“How much sugar is okay?”

This is a great question from one of the members of my private Facebook Wellness Tribe.

Sugar. The much debated, highly beloved, and widely feared sugar.

 

Is there sweet spot for sugar consumption?

How much sugar should we really be consuming? Some would say none. While others like the sugar industry, not surprisingly, advocate for up to 25% of calories from sugar per day.

What’s an okay amount for one person may not be the right amount for another person. You’ll always have to consider what works for you personally, what you’re consuming on the whole, whether or not you have candida or are struggling with addiction, cancer or other chronic disease.

The plain truth is that sugar is addictive. As addictive, if not more so, than heroin.

 

Do we need sugar?

In a way, yes.

Glucose is our body’s 1st source of energy. Your brain runs on glucose. So yes, we do need naturally occurring sugars in our diet in the form of carbohydrates and fiber like those found in potatoes, carrots, beets, milk, honey and fruit. But what we don’t need to live is added sugar. Honestly, nature has provided ample sources of beautifully delicious sweet tastes for us to get our fix.

Fruit like dates, bananas, mangos, apples, berries, peaches, pears and more are nature’s desserts. If you’re not on a candida cleansing diet, I recommend these in limited amounts.

 

What happens when you eat sugar?

All sugar, even natural sugars, raise your blood sugar levels.

Even so-called healthy foods that don’t appear to be “sugary” can spike your blood sugar levels. These foods have, what is known as, a high gylcemic index. When your liver senses high glycemic foods, it produces insulin (a hormone) to help your body metabolize sugar. Since glucose (sugar) is your body’s 1st source of energy, the body says “Yay! More energy. If we can’t use this right now – let’s store it.”

Where?

“Let’s create a fat cell and store it there for later use.” The trouble is we most likely never end up using that stored energy. We repeat the process over and over again and before you know it, there is unwanted fat being stored near our organs and in our extremities.

Foods like beans, beats, apples, sweet potatoes, other root veggies, most fruits, whole grains, maple syrup, honey of any kind, cane sugar, and any kind of sugar will spike your blood sugar levels causing your liver to create insulin.

Why?

Because carbohydrates convert to glucose immediately in the blood stream. That’s a good thing. We’re designed that way for a reason. The beauty of whole foods (even ones that spike your blood sugar) are that they come in a complex package with other nutrients like fiber, minerals, protein, vitamins, phytochemicals, antioxidants, and more. So eat them whole, not in their extracted forms. That’s what we were designed to handle.

What we’re not designed for is consuming huge amounts of added and processed sugars.

 

What to do moving forward?

The key is to avoid all processed and all added sugars (even if they’re organic and natural). Especially avoid white and refined sugar, artificial sugars like high fructose corn syrup and aspartame. This means granulated sugars or sugar syrups like cane syrup.

One teaspoon of granulated sugar equals 4 grams of sugar. To put it another way, 16 grams of sugar in a product is equal to about 4 teaspoons of granulated sugar. Your best bet is to be mindful of how many grams or teaspoons of added sugar you are consuming.

Try to consume fruits on an empty stomach and not combined with anything else other than leafy greens (like in a smoothie).

Before you go balls to the wall cutting sugar out of your diet, try first noticing how much you’re consuming. Then begin to “add in” naturally occurring sugars in the form of fruit to “crowd out” the processed forms of sugar like soda or refined white sugar.

Give yourself grace, get hugs and kisses and plenty of fun.

I could go on further about how to end the sugar crazy cycle. This is something I work with my clients on – helping them break the cycle and addiction to sugar. Let me know if I can help more!

Are you trapped in a sugar crazy cycle? How do you feel when you eat sugar?