Dear Julia:

You are welcome.  I read your reply and I re-read your original post: what you are describing is doing too much of every activity you refer to as addictive, not being able to limit the activity,  but in regard to some of the activities,  being able to stop the activity completely and abruptly: “mostly eating-sweets or snacks- too much..  binge watching, binge reading… using my phone, same story, hard to put aside… I did (stop a habit) but it always came with an abrupt and complete stop of doing something”.

You described craving and planning to do the activity, even though you don’t enjoy it anymore: “I’m planning to (eat snacks) in the evening. I plan my next ‘fixes’ – where to get chocolate, when to eat etc… sometimes to ‘reward’ myself even, which is absurd, because I just don’t enjoy this behaviour aka eating too much sweets, binge watching etc. anymore”.

You mentioned a past addictive behavior of meeting strangers from a dating platform: “I overall did not enjoy but I could not control myself... so I cancelled my accounts all together to stop…it was all in all rather stopping habit than changing“.

Even though the DSM-5 refers only to gambling as a behavioral addiction, seems to me, that some or all of the neurochemical processes and connections in your brain regarding the behaviors you listed are similar (or even identical) to that of drug addiction. At first eating sweets and snacks (I’ll refer to these as s & s) was very rewarding and your brain made neuro-chemical (physical) connections between s & s and pleasure and craving.  You were not able to limit the s & s behavior (had little to no self-control on the matter) because s & s and craving were connected, and the craving was activated regardless of whether you were hungry or not, enjoyed the taste, or not.

It is difficult to abruptly and completely stop the s & s behavior because you have kids at home who like s & s, maybe your husband like some of these too, as well as guests. You are aware that the items are there, in your home (you have access to it), and therefore the craving is activated. You were able to stop other addictive behaviors because you removed access to the items: “cancelled my accounts (dating platform, social media) all together to stop“. No access= no activation of craving= no behavior. Even heavy-duty drug addicts are able to stop their addictive behaviors  abruptly and completely when they no longer have access to the drugs, ex., when incarcerated.

“I thought about what brings me to starting going down the path again and again and like you described it probably falls back to anxiety – of being alone (with my thoughts?)“- yes, I think so.

“Also I had an excessive habit of daydreaming – I’m talking about hours over hours going to waste. It all stopped when I met my husband. These nights now and then I’m also finding myself coming back to this routine“- Growing up and all the way to my early 20s, I used to daydream for hours a day myself, sometimes starting in the morning and ending at night. In my case, it definitely had a lot to do with anxiety: it was a very unpleasant and anxiety fueling experience to live with my unpredictable, crazy mother, so when she was away at work, I lay in bed, listening to music and like a movie director, I directed the most amazing movies in my mind, playing the main character, love stories and such. It was taking a break from anxiety. I daydreamed elsewhere as well… just not when she was home.

anita