Tuesday
Apr162013

The Sugar War

The quick answer:  If there’s candy in the house, someone will eat it.  Buy your favorite sweets by the piece, not by the bag or box.

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Confession

I don’t eat candy bars.  Usually.  But the kids left us a package of Hershey bars, the larger ones that are sectioned, after making s’mores at a beach bonfire.  “Wouldn’t those Hershey bars be a little healthy,” I kidded myself, “if I ate them with some fresh walnuts?”  The combination tasted so good that I fell off the sugar wagon and ate the whole darn package.

Two days later I had a fast moving sore throat-cold that knocked me down for a week.  Now this isn’t supposed to happen if you’re eating well—that’s been my experience for several years.  So I have this bad feeling that gorging on sugar suppressed my immune defense and made me vulnerable.  So I’m contrite (and coughing) as I write; I knew better.  Ever done that?

A Quick Review on Sugar

The beautiful wife heard that a honeybee only makes 1/12 teaspoon of honey in its lifetime.  Historically, sugar was so scarce before the Industrial Revolution that only a king could gorge on it.  Today everyone can . . . and many do.  Excessive sugar intake is our biggest health problem, leading to diabetes, heart disease, and increased risk for cancer.  This is all well documented.  Here are three excellent researchers who have warned about sugar:

Gary Taubes:  If you want a serious book on the problem of sugar, read Gary Taubes, Good Calories, Bad Calories.  You hear a lot of people who should know better suggest that all calories are equal.  It simply isn’t true.  Eating 500 calories of sugar a day—the American norm—will definitely have a different result than eating 500 calories of fruits and vegetables. 

Bottom line, to expose yourself to overweight, diabetes, heart disease, and cancer, follow the American practice of excessive sugar intake.  Ugh.

David Ludwig, MD, PhD:  Here’s a guy dealing with the sugar problem every day—his specialty is child obesity.  It’s a terrible and growing problem that led to a radical proposal:  Severely obese children should be removed from the care of their parents.  Ludwig is best known for his YouTube video, “Sugar: The Bitter Truth.”  If you haven’t seen it, you should.

John Yudkin, MD, PhD:  He’s gone now but Yudkin was the first scientist to link sugar intake to diabetes and heart disease; others made the connection to cancer.  His 1972 expose of sugar, Pure, White and Deadly, made him famous in England.  The U.S. version is titled Sweet and Dangerous, The new facts about the sugar you eat as a cause of heart disease, diabetes, and other killers.  The title says it all.  (First edition copies of these books are collector items.)

Slashing Sugar Intake

To reform our diet, we must slash our sugar intake—this has to be the first step.  IF you want proof, try a 4-week sugar fast and see how much better you feel.  The AHA offers this wise counsel:  Limit sugar intake to 6 tsp (25 grams) daily for women; 9 tsp for men (it’s based on body mass).  The 2010 Dietary Guidelines for Americans makes a similar recommendation.  We just need to “do it.”

Healthy Change #1 attacked our biggest source of excess sugar: If you consume sugary drinks, real or diet, limit yourself to one (12 oz.) serving per week.

Healthy Changes #4 & 10 promote whole grains while reducing sugar intake with this wise rule:  Packaged foods must contain more grams of natural fiber than sugar.

Now Healthy Change #15 introduces a new rule based on this observation:  If there’s candy in the house, someone will eat it—probably Mom.  But sometimes it’s Dad, per my confession above.  So here’s the rule: 

 

Please comment:  How do you manage sugar in your life?  How have you gotten past the false belief that artificial sweeteners like those in “diet” drinks—such a sad, pathetic name—are somehow healthier than real food?  Tell about your experience with a "sugar fast."  Or share your sad story of falling off the sugar wagon.

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Reader Comments (12)

Growing up, my family kept the house well stocked with soda and other sugary drinks. Soda habit or not - that's what we drank on a day-to-day basis. What really helped me to stop drinking soda was when I went hiking in Big Sur a few years ago. I brought along juice boxes and other snacks (walnuts, energy bars, fruit, etc.) to help us maintain our energy level during the hike. Well, it turns out the snacks we brought were great and really did provide us with extra energy. In contrast, the juice boxes were not at all refreshing on an 8.8 mile hike - they had become warm and syrupy. After the hike, we stopped in Carmel and I ordered an iced tea (with no sugar), which turned into a mind blowing experience! This was the refreshment and thirst quenching I was looking for! And ever since then, I have learned to appreciate the thirst satiating properties of water, iced/hot tea (with no sugar), and also coconut water (which offers electrolytes if you lose too many salts from heavy sweating). I don't drink soda anymore except on rare occasions.

As for other areas of my diet, I am still gradually working on reducing the amount of sugar I consume. I started by first following Healthy Change #4 and 10 (more fiber than sugar), but I also look at the nutritional information on foods and compare sugar quantities to select the product with the least amount of added sugar.

April 18, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterTara

I have slowly been trying to cut out sugar in our household. Unfortunately, I have a HUGE sweet tooth and it appears I have passed that along to my children. Once, when my daughter was 2 years old, she was eating unsupervised at a party and ate so many M&M chocolates that she promptly threw up when she got home! Since then I've been very diligent to monitor and restrict my children's sugar intake, limiting them to 2 desserts/week. If they forget on their "treat nights" to ask for one (which regularly occurs), then they just miss that day and we wait until the next treat night. With that in mind, I've finally decided I need to be as diligent in my own diet. My husband and I have been enjoying a nightly "treat," most often ice ream, since before we got married 8 years ago. But with the birth of our 3rd child and my struggle to get the last 10 lbs off, he's graciously agreed to limit our treats to the same as the kids...2 times a week, if that. I'm hoping that once I wean myself to only twice a week, then I can cut it down to once a week, and then to only a few special occasions in the future. Because of my sweet tooth, I will search the cupboards to find ANYTHING to eat that is sweet, so now I've learned to keep my chocolate chips in the freezer (I hate frozen chocolate...refuse to eat it, so not a temptation any longer) and just like your healthy change is, I just don't buy bags anymore. I don't need it, the kids don't need it, none of us do. Thanks for all the suggestions on your site...I really enjoy reading each post!

April 18, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterChelsea

I find it hardest around the holidays. Have you ever looked at the shelves in the grocery store and noticed how they just rotate from one holiday to another? The shelves are filled with Christmas candy (like the mint JoJos at Trader Joes) and then Valentines treats (I am a sucker for those red jelly hearts) and then Easter candy (those yummy chocolate filled eggs).

I don't love that my kids equate so many holidays with candy. But because we don't normally have treats/candy on hand, I feel like that's an easy way to make a holiday feel "special".

April 18, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterBrooke Reynolds

A very timely post as I just had chocolate chips and walnuts for my after lunch treat. That combination is so hard to resist. Thank you for the encouragement to help me get my sugar intake under control.

April 18, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterChelsea S.

Even if I try to serve my kids items low in sugar every time I turn around some school activity or birthday party or post soccer game snack or neighborhood mother or cubscout leader is giving my kids cupcakes and juice packs and icees and bags of candy. Can't escape it!

April 18, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterJessica brown

I've started turning to dried fruit when I have a sweet tooth. I dehydrate my own fruit so I know exactly what is on/in them (uh... fruit). Dried Pineapple is absolutely to die for and I'd choose that over anything (Except my dark chocolate.)

April 18, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterCrystal

I gave myself a sugar challenge. I am avoiding all refined sugars, fake sugars, and white flour. I do occasionally use honey, maple syrup, and stevia. I have two cheat days a month. I've been doing this since January and I feel awesome. In fact I don't crave sugar any more. I do crave spinach and other greens though.

April 18, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterTori

I watched the youtube video you recommended, Sugar: The Bitter Truth, by Robert Lustig. It was very enlightening and inspiring. I have been gradually trying to improve my diet over the last few years, and this video may have been the push to do the last hard cleanup: remove sugar. When he revealed the ingredients of the infant formula, and that formula and soda basically have the same sugar content, my heart literally broke.

April 19, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterDenae

I'm a very healthy eater (obsessed with vegetables, only eat whole grains, have never been a soda drinker, very sparing meat consumption) except that I have a problem with dark chocolate. Despite my generally very healthy, fiber-rich and nutrient-dense diet I hover near the top end of my healthy BMI, and occasionally slip over it. I'd be very lean if not for the chocolate. Years ago when my sister was trying to kick her smoking habit I decided to give up chocolate during her quitting period as a show of solidarity and was off it for nine months. I never stopped craving it, sad to say, but I did get to a point where my feelings of superiority (look how self-controlled I am compared to you people!) were more pleasurable than eating chocolate. Ha. Perhaps I can get to that point again, though do I want to exchange a physically unhealthy behavior for a spiritually unhealthy one? :)

April 19, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterMarie

Thanks to all for your insightful and thoughtful comments. I loved Tori's sugar challenge experiment and how avoiding sugar led her to crave spinach and other greens. Also loved Tara for hiking in Big Sur then stopping for refreshments in Carmel. Reminds me what a beautiful world we live in. This brought to mind a 50-mile hike in the Sierras a few years ago. For an extra treat I had taken one large Snickers bar for each evening. The hard hiking however got me to a place where I just wanted healthy food and couldn't bring myself to eat the Snickers. I put one Snickers bar out for the squirrels one night and they wouldn't touch it. We can learn from animals in the wild also. Thanks to all. Skip

April 19, 2013 | Unregistered Commenterskip hellewell

I am constantly battling my sugar addiction. I get things under control and then, bam, life gets stressful, there is a holiday where extra treats are around, there is a special occasion, etc., and before I know it, I am back to eating way too much of the sugary good stuff. Something that helps me a ton are oranges. They really satisfy my sweet tooth and they are are actually fairly low on the glycemic index, so they are wonderful. I also try to use whole food sweeteners - honey, dates, etc. when I can. However, there is nothing like a box of real See's chocolates to remind you that whole foods just doesn't quite taste "right". I imagine it will be a battle all my life. For the most part, I just don't buy candy / treats and I rarely make them either. Because, like you said, it's likely Mom (me) will be the one to eat it.

April 19, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterSabrina

David Ludwig is involved with the sugar issue, he's the author of "Ending the Food Fight" with Suzanne Rostler. Robert Lustig is the physician w/ the You Tube video" Sugar: The Bitter Truth" and the book "Fat Chance: The Bitter Truth About Sugar".
Thank you for this great blog.

May 1, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterSara

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