How to Beat The Sugar Addiction
Most of you who are reading this blog are aware that sugar is bad for you. You’re also aware that most likely, you get plenty of sugar just by eating the healthy foods you like. You may not know that the American Heart Association has said that sugar is “associated with risk factors such as obesity, high blood pressure, high levels of triglycerides, and high levels of C-reactive protein, which has been linked to oxidative stress and inflammation”, but you do know that your body doesn’t feel good when you consume a lot of sugar.
[The guy who made this animation has done a lot of really well made and hilarious animations. It's amazing how much talent some people have! ]
There’s one problem though. Despite knowing that sugar is bad for you…you can’t stop. You can’t bring yourself to go without putting sugar in your coffee in the morning, or stop yourself from binge eating 20 cookies. This post is dedicated to showing you techniques to help beat the sugar addiction and get back your body. Here it goes:
How to Beat The Sugar Addiction
By being aware that you have an addiction to sugar, you’ve already won half the battle in beating it. Why? Because so many people are addicted to sugar, that it’s easy not to realize that there’s any problem with it. I mean, if EVERYBODY is doing something how can it be wrong, right? Nope, it actually just means that everybody is doing the wrong thing.
To check if you have a sugar addiction, do this simple test. First, approximately account for how much sugar you’re taking in during the day. If it’s too much, then ask yourself if you can stop. If it would be really hard to stop, like many others, you have an addiction to sugar. (Remember, just by admitting to it you’re only one step away from beating it.)
Going Cold Turkey
I wouldn’t suggest this for everyone, but for some people, going cold turkey is the best way to beat the sugar addiction. In some ways, this is the simplest solution. All you have to do is wake up, say to yourself “I’m not going to eat any processed junk or add sugar to anything” and then do it. I once read that fitness legend Jack Lalanne did exactly that when he was a teenager, after he realized that refined sugar was the reason he was feeling weak and getting headaches all the time.
Speaking of Jack Lalanne…here’s one of his classic videos on “not being a sugarholic”.
Beat The Addiction One Food at a Time
If you’re not the kind of person who does well with the “cold turkey” solution, try this. For the first week you start cutting down on sugar, cut soda out of your diet but continue with everything else. For the second week, cut cakes and cookies out of your diet except for one or two times a week and substitute some sweet fruits instead (but no binge eating). For the third week, start putting less coffee in your sugar.
Gradually, you’ll completely get refined sugar (that includes brown sugar, by the way) out of your diet. The important thing is to be on the offensive against eating sugar. If you’re not eating more healthily, chances are you’ll start eating less healthily.
No Binge Eating
I’ve heard of people who start cutting bad foods out of their diets, except for that one day a week where they allow themselves to pig out. In my experience, this doesn’t work. There’s nothing wrong with giving yourself one day a week where you allow yourself to eat poorly in the beginning, but it has to be in moderation. Binge eating can potentially feed the addiction and is the last thing you want to do when cutting refined sugar out of your diet.
Surround Yourself With People Who Have Good Habits
No, I’m not telling you to ditch your friends who don’t eat healthily, but if you’re trying to cut sugar out of your diet, it doesn’t help to have people around you who are constantly eating processed junk. By surrounding yourself with people who are healthy and have good habits, you’ll be able to learn from their example and kicking the sugar addiction will be that much easier.
Also, if you haven’t already, check out Kathleen DesMaison’s (Ph.D.) guide to beating the Sugar Addiction called “The Sugar Addict’s Total Recovery Program”
There You Have It…
There you have it. Now you know the steps to take in order to take back your body and beat the sugar addiction. Do you agree that most of us consume too much sugar in our diets? Leave a comment and let me know!
August 27th, 2009 at 8:53 am
Rafi are you saying that one should have absolutely no refined sugar at all. I am asking because I am not a sugar addict i.e. not much cakes, colas or cookies in my diet. But every day in the afternoon in the office at 4, we all have a cup of tea (which is not from the machine, you know, made from scratch so it tastes good) and this tea has sugar. Should I avoid that because I can – no big deal.
August 27th, 2009 at 9:03 am
Rafi,
This is a great post.
Several years ago, i was totally sugar free for about 2 years. No sugar at all except what i would get naturally. One day while shopping, i ran into some of those really evil cream cheese brownies that were not in the bakery section of the store and were strategically placed in the produce section. when I got home, I had one and withing 5 minutes, was having heart palpatations and sweating and feeling rather poorly…..sugar is a bad thing for sure. It’s not always easy to kick and sometimes folks might not think they are addicted, but a craving is our body’s way of letting us know that we’re lacking something.
August 27th, 2009 at 9:19 am
good advice sugar also increases the risk of gum disease and some studies have found that it weakens the immune system. With so many health promblems associated with sugar it best to avoid as much as possible.
It is well known that obesity causes chronic health promblem such as heart disease, cancer etc but what is more surprising is that it also reduces your mental capacity. A study found that people who were overweight had brains that were an average of 16 years more aged than people who were slim and had a increased risk of alzheimer’s. http://health.usnews.com/articles/health/healthday/2009/08/25/as-waistlines-widen-brains-shrink.html
August 27th, 2009 at 10:10 am
I generally eat 2tea spoons of sugar wid coffee 2-3x a day(dat makes it 6t spoons daily.)other than dat i dont even touch sugar.is it 2much?
August 27th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
Sangita – In my opinion and considering that you’re active and eat healthily, I’d say that having some sugar in your tea once a day is fine.
Some people, like Jack Lalanne, might disagree with me but I like to give advice that allows people to be healthy without having to go the extreme.
Rob – That’s a really crazy story. Just goes to show how not just how bad refined sugar is for you but also how stores try to lure you into getting it. You have to be on your toes!
Henry – Really interesting (and somewhat scary) study. Thanks for sharing it.
Lihan – In my opinion, when you consider that you’re also getting sugar in the normal foods you eat (like fruit), you might want to try cutting down on the refined sugar intake a bit. To start, it might be a good idea to only put one teaspoon of sugar in your coffee instead of two. Hope that helps.
Once again…really great comments guys (and girls)!
-Rafi
August 27th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
Avoiding refined sugar is difficult and you really need to focus on not consuming any. Unless you eat totally natural sugar seems to creep in everywhere. My approach has been to be conscious of it and really focus on moderation as opposed to the cold turkey approach. I find that this way I am not totally deprived and get my fix every once in a while.
That being said, I have noticed that as I cut down on my sugar, my cravings for it have dropped dramatically. Every once in a while they creep back and then I have a small portion. It seems to work for me so far.
August 27th, 2009 at 1:38 pm
Jeremy – Yeah, moderation is also an alternative to the cold turkey approach. Thanks for sharing your strategy for keeping your sugar intake down!
-Rafi
August 27th, 2009 at 9:10 pm
Definitely one of the toughest things to curb from your diet.
I find progression to be the safest way to tackle about anything in life so your strategies are sound.
Mike
August 28th, 2009 at 4:55 pm
Glad you like the strategies Mike.
-Rafi
August 31st, 2009 at 4:38 am
Thanks Rafi! Funny your post came on the eve of a major festival in my country(I’m from India). So lets not even talk about my weekend consumption of sugar!
Lol! But I went for a killer cardio workout yesterday (1 1/2 hrs). Makes it easier to face Mondays. I reccomend killer workouts on Sunday for everyone.
August 31st, 2009 at 1:04 pm
Sangita – Ha! Well, festivals are a different story. So your strategy is to give yourself such a hard workout the day before the work week that the work week doesn’t seem so tough? That’s pretty interesting. Also, here in Israel we have to face Sundays since that’s when our workweek starts instead of Monday like many other countries.
-Rafi