What do you reckon? Should we re-spell sugar as ‘suga’ and regard it as a four-letter word – bad, bad for you!
Amazingly, sugar is the only addictive drug we feed to babies. We don’t think of sugar like that, do we? There is no such thing as a motherhood manual and mothers don’t attend nutrition classes before having babies. This information is not taught in schools. We have to seek out our own research.
unheathly food
Don’t believe the adage of ‘everything in moderation’. It is misleading and suggests there is a safe level of sugar consumption. Not so! Sugar is not a nutrient. The average daily sugar intake for an adult is 17 teaspoons. It is a substance that is as addictive as nicotine or caffeine, with long-term lasting health effects. Sugar makes you fat. No easier way to describe its effects than that. Your liver converts sugar directly into fat and destroys your appetite control. Which means that you eat more of it and the fatter you will be.
As far back as 1800, sugar was very expensive. There was no sugar cane manufacturing. 100 years later, there was still very little heart disease and then WHAM! sugar-based foods started invading the Western diet. Cadbury had just started selling chocolate. Biscuits were being commercially produced. 15 years later Coca Cola was rolling off assembly lines. 5 years after that came breakfast cereal. By the 1960s sugary products had exploded into Goliath type companies. Tying in with this was the increase in heart disease and diabetes.
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As humans got fatter, fad low-fat diets were the favourite. Food manufactures made low-fat everything, but we still got fatter, despite the boom in the ‘health’ industry. Why? Because more sugar was added to the products to make up for the no fat taste. Then came Big Pharma trying to reduce cholesterol and a pill for every complaint. Still, we got fatter. Our appetite control system was broken. What broke it?
The research identified that when we eat fat and protein, our body releases a hormone to tell us to stop eating. A different hormone is released by the pancreas, when we eat carbs – tells the brain the same thing. Stop eating! BUT there is one carbohydrate that doesn’t flick the hunger craving control switch. Fructose. Our bodies do not perceive fructose as food. It overloads the liver, changing carbs to fat.
If you have too much fat in the bloodstream, hormones like insulin don’t work as they should do. Keep eating sugar and your blood sugar levels rise, meaning the body can’t produce enough insulin to eradicate the sugar from the bloodstream. Attaching itself to proteins in the blood, the mix of these proteins causes the skin to lose its elasticity. No amount of face cream will help with those wrinkles!
With links to heart disease, diabetes, obesity, stroke, cirrhosis, cancer and depression, sugar is detrimental to your health. Sugar consumption can raise blood pressure and increase inflammation. I suggest that you eliminate your sugar intake and add Turmeric to your daily diet.
Not only do we get fatter, but we also get sicker. Even your immune system can be affected. Bacteria and yeast feed on sugar. A build-up of these organisms can cause infections.
Do you clean your teeth after every meal to eliminate the sugar? Sugar decays your teeth more than any other food.
sweets
We joke about being a chocoholic, but all in seriousness, it is an addiction. How do you break a sugar addiction? Any sugar addict will tell you that eating a sugary sweet makes them feel better. It is a cycle of pleasure and withdrawal. Exercising willpower will set you up to fail. Understand that you are chemically addicted to fructose. Our brains are hardwired to pursue sugar, just like an addict seeks cocaine. You can’t quit cocaine by taking smaller doses. Same with sugar. You can’t quit sugar, by reducing the amount of intake. It is cold turkey. It is a brain chemical withdrawal. There is no moderation.
Step1: Attitude.
Consider that you are choosing to not poison yourself. You are not depriving yourself. You are removing yourself from harm. Educate yourself. You will be surprised how many diet foods contain large portions of sugar.
Step 2: Habit Elimination.
Identify the habit that goes with the addiction. Examples – Do you curl up on the couch in front of the TV with chocolate? Do you have a biscuit with every cup of tea? Remove the habit. Stop watching TV for a while. (This should be easy because of all the fake news). Stop drinking tea and drink water instead.
You can also use products such as magnesium powder, as it regulates glucose and insulin. Research the benefits of the white mulberry leaf, chromium and zinc too.
Step 3: Avoidance Methods.
Remove all processed foods from the pantry. Replace the biscuit jar with a jar of nuts. Drink water instead of Coca Cola. Don’t snack on sugary bars. Eat a banana instead.
Step 4: Eliminate Sugar.
Read the back of packets when doing your food shopping. Let labels be your guide. Choose food carefully. Manufacturers add sugar to products to increase flavour and shelf life. Even artificial colours, preservatives and synthetic flavouring have sugar composition. Pick fresh fruit and vegetables before anything else. Avoid the supermarket middle aisles and shop around the outside aisles. Note that cracker biscuits have just as much sugar content as a sweet biscuit. Most processed foods contain sugar, that is everything in a packet, bottle or a can. To satisfy your sweet cravings, you may find yourself reaching for replacement foods such as white bread and white rice. Don’t! They are high in fat and sodium, which can increase glucose levels.
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If you get past the first few weeks, you will notice that your desire will vanish. Then try eating a sugar product and guaranteed you will not like the taste and the immediate effect of fatigue. I have been biscuit and lolly free for 93 days. At the weekend I ate a Tim Tam and I spat it out. It gave me no pleasure at all. Fingers crossed you can achieve the same goals.
