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Do you have a cheese addiction? How heroin, cocaine and cheese affect your brain

Peggy Kraus' photo
Disease Prevention Examiner

Your passion for cheese is more deeply rooted in your brain than you may realize. 

Just as heroin, cocaine, and other recreational drugs such as nictoine and alcohol affect the pleasure center of the brain, your brain is stimulated by cheese. The pleasant fuzzy feeling you experience makes you go back for more.

Cheese contains primarily two proteins, whey and casein. When the casein is broken down by acids and bacteria in the gut, a variety of casomorpins are created. One of these casomorphins has about one-tenth of the pain-killing power of morphine, which makes it a socially acceptable drug.

Because eating cheese creates a pleasant relaxation time and time again, we consider ourselves "addicted" to cheese. We seek it our over other less-gratifying foods, such as broccoli or black beans. These foods, while far better nutrionally, are not addictive because they do not create euphoria in the mind.

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Cheese, like heroin and cocaine, stimulates the brain and creates euphoria
Cheese, like heroin and cocaine, stimulates the brain and creates euphoria
Photo credit: 
cebix.net

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Frailty and disease have become an acceptable part of life, but both are avoidable when you exercise and eat right. Peggy Kraus, a clinical exercise physiologist, will tell you how.

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