What's So Wrong with Sugar - Part 2

A continuing guest post from Regina. You can read the first part here.


Learn to check and read food labels all the time! Take nothing for granted! Sugars are hidden in everything from soups to nearly all prepackaged foods to breads to veggie dips, to hamburger patties etc. We do not have to eat only refined sugar to be consuming sugar. Sugar is also labeled in other terms. High fructose corn syrup (HFCS), corn syrup, sucrose (table sugar), fructose (fruit sugar), lactose (in milk), maltodextrin, caramel, beet sugar, barley malt, fruit-juice concentrate, and brown sugar (almost the same as white sugar and not any “healthier”) are all different terms for sugar. Sugar is also often the second ingredient listed in products and in some cases (Honey Puffs cereal, Hershey Chocolate Syrup, Baby Rays BBQ etc.) it is the very first ingredient which means that sugar makes up more than anything else in the food.

High fructose corn syrup is one of the worst forms of sugar and is used more than any other sugars since it is so cheap to manufacture. HFCS has replaced regular sugar in nearly all products and studies are know showing how detrimental to our health HFCS is. Our bodies do not know how to use and digest HFCS and it can take up to 3-4 days for our bodies to metabolize what we consumed of HFCS versus a day or so for regular sugar. One study showed that rats who ate HFCS gained significantly more weight than rats who ate basic table sugar. Since HFCS was formulated in 1970, the obesity rate has been considerably on the rise. Another research has shown that HFCS is destructive to the liver (it is so hard for the liver to pass it through) and that a lot of it is laden with high levels of mercury. The problem is, it saves the manufacture’s money and is so easy to mix with foods that it is found in everything we buy. Pancake syrup is mostly high fructose corn syrup, commercially made jams and jellies and ketchup are made with it, and so is drinks, juices, cakes and cookies, marshmallows and breads. A very sad one I just discovered was Hershey’s Chocolate Syrup. HFCS is the first thing listed on the label. A quick note, Karo is nothing but high fructose corn syrup with King Syrup close behind.


Some of you may be thinking, why worry? What is the harm of consuming a cup of sugar a day or 180 pounds a year?

Do a quick Google search and you will get endless sites of research of the effect that sugar has in our bodies. To name just a few, sugar causes excitability, hyperactivity and anxiety in children. It hinders concentration in studying and reduces learning capacity and foggy thinking. Sugar causes headaches, bone, tendon and teeth decay, irritable feelings, mood swings, depression, kidney stones, diabetes, and food allergies. Sugar also is a cause of poor complexions, feeds cancers, yeast and suppresses the immune system.

When our body gets more sugar than it can use (one research said our body can safely handle only about 3-4 tsp. a day ) then it can not metabolize it correctly and an over-acid condition results. So the body pulls calcium, minerals, and enzymes out of its store deep in our body to offset the affects of all the sugar in the system.

Sugar is also very addicting and your body will crave sugar just like a drug addict. If you remove sugar from your diet, you can have withdrawal symptoms, and if you don’t believe me, just try it! Try going without any added sugars for several days. You will find that you crave it, that you will walk around trying to find something to eat with sugar, you will have to about sit on your hands to keep from grabbing jelly beans and stuffing them into your mouth!! You may get shaky and jittery and have a headache just like a person on drug withdrawal. Studies show that sugar is just as habit forming as any narcotic. Refined sugar is called a drug by some because in the refining process everything of food value has been removed except the pure calories. Many experts say that white sugar is extremely harmful, possibly as harmful as a drug in the quantities consumed by Americans today. A very interesting fact: Dr. David Reuben states that sugar is a pure chemical extracted from plant sources, and is purer than cocaine, which it resembles in many ways and shares a close chemical formula.

Another point of interest is that you will find after you haven’t had sugar for a while, and especially after you work it out of your diet for months, when you do introduce it again into your system, you may get flu like symptoms and will feel tired and irritable!

Article continued tomorrow...