When we talk about addictive substances we always refer to drugs and think about their great negative effects on our body. However, in the usual diet and almost without realizing we are also surrounded by addictive substances that harm the body. We talk about alcohol, sugar, theobromine and others.

“Socially accepted drugs”

Although we will not go out to steal to buy them or generate an impact as fast as destructive in our body, these addictive substances or “socially accepted drugs” have their side effects.

When we talk about “drugs” substances such as cocaine or heroin come to mind: both these and those dealt with in this article have addictive power, although in the former it is much greater. Unlike the previous ones, small amounts of substances such as sugar, caffeine or theobromine may not be harmful to our body; however, we must know the consequences that its consumption can have on our body in the long term.

All these addictive substances produce not only a pleasurable effect after consumption but also stimulate the central nervous system and help us to disinhibit behavior, something that is common to all drugs. The problem is that in this case, these substances are usually incorporated into our diet and maybe that is the reason why we look at them with different eyes.

Alcohol, caffeine, theobromine, sugar, sodium and fats are common and we would never consider them drugs, however, they have an addictive power and other qualities similar to those addictive and legally prohibited substances.

Its effects on the body

Generate addiction is its main negative effect on the body, as they encourage us to consume more and more of each of them always leading to a common result: excess calories.

Both alcohol and sugar and fat are a source of calories and it is more than evident that their intake of addiction can lead to excess weight and body fat. But also if we are addicted to theobromine we can go to chocolate that in most cases contains sugar, fat and of course, many calories.

An addiction to sodium or an excess of sodium also results in higher caloric intake and clear, caffeine is not only in the coffee that we usually sweeten or accompany other food, but also in soft drinks, energy drinks and others that are also a pump of calories of bad quality, because they derive in their majority of sugars and / or fats without offering vitamins, minerals nor antioxidants.

Thus, these addictive substances are widely spread in a variety of foods of habitual consumption that can generate addiction over time and lead to excess calories, metabolic disorders and diseases of all kinds.

These addictive substances lead us to commit abuse and suffer its consequences over time, because an excessive intake of caffeine today will not cause negative effects other than gastrointestinal symptoms and irritability, but in the long term the consequences can be greater and even damage the cardiac system The same happens with sugar, sodium and the rest of the “socially accepted drugs”.

Today these addictive substances are harmful to your body responsible for the most prevalent diseases: cancer, obesity, hypertension, diabetes and more, therefore, it is time to realize that beyond the “real drugs” in our day to day we can be addicted to substances that harm our health.

The key: to get away from processed and ultraprocessed products and consume more food because in these addictive substances do not exist or have qualities different from those of industrial origin that can alter the health of the organism.