homeopathic drops they are a minute dilution of the allergic substance; maybe one part in 100,000. Another doctor suggests inhaling an unlit cigarette. Possibly one might get the correct tiny dose of nicotine to neutralise craving.
Baking soda, or the soda/potassium antidote (two parts of sodium bicarbonate and one part of potassium bicarbonate) reduces allergy symptoms, including craving. Alexander Schauss describes a research in which a group of smokers took 1300 mg of the antidote in a cup of warm water, three times daily for a minimum of five weeks. After six weeks they had stopped smoking; none of the control group had. 1300 mg would be about a third of a teaspoonful.
