A 36-year-old woman has to eat a sponge every day to satisfy her addiction.
Candice Knox, a sales executive from Boksburg in South Africa, refuses to leave the house without a sponge in her handbag in case she gets peckish during the day.
She said: 'It's a serious addiction. If I hear the word "sponge" or see an advert on TV, then the craving begins, and I have to have some.
'I have a sponge at home, in my car and at work because I cannot go without it.'
She added: 'It has no taste really. It is more the smell of it that attracts me, the smell of a wet sponge drives my craving to a point of no return.'
Her craving for sponge started when she was six years old and started picking the padding out of her car seat and eating it.
She was then elated when her mother told her she would be getting a sponge cake for her seventh birthday, only to be left crestfallen when she realised it was not made of actual sponge.
Miss Knox, who suffers from a condition called Pica, the persistent eating of substances such as dirt or paint that have no nutritional value, can now get through an entire sponge in just a week or two.
Despite her family disapproving of her strange diet, Candice refuses to give up the habit and admits the smell of a wet sponge is enough to drive her crazy.
She said: 'My fiancé Clive worries about my health. If I ask really nicely he will give me a tiny piece to eat just to satisfy my craving.
'The rest of my family does not approve of it. They have learnt to accept it but I'm not permitted to eat it in front of most of them.
'When we first met Clive caught me hiding behind my wardrobe door sneaking a piece into my mouth, obviously the reaction was as if he had caught me eating a mouse or a live insect.
'After explaining why I eat sponge, he told me that he didn't think that it was healthy and that he would help in any way he could to get me to stop eating it. We are now at the point where he holds the power to give me a piece or not.'
Miss Knox, who takes iron tablets to curb the habit after following advice from doctors, said she wanted to break the taboo surrounding Pica.
She said: 'I used to hide if from my friends and colleagues until about three years ago when I decided to just stop being a baby and deal with the reaction that I got.
'And here we are today, if I pull out a sponge at work there is no reaction as people around me daily are used to it.
'I can't think of any food that has a similar texture to it either. Sponge is in a world of its own it eventually disappears into tiny little pieces if you chew it long enough.
'SpongeBob SquarePants is banned in my house due to the fact it makes my mouth water every time it comes on television.
'If SpongeBob ever had visit our beautiful country, I would advise him not to come to the East Rand, it's just safer that way.'
Candice Knox, a sales executive from Boksburg in South Africa, refuses to leave the house without a sponge in her handbag in case she gets peckish during the day.
She said: 'It's a serious addiction. If I hear the word "sponge" or see an advert on TV, then the craving begins, and I have to have some.
'I have a sponge at home, in my car and at work because I cannot go without it.'
She added: 'It has no taste really. It is more the smell of it that attracts me, the smell of a wet sponge drives my craving to a point of no return.'
Her craving for sponge started when she was six years old and started picking the padding out of her car seat and eating it.
She was then elated when her mother told her she would be getting a sponge cake for her seventh birthday, only to be left crestfallen when she realised it was not made of actual sponge.
Miss Knox, who suffers from a condition called Pica, the persistent eating of substances such as dirt or paint that have no nutritional value, can now get through an entire sponge in just a week or two.
Despite her family disapproving of her strange diet, Candice refuses to give up the habit and admits the smell of a wet sponge is enough to drive her crazy.
She said: 'My fiancé Clive worries about my health. If I ask really nicely he will give me a tiny piece to eat just to satisfy my craving.
'The rest of my family does not approve of it. They have learnt to accept it but I'm not permitted to eat it in front of most of them.
'When we first met Clive caught me hiding behind my wardrobe door sneaking a piece into my mouth, obviously the reaction was as if he had caught me eating a mouse or a live insect.
'After explaining why I eat sponge, he told me that he didn't think that it was healthy and that he would help in any way he could to get me to stop eating it. We are now at the point where he holds the power to give me a piece or not.'
Miss Knox, who takes iron tablets to curb the habit after following advice from doctors, said she wanted to break the taboo surrounding Pica.
She said: 'I used to hide if from my friends and colleagues until about three years ago when I decided to just stop being a baby and deal with the reaction that I got.
'And here we are today, if I pull out a sponge at work there is no reaction as people around me daily are used to it.
'I can't think of any food that has a similar texture to it either. Sponge is in a world of its own it eventually disappears into tiny little pieces if you chew it long enough.
'SpongeBob SquarePants is banned in my house due to the fact it makes my mouth water every time it comes on television.
'If SpongeBob ever had visit our beautiful country, I would advise him not to come to the East Rand, it's just safer that way.'
Music: "Too Cool" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Source: Daily Mail , The Sun , Mirror
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