Sugar in your food: Almost everything has some form of sugar and we as a society seem to never get enough. First off, let’s bring to light what sugar can do to your body. This sweet substance can bring on a slew of health problems, a few of which are major issues common among those who like to overindulge. The big two would be diabetes and obesity. In truth sugar can definitely make things seem to taste drastically better but there is a toll for it in the long term.
Obesity is rapidly becoming more common among the populace. From a young age children are exposed to sugar as this holy treat full of goodness. I’m sure most people at the time were thinking, “I wish I could eat [insert disgustingly high sugar content item here] for the rest of my life!”. You used to get extremely excited whenever your parents or someone asked if you want a treat or to go down to the store because you know you’re about to leap onto a cloud full of angelic awesomeness. Then you grow a bit older and maybe you started getting a bad case of acne. From there it can just snowball into a mound of unwanted effects or conditions. Everyone is different but no one is invincible to the effects of sugar.
The problem is that instead of treating sugar like, well a “treat”; We instead ingest it all day everyday like it’s common place and normal to do so. Dr. Robert Lustig, author of the book Fat Chance: The Bitter Truth About Sugar claims that 75% – 80% of all obesity stems from insulin which is created from sugar intake. In a previous blog post on Why You Shouldn’t Neglect H2O I wrote about how a consistent diet of soft drinks is absolutely awful for you. Your body can handle some sugar spurts but when it is routinely consumed that’s a completely different story.
Now some of these are surprising and some are not. Something to keep in mind is that even when you think you are eating something “healthy” it very well might be packed with extra sugar. It’s smart to check the nutrition facts or even the ingredients on the back of the packaging yourself. You might be surprised to see some things like dried fruits and sugar listed as the first ingredient instead of fruit!
Sugar/sweeteners (Stop or loosen up on adding this to everything!)
Soft drinks
Dried fruit (look for unsweetened instead)
Flavoured yogurt
Cereal
Flavoured oatmeal
Spaghetti
Fruit juice
Sweetened iced tea
Sports drinks
Salad dressing
Ketchup (along with many other sauces)
Low fat/fat free sweets
Energy bars
Granola
Fruit smoothies
Frozen tv dinners
Canned baked beans
Jam/jelly/spreads
Apple sauce
Sugar is a Drug: Drugs alter your mind, are addictive and usually toxic. So is sugar! Imagine if a food company laced your meals with morphine so that you’d buy more? The public would go nuts. So they use sugar to get people hooked. Most of the items commonly consumed that are clearly treats also don’t offer any nutritional value. This is a massive concern especially when it comes to kids. The worst thing you can do is have your kids hooked early. It’s extremely easy to eat sugary foods and gain weight but it’s quite the opposite trying to lose the sugar and weight.
Here is the 13 side effects of sugar intake:
Obesity
Diabetes
Heart failure/disease
Cancer
High blood pressure
Restrain the immune system
Poor memory
Acne
Tooth decay
Learning disorders
Depression
Headaches and migraines
Yeast infection
You may need to: Reduce, limit or avoid as much sugar as possible. A lot of foods even thought to be healthy already have sugars. Fruits in particular are a huge source of sugar. Teach the world that sugar is a treat and not an everyday pleasure. Check out the nutrition facts and ingredients on the back of consumables to make sure sugar isn’t the first and highest rated item. Oh and do yourself a favour and replace most your beverage choices with water!
As always, stay safe and healthy !
bird
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