Is Sugar Toxic?

[mckitterick]

First, read this NYT article on why sugar is so dangerous to your health. I'll wait.

I stopped eating refined sugars a year ago, and within two weeks I lost 10 pounds. I also started feeling healthier almost right away. This is why: Not only does sugar (cane, corn, you name it - refined sugar) make us fat, but it also causes insulin resistance. This makes it a primary cause for diabetes and metabolic syndrome. That means sugar causes heart disease. Worse yet, because of all these effects, it promotes cancer.

There's a terrifying thought, considering that it's in almost every prepared food you find in the grocery store.


Click the image to see the NYT article.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to give up refined sugar for one month. See how much your body responds.

Starting today, I'm giving up on diet soda, as well. Why? One's body sees the artificial sweetener and produces insulin in response... so the most dangerous aspect of sugar - that it promotes these diseases - can't be avoided by using artificial sweeteners in place of sugar. I've been noticing soreness in my guts, what appears from all symptoms to be a gall-bladder issue. Therefore, my body is responding to diet soda by producing insulin and increasing my triglycerides (blood fat) from artifical sweetneners.

*sigh*

I'll report in a month on how that's going. I hope to hear from YOU, too!

Good luck.
Chris

Comments

[victoria-lane.livejournal.com]

I gave up soda two years ago for the final time. Diet soda, of course. I don't drink any sort of soda now.

But I do drink coffee. With sugar.

I've been thinking about the whole cutting out sugar thing for quite some time but I don't know if I can cut it out entirely. Some days, that damn cup of coffee in the morning is the only good thing that happens to me all day.

I used to live for most of my life relatively sugar free. I didn't eat much because it wasn't allowed in my house and I never craved it. It wasn't until the last seven years that I started to eat it. And it shows in the way I look.

[mckitterick.livejournal.com]

Good for you! I hope I can do it without all the cravings. Need to move the diet soda into storage for parties to avoid the temptation.

I use milk to sweeten my coffee. Never much liked sugar in it, oddly! I think it's because that's how my grammie would make it for me. She called it "baby coffee" - more milk than coffee.

[victoria-lane.livejournal.com]

It's called a Boston Coffee when it is half milk or more. ;)

[mckitterick.livejournal.com]

That sounds more grown-up! I try to order them at coffee joints by asking for a "cold milk latte," which 99% of the time results in an iced latte. Boston Coffee it is!

[victoria-lane.livejournal.com]

You might have to do some educating, though. Not everyone knows what it's called. I wouldn't think in the midwest it'd be a known term. But then, I hear Kansas City is one modern, trendy place.