I never thought of my love of protein and cheese as an addiction. Sometimes I have a very hard time controlling myself around salty foods with rich texture (such as olives, cheese and meats, or in my previous life chips and other snack foods). Red meat is especially hard. If I don't have it for a long time, when I do finally eat it I'm insane like gollum for the stuff.

I don't think it is an addiction, it's more just my body telling me it has a need for protein and fat rich food. Foods I was addicted to like fruit and rice... it's a different feeling of compulsion. When I was addicted to juice, fruit and rice, it was almost as if I craved it, not my body (except when hypoglycemic, which was rare as I had learn to eat all day to prevent that). It's hard to explain. The hunger I had for those foods was bottomless, whereas the hunger I have for meat and cheese is satisfiable.

Also, when I abstain from juices fruits and rice, the cravings lessen over time, whereas when I abstain from fats and protein, especially red meat and cheeses, the need only cumulatively increases. I've been living this way for 13 months now. My cravings for fruit are now "normal" whereas before they were unsatisfiable. Juice tastes like disgusting syrup. Rice and pasta taste like gummy sacks of starch. On the other hand, should I abstain from red meat and cheese, the need only increases until it is satisfied (which, should I go too many days, usually ends in me binging till I'm stuffed). Therefore, I make sure to feed my body such foods regularly.

If our cravings for animal meat and fat were a true addiction, wouldn't abstaining or limiting consumption cause the physical cravings to go away or decrease with time? They don't. The cravings for these foods are in response to a true physical need of your body for the protein and the fatty acids. Whereas, carbohydrate addiction is a true addiction, because your body has no need for these substances. Your body only craves them because excessive consumption creates a false dependency. That is why when consumption of carbohydrate is lessened, cravings also lessens. The dependency is decreased when the substance is not being abused.