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Get Rid Of Sugar-Get Rid Of Fat!

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GET RID OF SUGAR!

Last night while watching “A Current Affair” I watched a story on how making one little change to your diet, could make a huge difference in terms of weight loss.  What was that change?  Removing sugar from your diet.  I have subscribed to this philosophy for years and have been preaching it as part of my CANDS message.  CANDS is an acronym for Caffeine, Alcohol, Nicotine, Drugs and Sugar.  So it seems like a timely reminder that I explain my view point on the dangers of sugar for you now.

So, what is sugar?

Taken straight out of Wikipedia, sugar is an informal term for a class of edible crystalline substances, mainly sucrose, lactose, and fructose characterized by a sweet flavour. In food, sugar almost exclusively refers to sucrose, which primarily comes from sugar cane and sugar beet.

Other sugars are used in industrial food preparation, but are usually known by more specific names—glucose, fructose or fruit sugar, high fructose corn syrup, etc.

The glycemic index or GI is a measure of the effects of carbohydrates on blood sugar levels. Carbohydrates that break down quickly during digestion and release glucose rapidly into the bloodstream have a high GI; whereas carbohydrates that break down more slowly, releasing glucose more gradually into the bloodstream, have a low GI.

The concept was developed by Dr. David J. Jenkins and colleagues in 1980–1981 at the University of Toronto into their research to find out which foods were best for people with diabetes.  The index uses pure glucose as a baseline and has a GI ranking of 100 with all other foods measured in comparison to it.  If you want to know more about the GI index, then please check out my previous article titled, “The GI Conundrum”

Why is sugar the weight loss enemy?

If you think about it for a moment, any food we put into our mouth has two main functions, to provide us with energy to function and to provide us with nutrients to repair, recover and recuperate.

However, as we already know, not all foods are created equal and not all calories are created equal.  Some calories are worth more than others.  What do I mean?

Let me ask you this.  If you had the choice between eating 100 calories of pure unadulterated energy (with no actual substance) or 100 calories containing vital nutrients, vitamins and minerals, which would you prefer?

If you were running a marathon and desperately needed energy, then obviously, option one is a go’er.  However, most of us on a daily basis aren’t running marathons, so option two is most definitely the wiser choice.

And this is why sugar has become our enemy in the weight loss industry. It provides lots of energy, with no other substance.  However, I’m not a great fan of using the term “good or bad”.  I’m a believer that there is no such thing as good or bad.  In the words of Sesame Street character Elmo, there are only “sometimes foods” and sugar in my opinion, is a sometimes food.

The other reason why sugar has become such an enemy of the weight loss industry is because of the sheer quantities that we as a nation are eating.  150 years ago, we were eating approximately 1 – 1.5 kgs of fructose per person per year.  That figure has now ballooned out to 30-35 kgs per person per year, so it’s no wonder that we are getting fatter as a nation.




SO, where is the sugar in our diets?

You’d be surprised, shocked even to realize that sugar or one of the other forms of sweetener has found its way, through cunning marketing techniques, and in some instances, downright dirty tactics, into virtually almost every single packaged food and drink item that you buy every day at your local supermarket, and you didn’t even know it.  One of the services that I provide as part of my personal training business is to take my clients to supermarkets and teach them how to shop and more importantly read labels.  Luckily in Australia, food manufacturers are required by law to show how much sugar is contained within their products, so it makes for a simple exercise to see exactly how much you are eating.  Here are a couple of examples:

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The label on the left is a brand of wheat biscuits, the label on the right is another breakfast cereal called “Sultana Flakes”.  As you can clearly see, 21.9 grams of every 100 grams of Sultana Flakes is SUGAR, whereas, only 2.7grams of every 100 grams of wheat biscuits is sugar.  Do you want to know how many teaspoons of sugar it takes to weigh 21.9 grams?

Where else is the sugar in our diet?  Over the last 30 or so years, we have been bombarded with the “FAT FREE” message.  99% fat free, low fat, bla bla bla.  We are getting fat as a nation, not because we eat too much fat, but because we are eating too much sugar.  So, next time you go shopping, check the sugar content of your typical low fat, 99% fat free products.

OK, so now we know where it is, what to do about it?

Once you’ve discovered where the sugar is in your diet, it’s time to slowly remove it.  Like most addictive things and yes sugar is addictive, you will experience withdrawals, however, these will subside over a week to 10 days.  Here are my top five tips for removing sugar from your diet.

Read your labels: Once you’ve done a typical shop, get your groceries home and sit down and read the labels.  This is the first step in learning where your sugar is.  Make written notes of the sugar contents of your grocery items and learn them.

Find a suitable replacement: Once you’ve decided which items you want to cut out of your diet regime, its time to come up with a suitable replacement.  For example, I have replaced coffee (because I have sugar in coffee) with tea (because I don’t have sugar in tea).  If you like breakfast cereals, (most cereals contain loads of sugar) find one that doesn’t have as much sugar as your current cereal.  The wheat biscuit example only has 2.7 grams per 100 as opposed to Sultana Flakes which has 21.9 grams per 100.

Make the changes over time: Don’t go all out for completely cutting every sugary food item from your grocery list.  Choose just a few items per week and then slowly introduce sugarless replacements slowly.

Artificial Sweeteners are just as bad: If you are considering replacing sugar with one of the many artificial sweeteners, think again.  They tell your taste buds that nutrients have arrived.    However, when it hits the walls of the small intestine, another message is sent to the brain saying, “We’ve been tricked, no nutrients here, keep eating, we need nutrients to digest this FAKE FOOD”.  And that is another reason why we are getting fat.  We are eating more.

There are some natural sugar alternatives: Unprocessed and unfiltered honey (the ones with chunks of bees wax and you can’t see through it) when used in moderation is supportive of good health.  Stevia is a herb and is 1000 times sweeter than sugar and is also ideal for coming off sugar sweets or caffeinated drinks.  In season fruit can be used as a natural sweetener.  Yes it has fructose, but if you eat the whole fruit (and not just the juice) you also get the vitamin, minerals, nutrients and fibre.  Below ground vegetables such as sweet potato, shredded carrots or beets are quite sweet and can be used as a sugar replacement.

So, there you go, my take on sugar.  You don’t have to go completely without, just find a replacement that best suits you.

A Shopping Printable is coming soon.

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