As you may have guessed, not all sugar is created equal. We have our stripped sugar, and then several different natural alternatives. Then, of course, we have the sugars in fruit, vegetables etc.
Added sugar is the most detrimental kind of variety. This is easily found in many shelf products, adding flavour to your food. You will notice a huge difference in taste when comparing a natural to a human-made substance. The scary thing is, most people don’t read labels very well, and maybe consuming more sugar than what’s needed. This leads to unnecessary fat storage, weight gain and also your susceptibility to develop disease increases.
I want to share my journey towards quitting sugar. About 7 years ago, I embarked on my most challenging and rewarding journey. That pathway involved preparing for bodybuilding shows. This meant I had to look a certain way, and I loved the gradual progression towards getting the best physique that I could have. I wanted to know how much I could push myself and how far I could control my mind when it came to all the mental and emotional challenges of dieting and exercise. One of the biggest achievements through the training and nutrition programs was to cut out refined carbs and sugars. I believed at the time, cutting my most loved carbs would be the hardest thing. In fact, that was easy compared to cutting sugar!
My strategy was to eliminate it slowly, not to cause any aggressive craving. That seemed to work fine initially, but you do get to a certain stage when the cravings take control, and you start dreaming of eating things with sugar. I remember being at a dessert bar (bad idea when dieting), and having my cheat meal, staring at the chocolate fountain. I found myself uttering these words to my family “guys; I can now picture myself swimming in that chocolate with my mouth open.” Although I was visualising junk good binges, I can laugh about it now as I realise just how stupid the whole situation was. This is one of the main reasons why I decided not to pursue it professionally. Although I’m an athlete, the food and lifestyle restrictions didn’t sit well with me.
As hard as cutting out sugar was, I did find that it was the key to my weight loss. But I’m assuming that as a former sugar addict, this rapid weight loss would happen to…
