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Even as Sandra Williams’ dependence on marijuana worsened, people would tell the pastry chef that cannabis addiction was not real.

They would tell her “it’s not a problem,” that the substance is natural so there was nothing to worry about.

“But it had found me in a very dark place,” Williams told CTV’s Your Morning on Monday. “My experience was that marijuana was able to take me to a bottom that I didn’t think was possible.”

At the worst periods of her dependence, Williams hid in the basement of her home, ignoring the world around her and “losing herself.” Her position as head pastry chef at an Oakville, Ont., bakery came to an end. She eventually left home and wound up in a homeless shelter. That’s where she came across a 12-step program that helped her come out of that dark period in her life.

Williams now says she hasn’t used marijuana for 13 years. She has since resurrected her career as a pastry chef and become an addiction awareness advocate. She believes that the impending legalization sends a signal that “this is OK and it’s safe.” But that has not been her experience or the experience of some others who use the drug.

The Government of Canada says pot can be addictive, citing 2014 research in the New England Journal of Medicine that found as many as 9 per cent of people who use cannabis in their lifetime will become addicted to the substance.

“I had lost everything that I was before,” she said. “Coming full circle through a 12-step program has allowed me to find my passion for life again.”

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New U.S. research has found that quitting junk food can produce similar withdrawal symptoms during the first week to those experienced when quitting drugs.

Carried out by researchers at the University of Michigan and published in the journal Appetite, the study set out to investigate what withdrawal symptoms are experienced when people stop eating highly processed foods, such as pastries, French fries and pizza.

The researchers recruited 231 adults age 19 to 68 and asked them to report what happened when they cut down on the number of highly processed foods in their diet during the past year.

The findings showed that the withdrawal symptoms experienced by the participants, including feelings of sadness, irritability, tiredness and cravings, were most intense during the initial two to five days after they quit eating junk food.

After these first few days the negative side effects tapered off, which parallels the pattern of drug withdrawal symptoms.

Previous studies have looked at the effects focused on sugar withdrawal among animals and the literature regarding humans offered only anecdotal evidence

The study did not look at the methods the participants used to cut down on junk food, for example going "cold turkey" or gradually reducing the amount of processed food in the diet, with lead author Erica Schulte also adding that future studies should look at the effects of cutting out junk food in real time rather than asking participants to look back on their experience.

However, the team concluded that the findings suggest that the withdrawal symptoms experienced after cutting out junk food could make dietary improvements challenging, which may contribute to people going back to their old, unhealthy eating habits.

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SAJLMFAO Coffee, tea, tasty food, jogging, gambling, drugs, sex what the fuck can't people get addicted to? Or is it the person not all the fun things in the world that is the underlying cause of addiction.