I've known for a long time that I had an addiction to sugar. I thought it was pretty harmless as long as I was exercising and watching my calories. But see... that's the thing. I haven't been exercising (until yesterday), and like any addiction, a substantial dose of sugar makes you want more and more and more! It sends all kinds of warm fuzzy signals to your brain, which make you feel good for a while, until you crash.
There's a lot of newly published research out there about what sugar does to your body and the vicious cycle it causes. The main concern for me is the spike in insulin, especially since I'm labeled by the doctors as "insulin resistant". When insulin goes up, it triggers the urge for more sugar, which causes more insulin, which triggers sugar cravings, which causes more insulin... you get the point.
Insulin also causes fat storage in the belly area. And if you're on a vicious insulin, sugar, insulin, sugar cycle, guess what's getting bigger? Yep! I have been overweight my whole adult life, but never really had a BELLY until the last 2 years. Where the heck did that come from? I thought maybe it just had nowhere else to go, and maybe that's true. But, the things I'm reading about sugar are quite scary because I know that if I don't get it under control, I am fighting a losing battle.
So, instead of counting calories, I'm trying to stick to the recommended max 5 grams of sugar per meal (which doesn't spike insulin). It sounded easy enough to do until I started looking at nutrition information. Do you realize how much sugar is in everything you eat? Not talking about carbs here... just sugar grams. It's going to take a lot of effort and a major mind shift to ween myself off of sugar, but I think if I can do that and keep up the exercise, the results will follow. The hope is that eventually I don't daydream about Sprinkles cupcakes all day long. mmmmmm.... bad!bad!bad!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment