Taking control

I have realized that what I really love about this sugar fast is how aware I have become and how empowered I feel. I have never been interested in strict diets because I hate to feel restricted and deprived. But by only giving up this one thing, I find it easier to give up other junk. I have been a healthy eater for a while, but I have always felt that I barely fall short of where I would really like to be. This past week, I'm exactly where I want to be. Because I so readily pass up the cookie isle at the grocery store, I can more easily pass up the chips (the ones that "only have 6 grams of fat instead of 12"--chips are chips). I was offered cookies by a fellow scrapbooker and 2 rounds of girlscouts today and when I told all of them that I was on a sugar fast, I didn't feel left-out but rather bold and strong. It feels good to say no with confidence to something that is bad for me. Some people have said, "oh you poor thing" or "that really sucks," and it only encourages me more, because I realize that to me it doesn't suck and I don't feel like I'm making a huge sacrifice (plus I bought agave sweetened chocolate ice cream today, so I'm totally saved). It feels like I'm finally doing what my body has always wanted me to do. Give it up for good health!!

Day 2/3

I'm surviving. I'm more than surviving. All these talks of withdrawals seem to be a bit exaggerated. Don't get me wrong, candy and ice cream sound great, but I'm not like dying to have them. I think there are three reasons for this.

1. It's only day 3.
2. As Janette pointed out, I have technically only cut out 10% of my sugar intake (the portion that is attributed to actual sweets such as candy and ice cream.)
3. I understand the benefits of not having sugar, one again, as my expert sister pointed out, and it makes it very easy to feel good about staying away from it.

In any case, I am very pleased with how I feel thus far. I tried this a few months ago, only for a few weeks (holidays hit), and I really did notice a difference. I am thin, but I have always had a tiny little pooch that I couldn't get rid of. All the crunches in the world didn't make a dent. A few weeks off sugar, however, and I dropped those last few pounds and had a really flat stomach. I know this is about health, not weight, but the point is that my body was healthier and thus didn't hang on to excess nastiness.

My next goal will be to remove sugar completely. This will be accomplished by staying a way from processed and artificial foods altogether. It requires planning and spending more money, so as soon as I am settled in my new house and JD in his new job, it will be much more feasible. I can't wait. BBQ sauce, ketchup, dressings, many things have crap. We can learn to identify them by memorizing the crazy names Janette told us about, and really get stricter about our nastiness intake. For now, I feel good about this step to stay away from blatant sugar. One step at a time.

If you are new to the blog, and are debating joining our sugar free mission, DO IT. It doesn't matter if we are a few days into it, you can follow along whenever you are ready and post what day/step you are at as you go. If you have started this quest with us, please let us know how it is going for you!

Newfound Courage

So I was reading an article in a health magazine about sugar, and I am even more thrilled to be rid of sugar. Turns out, not only does sugar suppress your immune system, harm nearly every organ in your body, and make you gain weight, it causes a ton of other terrible things! It causes depression, anxiety (which we both have mo), heart disease, dimensia, and Alzheimers (there is no "T" in that word for those of you who say "altimers." That drives the English major in me crazy! FYI). And here's the big one, accelerated aging! Ah! Who wants that? So this sugar ban is for both our health and beauty. Two things that cannot be sacrificed for a chocolate chip cookie.

So here's the other interesting thing, sweets like candy and pastries alone comprise 10% of our sugar intake. Holy cow! So you could go off dessert and still consume way too much sugar. This is why in the past 20 years, the average person has gone from eating 20lbs of sugar/year to 156 lbs! No wonder Americans are so unhealthy. This is only one of the awful substances in our foods.

Lastly, we have to look for all the words in the ingredients lists that mean sugar. They are mainly: glucose, fructose, dextrose, corn syrup, and cane sugar. The most common artificial sweeteners are: aspartame, saccharin, acesulfame and sucralose. Here's the crazy thing, these 0 calorie substitutes have proved to disrupt the body in such a way that they actually cause weight gain! Along with ADD, hypoglycemia, and cancer. No biggie. Do you know that my gum and mints even have aspertame? Better just get to brushing more times a day!

So there you have it. I am a vessel of knowledge today. And most importantly, I feel much more motivated and excited about kicking the sugar out of my life. Eventually I will have to have some chocolate and birthday cake, but it will be most always with organic sugar or else a very rare treat. My 2 permanent goals for this month plan is that I will get out of the habit of eating sugar and I will get sugar out of my regular foods that I consume all day.

I'm with you sista!

So, breakfast: organic blueberry oatmeal with no sugar. Lunch: herbed chicken and veggies. Snacks: organic apple and peanut butter, sugar free applesauce, cinnamon cottage cheese, and baby bell cheese (hypo-glycemic, I have to snack a lot). I'm feeling great and telling my patients I can get through this just fine. I come home to make my healthy spinach, strawberry and bbq chicken salad; there is sugar in bbq sauce. I decide to make my own--there is sugar in organic ketchup. I throw the not so good concoction away. All my organic salad dressings--sugar. I decide to make my own honey dijon, but I have used all my honey on the wasted bbq sauce. After getting permission from Mo (blame her!) I had a little kc masterpiece bbq on my chicken and some honey mustard dressing. Was I satisfied? Big fat no. As soon as my plate was clear, I went to the pantry without thinking about it and had magical thoughts of chocolate going through my mind. I'm proud to say that I am sitting here sipping my agave-sweetened desert tea and have not touched the chocolate. But my point is, I know how you feel Mo. Day two, and I already feel deprived.

So, here's the plan. First of all, I have realized that most of the sugar addiction is simply a habbit, not always a craving. I eat, I want a sweet. That's been my routine. Even if I'm full and not craving sugar, I have trained myself that I get a small treat after dinner, and I need to break that habbit.

Here is the step I am going to take to help this plan. I am going to gather all the foods in my house that contain sugar and hide them for the month (most of it is organic sugar, so I'm not so sure I want to throw it away just yet). You too Mo. Get it out of sight and out of mind. Tell everyone what you are doing so they will keep the sugar away from you. Brady lives in fresh produce paradise, so she probably doesn't have to avoid it like us. Lucky.

QUESTION: how do we satisfy the chocolate craving?! Even my cocoa roast almonds have aspertame. We have cocoa powder and natural (non-sugar) sweeteners. Any advice?

Day 1 Report

Ok. I am officially sugar free, and have been for 24 hours. Do you know what that means? Let me just tell you. Yesterday was my birthday. No birthday cake, dessert, or sweets for this girl! I know, I know, sounds completely tragic. But surprisingly? It wasn't that bad. In fact, by the time I went to bed, I thought to myself,"Ya know, I just might get through this without withdrawals or anything. I may skip all that stuff and go straight to the point of not craving it anymore."

Lest ye feel I am a complete fool, listen up. I woke up and re-evaluated my hypothesis. The truth is, this is going to suck. I know it. I know it because I really really want to munch on gummies to make this work day go by quicker, and I really really want to go home and eat ice cream while I watch a movie after a long, busy reporter's day.

Alas, I will do neither of these things. Instead, I shall go home, eat my fish and rice (to top off a day of a protein shake and homemade chili) and drown my sorrows in a, er, a bowl of sugar free cereal. There.

Hopefully some of you are not poor, destitute, scrawny grad students like me. Should this be the case, you may drown your ever mounting sorrows associated with the absence of sugar in a bowl of delicious (yet costly) agave sweetened coconut ice cream, as Janette mentioned, found in most grocery stores near you.

No More Self Induced Pain! It's Just Silly!

I believe in being healthy. I believe in eating right. I believe that life is precious, that my body is a temple, that I only get one and that what I eat has a direct result on my health and my quality of life. Knowing all this, I STILL eat ice cream a few times a week. I still scope out jelly beans and peanut butter cups. I still eat eat chocolate when I am sad, and want to chew on Starbursts when I'm bored. If it wasn't for my gluten allergy, I would no doubt fill my eating hours with cookies as well.

I don't feel like I eat sweets more than other foods, nor do I feel that I eat sweets in large amounts. But even so, I have tummy aches a lot, I feel nauseous frequently, and I feel heavy and bloated far to often. I feel tired and blah.

The time has come to stop making excuses, to stop rationalizing that I don't eat sweets to often and to stop acting like, "It's not a big deal, I deserve it." I deserve to be healthy! I deserve to feel refreshed and strong, and so do you!

I have made the decision to remove processed and artificial sugars from my diet. No sugar, no corn syrup, and certainly no artificial sweeteners. I will report back frequently and let you all know what changes I am noticing. I extend the challenge to all of you to do the same. It won't be easy, but we can do it. We must stop eating eating poison, no matter how hard! Janette and I would love to hear what results you are noticing, or not noticing, and we would especially love to share delicious and healthy recipes for those of us who suffer from the sweet tooth.

Sure, there are plenty of other fattening, processed foods that we can do with out, but one step at a time. And this is one BIG step.