I've been off alcohol and drugs for 2.5 years, and abstinent from compulsive overeating for almost a year. Food was harder to get a handle on than meth, no joke. Quitting refined/added sugar in particular was almost as bad as quitting smoking. (Haven't smoked in 1.5 years either.)<p>In my experience, compulsive overeating is every bit as much an addiction as alcoholism, smoking, or hard drugs. I saw myself exhibiting the exact same behaviors around food as I did around alcohol (splitting my shopping up between multiple corner stores so none of them would know how much I was eating) and feeling the exact same way about myself (I'm a worthless piece of shit, I'll never get a handle on this, I might as well just dive in and die young).<p>You might argue that had I not learned those behaviors while being an active alcoholic, I wouldn't have put them into use with food. Maybe. I think that's beside the point. The point is that I couldn't stop even though I desperately wanted to.<p>In my case I had food problems before I got sober. I hear about people turning to food after they stop drinking (in fact one very well-known program explicitly recommends it), but for me food, booze, drugs, nicotine, and casual sex were/are a package deal. They all hit the same place in my brain, perform the same function for me emotionally, and are impossible to quit on my own.<p>(Posted anonymously for reasons I hope are obvious.)