Until 2008, a year that launched breakthrough research that would ignite interest in neuroplasticity for reversing the obesity epidemic, the idea of wiring the brain for weight loss seemed a little far-fetched.
Three breakthroughs in neuroscience
Until then, most clinicians considered obesity a diet and exercise problem, not something fueled by associative learning of the stress response. Then, Robert Lustig and Michele Meitus-Snyder documented the role of the emotional brain’s “limbic triangle” of structures that collude to dysregulate the major chemicals that foster overeating and weight gain.
The following year, a study by New York University researchers showed that fear memories could be erased just after the current circuit was stress-activated. In 2012, Joseph LeDoux’s article on the emotional brain proposed a role of “survival circuits” encoded by conditioning to drive extreme responses.
Rewiring the “Stress Triangle”
Understanding the three structures in the unconscious mind, all promoting weight gain in stress, gives us a new appreciation for the neuroplasticity of emotional circuits, and the idea that a fight-or-flight reactive wire (“survival circuit”) is pointing to the promise of neuroplasticity, the groundwork for rewiring the brain to promote weight loss.
Robert Lustig, MD, speaks about the role of biochemistry in promoting obesity.
Although citing the science is essential, it’s often not until a participant experiences that switch in interest in food after rewiring that it seems even possible. While survival circuits are activating biochemical drives to overeat, the thought that we could be sensible about food seems preposterous. However, it is stress-related chemicals that drive overeating and obesity.
Dr. Lustig spoke about the biochemical nature of obesity for professional certification training in EBT, long before obesity was seen as a disease (see video above). The strategy of rewiring the stress response is so important because if the brain is rewired, there is no ongoing expense for changing biochemistry through injections. The source of the problem – neural brain circuits – has been erased, so the chemical change is lasting.
As our nation battles out the role that this new generation of weight loss drugs will play in turning around the obesity epidemic, some of the benefits of becoming wired for weight loss may gain more public attention. Erasing the circuits that drive the stress chemical cascade that fuels weight gain has the potential to be a cure. It will take a whole host of treatments to bring the US back to even 2011 levels of obesity, and becoming “wired for weight loss” is an appealing option that just might catch on.
