Does Your Sugar Intake Control You or Do You Control It?

Want to protect against aging and minimize your risks for disease, including cancer, GET OFF THE SUGAR WAGON!

You must break the addition of sugar cravings because the high consumption of sugar is taking a devastating toll on your health. 

• In 1700, the average person consumed about 4 pounds of sugar per year.

• In 1800, the average person consumed about 18 pounds of sugar per year.

• In 1900, individual consumption had risen to 90 pounds of sugar per year.

• In 2012, more than 50% of all Americans consumed 1/2 pound of sugar per day — translating to a whopping 180 pounds of sugar per year!

In 1890, only 3 people out of 100,000 had diabetes. In 2012, almost 8,000 out of every 100,000 people were diagnosed with diabetes (and this number is rising all the time)!

More Addictive than Cocaine

I know this personally all too well because up until age 37 my drug of choice was SUGAR!

Excess intake of ALL processed sugars results in four key things:

1. Compromised immune function, decreasing the white blood cells’ ability to destroy bacteria)

2. Obesity

3. Diabetes

4. Rob your youth because it ages and wrinkles you faster

And if that’s not enough, keep in mind that sugar is HIGHLY addictive! That’s right! Dr. Serge Ahmed of Bordeaux, France, has been working with rats and giving them the choice between cocaine and sugar. Guess which one wins, time and again?

That’s right… sugar!

It turns out that the sweet taste of sugar is more rewarding than the high of cocaine because sugar produces dopamine − a happy, feel-good chemical − in the brain.

When addicted to eating sugar, you feel “normal” when you have it, but undergo “withdrawal” if don’t.

When you break the sugar habit, your taste change, and your brain will begin to produce dopamine on its own, but the discomfort of the withdrawal process keeps many “sugar addicts” trapped in their addiction.

So let me ask you this question: since sugar is cancer’s favorite food and increases the risk of obesity, diabetes, and compromises your immune system, does it take getting that dreaded call from your doctor that you have been diagnosed with cancer before your take action? Or, is it time to take action and break up with sugar now and regain your health?

Ending the Sugar Confusion

It’s easy to become confused by the various sugars and sweeteners, so here is a basic overview:

• Saccharide = sugar

• Glucose (aka “dextrose” or “grape sugar”), galactose (“milk sugar”), and fructose (“fruit sugar”) are all “monosaccharides” (i.e. single sugar molecules), known as “simple sugars.” The primary difference between them is the way your body metabolizes them.

1. Glucose is a form of energy you were designed to run on. Every cell in your body uses glucose for energy.

2. High amounts of fructose are very damaging to the body if it isn’t burned immediately for energy because it travels directly to the liver where it’s converted to triglycerides (fats). Excess triglycerides increase insulin resistance (and insulin production), thus contributing to diabetes in a “back door” fashion.

3. The simple sugars can combine to form more complex sugars, like sucrose (“table sugar”) which is a “disaccharide” comprised of 50% glucose and 50% fructose.

• “Refined” white sugar (pure sucrose) is washed with a syrup solution, then with hot water, clarified (usually chemically) to remove impurities, decolorized, concentrated, evaporated, re-boiled until crystals form, centrifuged again to separate, then dried. By this point, any remnants of “natural goodness” and “nutritional value” have completely disappeared! Quite frankly, white sugar should be considered an “industrial product” rather than “food.”

• “Brown sugar” is white sugar mixed with molasses.

• “Raw” sugar is not really raw. It has been cooked, and most of the minerals and vitamins are gone. But it’s probably a little better than refined white sugar because it has a little of the molasses remaining.

• Aspartame or AminoSweet is a neurotoxic rat poison… need I say more?

• Splenda (sucralose) is NOT a sugar, despite its deceptive marketing slogan, “made from sugar.” It’s a chlorinated artificial sweetener in line with aspartame.

• Honey is approximately 50% fructose, but in natural (raw and unpasteurized) form contains many health benefits. Buying honey that is local and unpasteurized is best.

• Stevia is an extremely sweet herb derived from the leaf of the South American stevia plant, which is completely safe (in its natural form). Green stevia is the whole plant, while white stevia is processed and can often contain other ingredients like natural flavors or dextrose − a form of sugar. 100% organic green stevia in its natural state is what you want.

• Agave nectar is made from the agave plant, which is a cactus. Sounds natural, right? Like maple syrup from a tree, or honey from a beehive. Only it isn’t. Agave is HIGHLY processed while the end-product does not even remotely resemble the original agave plant. Furthermore, agave is approximately 80% fructose (much higher than honey and maple syrup).

• HFCS (high fructose corn syrup) is 55% fructose and 45% glucose. It is mostly genetically modified. Stay away!

• Rapadura is the pure juice extracted from the sugar cane (using a press), which is then evaporated over low heat, whilst being stirred with paddles, then sieve ground to produce a grainy sugar. It has not been cooked at high heats or spun to change it into crystals, and the molasses is maintained in the sugar. “Sucanat” is the USA trade name for Rapadura.

• Coconut sugar is made from the sweet watery sap that drips from the cut flower buds of the coconut palm. It has a low glycemic index (GI) and is rich in amino acids. It is typically less than 10% fructose, with sucrose being the primary component.

• Xylitol is a sweetener known as a “sugar alcohol” (or polyol). Sugar alcohols are neither sugars nor alcohols − they are carbohydrates (with structures that happen to resemble sugar and alcohol). Xylitol is extracted from corn or birch cellulose. Unlike sugar, Xylitol is slowly absorbed, does not cause a rapid blood sugar increase, and does not require an immediate insulin response from the body to be metabolized. Moreover,  many studies have shown that it actually helps prevent dental cavities, ear infections, and some evidence suggests that it helps prevent gum disease because Xylitol is anti-bacterial. However, Xylitol does have some potential health side effects (most notably gastrointestinal issues) and should be used with caution.

Excerpts taken from Sugar and Cancer article by Ty Bolinger

Best Choices for Sweeteners: 

Once you break up with sugar, sugary foods will taste way too sweet, and you won’t want to eat them – this is been my experience. But to break up with sugar or change any habit it first begins with a change in mindset, which is another topic on its own.

Best sweeteners to use: Date paste, dates, fruit, date or coconut sugar, stevia, pure maple syrup, blackstrap molasses, or raw honey.

David Cooley
Certified Health Consultant
Author

David spent over 27 years in the mortgage/real estate business. But 33 years ago, God re-directed his life and placed in him a passion for natural health and prevention of disease. Today, David is a certified health consultant, and for the last 33 years has lived a natural food lifestyle and discovered simple, key components for living a lifestyle of health and vitality. One of the early things David realized is that disease was NOT the result of a drug deficiency. And that everything we think, say, and consume or are exposed to in some manner or another either supports our cellular structures or causes them to age faster and breakdown.  

David believes there is nothing more important than to live within God’s blueprint for one’s life. Each of us has been given specific gifts, talents, and purpose that are to be lived out on a foundation of faith in Him and His Word.

“It saddens me to see people suffering, frustrated, or discouraged with life … and fall into the rut of living, unable to reach their full potential: spiritually, emotionally, physically, and financially. I think it’s also a travesty in this country people that are not educated in personal health care, nor in how to protect their privacy, assets, and often liberties. God has designed us to live amazing lives, and sometimes it just helps to find someone who will come alongside and provide the hope and direction needed at that moment. It’s about bringing together your personal and business aspirations into a balanced vision for your life, aligned with His Word.“

“Bottom line, what balance do you need to bring to your life, what type of life do you desire to create that enables you to be all you can be and live a life with no regret – a life that produces a faithful servant?”

To learn more about David, go to Image What Could Be.

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