A Week In

Hey y'all,

Just a super quick check-in today a week after my bold introduction as a sugar-holic. I double checked and yep, seven days later I'm still me and I'm still addicted, but guess what? My name is Shan, I'm a sugar-holic and I have 7 days clean! As my pal Elise says sugar is No Bueno!

This is the most challenging time I have ever had getting off the sweet stuff for as those of you who know me or who have read about my run-ins with "the wagon" know that I often do things my own way. What this has meant in the past was that I always managed to keep the sweet flavors in even when sugar-free for seven months or while doing Dr. Junger's Clean program. Seriously. I was clean apart from that bite or two or bar of Green & Blacks dark chocolate.

So there it is folks, I'm a cheater. I had unwittingly been cheating myself. But why so hard core this time around you may be asking? Well it's a health thing. Both physical and mental. I have exhausted myself around thinking about sugar, which cake to have, how many cookies to indulge in, how many two-bite brownies before I throw up, can I have ice cream with that, oooooo a chocolate bar would be great about now, I need those chocolate covered almonds to go with my coconut milk mocha (which is bloody loaded with sugar by the way). My mind was (and still is) a slave to the crave. I am craving it right this very second but I figured if I wrote about it my fingers would be too busy typing to eat any. Ha, immediately my mind went to voice command;

"You could have a few chocolate chips while you dictate the blog, Shan." 

It's an ongoing nightmare.

I went to the fridge right now and saw a jar of jam and considered taking a spoon to the entire thing and I don't even like jam dammit.

The other reason of course is physical. It's plain bad for our health. Period. I recently watched a great great great documentary called That Sugar Film.

I was shocked to learn that sugar has been added to almost everything we eat, even the stuff that's purportedly healthy for us. And why? Because sugar is a global industry worth over five billion dollars. It's been proven that sugar is the root cause of diseases like fatty liver, heart disease, diabetes just to name a few. But before it even gets that far it screws up your digestion, makes your brain go crazy, makes you moody, foggy, exhausted and fat! This is big tobacco all over again people, and we need to wake up from the sugar coma they've put us in!

When I started blogging I did it because I wanted to track my progress on Tracy Anderson's 30-Day Method. (Don't worry this isn't going to turn into a blog strictly about quitting sugar). I bring it up because Tracy then came out with a program called Metamorphosis that had 4 divisions within it based on body types. You choose the one that's right for you and you're off to the races. I was abcentric, meaning I gain all my weight around my mid-section. (Did I say this was going to be a quick post? I might have lied, but we already know I'm a cheater so...)

As I went through the program including her very strict diet I was able to lose my excess weight, return to my thin physique, but I never really developed a flat tummy and I certainly never got a tapered waist. This is me at the end of the 90 day Meta program after also completing the 30-Day Boot Camp...

Don't get me wrong, I looked and felt the best I'd done in years. I was lean, but I couldn't keep it up. I immediately gained back about half the weight and in fairness I may have been a little below my body's comfort zone, but I gained it all back in my gut.

After watching That Sugar Film and learning about the effects of sugar in the body, basically how it spikes your sugar level, which then triggers Insulin which drops your brain chemicals down below your happy normal levels, which then triggers an adrenal response, prompting you to crave more sweets, which you then have, which then spikes your sugar, prompts Insulin, you get the idea. It goes on and on until your body no longer functions the way it is supposed to and your liver just starts basically pumping out fat. Now that's not the exact science of it, for that you can watch the film. In any case a lot of that fat gets stored around the organs and becomes this abdominal fat that you just can't shake.

Now that I have taken my body off of refined sugars, it thinks that I'm starving it, so it's holding on to all of its glucose stores and sucking as much sugar out of the natural food that I'm feeding it as it can. Eventually (I hope) it will learn that it isn't starving, that it isn't going to have such easy access to sugar and is in fact going to have to work for it, it will start burning off those stores for energy and return to a normal properly functioning human body.

But since I have never not been off sugar for real, as I said when I was sugar free I was still consuming natural sugars like dates or maple syrup, (And while they are okay for you, they still keep that sweet tooth alive and create that trigger response.) now that I really am off it, no sugar in my tea, salad dressing with no added sugar, whole foods high in fat and a little more protein instead of carbs, maybe I will actually allow my body to finally get a bit of balance and work the way it was designed to, as a fat burning machine. Damn that was a long sentence. I've been addicted to sugar and have comforting loving emotions entwined with the sweet stuff going as far back as my memory. I was born loving sugar. 

What I am trying to say is that while I will never ever have an hour glass figure, perhaps I am not really abcentric after all. Can you even imagine?? I'll keep you posted, but in the mean time what I am aiming to do is finally get my sweet tooth to listen to my wisdom tooth!!

This is going to be the first time in my life that I am going to attempt to recalibrate my taste buds away from sweet and who knows where that could potentially lead.

Excuses be gone. Just say no. These are my mottos and as my friend Jenne put it, it's about managing the moments. We only ever have to contend with the current moment and if we can get past this moment's craving, each time we do it will continue to get easier.

Thanks for checking in.

xoxo
Shan