“I’m an alcoholic in recovery, so I’ve stopped drinking but now crave sugar and am having a really hard time not bingeing on sweets. Why and what can I do?,” a woman asked at a recent community workshop at which I was the presenter. It was hosted by a chemical dependency alumni association and open to the public. My talk was titled, “Secondhand Drinking – the Phenomenon that Affects 90 Million Americans.” This particular powerpoint presentation helps attendees understand alcohol misuse, addiction, secondhand drinking (SHD)-related stress, codependency, and recovery for the family system from the brain’s perspective. The topics relevant to her question, included:

• the basics of neuroscience (including fMRI and SPECT scans) and how a person’s brain develops and wires unhealthy habits, such as alcohol misuse or secondhand drinking-related coping skills;
• alcohol misuse (and the distinctions between binge drinking, heavy social drinking and alcoholism), which is the cause of drinking behaviors and thus SHD; and
• what a person who misuses alcohol or is experiencing SHD-related stress can do to heal/re- wire their brains.

And it was the connection between alcohol and sugar and the dopamine pathways that best answered this woman’s question, which is a common question for person’s in recovery from alcoholism.

Stopped Drinking But Now Crave Sugar – the Alcohol | Sugar | Dopamine Connection

As I stated, the common connection is the brain’s pleasure/reward pathways, aka neural networks (which are the way brain cells [neurons] “talk” to one another), aka electro-chemical signaling process. These neural networks rely on dopamine neurotransmitters. These are the chemical portion of the brain’s electro-chemical signaling process. This prior post of mine helps explain this concept, “Here’s to Neural Networks and Neurotransmitters – Keys to Brian Health,” and this 1:48 minute video by NIDA is excellent, “The Reward Circuit: How the Brain Responds to Natural Rewards and Drugs.”

So to answer this woman’s question more fully for BreakingTheCycles.com readers, I’ve pulled two pieces. One is an article by Kris Gunnars, BSc, “10 Similarities Between Sugar, Junk Food, and Abusive Drugs,” and the other is Nichole Avena, Ph.D.’s TedEd Video, “How Sugar Affects the Brain.”

To understand how alcohol changes brain function and taps the brain’s dopamine-reliant pleasure/reward pathways, check out NIDA’s Brief Description and NIDA, NIAAA, The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, HBO’s The Addiction Project > “Addiction and the Brain’s Pleasure Pathway: Beyond Willpower.”

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Lisa Frederiksen

Author | Speaker | Consultant | Founder at BreakingTheCycles.com

Lisa Frederiksen is the author of hundreds of articles and 12 books, including her latest, "10th Anniversary Edition If You Loved Me, You'd Stop! What you really need to know when your loved one drinks too much,” and "Loved One In Treatment? Now What!” She is a national keynote speaker with over 30 years speaking experience, consultant and founder of BreakingTheCycles.com. Lisa has spent the last 19+ years studying and simplifying breakthrough research on the brain, substance use and other mental health disorders, secondhand drinking, toxic stress, trauma/ACEs and related topics.

Latest posts by Lisa Frederiksen (see all)

• Does a Loved One Have to Hit Bottom? - November 20, 2022
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