Poisoned By Sugar

The 11 items in my kitchen that contain sugar. More about this on a later post.

I've been saying that sugar is poison for years. I knew it to be true but I couldn't explain why except that sugar is known to be empty calories. I'd read Pure, White and Deadly and also Fast Food Nation but I didn't retain enough facts to be able to make the argument. And despite knowing that it was true, it's ever so hard to give up on sugar completely.

Then I had some routine blood tests done and some of the results were shocking. I've always been healthy if, at times, overweight. This was a big wake-up call especially as the 'at times overweight' has slipped into obesity over the past couple of years.

As you know from reading this blog, I've tried everything in a quest to eat a healthy diet. For me it was never just about losing weight (except when I was desperate), it was was always about finding the healthiest diet to ward of disease, to keep from becoming an old woman before my time, to be able to get the most out of life, etc... Of course this also includes not being fat.

My 'wake-up' call was actually frightening, all the more so because my father died this year from multiple complications of type two diabetes, which isn't a disease in itself but rather a collection of symptoms including insulin resistance and any number of the following: non-alcoholic fatty liver, fatigue, obesity, pressure on the heart and kidneys, circulation problems leading to leg ulcers and amputation, skin problems, loss of eyesight, and possibly alzheimer's disease.

I started googling about healthy diets for prediabetics. Folks, it's all about the sugar - even the sugar in carbohydrates such as bread and pasta. Ok, we knew this already. But did you know the extent of the sugar in your food? And do you know what it's doing to you?

I love this entertaining talk about Our Year of No Sugar by Eve Schaub. I'm giving you the link rather than embedding the video because it's more reliable in the long term. Please watch it, it will make you think about how you feed your family.

I was then all fired up against the food industry and thought that surely, after all these years of being told about it, someone must be fighting it. I found Dr Robert Lustig on You Tube who is waging a similar war to the anti-tobacco wars. The two are remarkably similar in many ways. Please watch Dr Lustig here, it's shocking.

And finally I found Dr Jason Fung, an expert in obesity and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease and type two diabetes. I wanted a real doctor, not a health guru with something to sell. And I wanted information that applies to everyone, not a specific diet. I love it that he tells you how you can reverse type two and that the drugs are not the answer.  This is also for anyone who doesn't want to be fat or unhealthy in the first place. (Warning: this is the first in a series of six videos.)

If you care enough about this issue and you take the time to watch all eight hours of video that I've given you, you will be well informed. What you do after that is up to you.