To say that I’ve had a sweet tooth since I was a child is an understatement. I think all 32 (now 28, thanks to the modern-day torture some refer to as wisdom teeth extraction surgery) of them were sweet. Even though I never really ate a lot of candy, I loved anything of the cake-variety. Cupcakes, birthday cake, brownies, Twinkies, you name it… I ate it.
Ice cream was my other love and so much easier to maintain a relationship with because all it required was a trip to the grocery store, no pesky baking. Cookies and cream and chocolate were my favorites growing up but as I got older, my palate expanded to include such wondrous creations as peanut butter buckeye and graham central station (from a certain ice cream chain).
I usually was pretty good in the mornings. I was never a huge fan of the sugary cereals or donuts, except once in a while as a “treat.” But lunch and dinner were a whole other story. As soon as I’d finish eating my main course (or usually before I was even done), my body would start craving something sweet for dessert.
[On a side note, can I just say that part of this must have been due to genetics because my mother would actually stop eating a meal halfway through in a restaurant and take the rest home in a box, JUST so she could have dessert.]
I also loved whenever we celebrated a birthday or anniversary at work and they’d bring in a giant sheet cake for everyone to share. Or when a coworker decided she was going to use all of us in the office as guinea pigs for the new cupcake business she was starting.
I would actually post photos of all the cupcakes I was eating on my Facebook page because they made me so happy. I had found a cupcake shop too that must’ve literally dropped from the heavens because they had flavors like French toast, mojito and chocolate chip cookie dough.
It was a love story that I thought would never end. All of my teeth were miraculously staying in and my jeans still fit, so why stop a good thing?
That was until my health started going downhill in 2011.
It was gradual at first… a pain in my left side appeared, I started feeling very fatigued even when I had barely done anything, my skin started breaking out more and I started having trouble sleeping. This would end up dragging on for over three years, with more symptoms popping up and endless amounts of doctor visits and medications going nowhere.
Thankfully, through a naturopathic doctor and a lot of research on my own, I ended up finding out what was wrong. It was a combination of issues with my adrenal glands, blood sugar, GI tract and hormones and I’m now on the road to recovery. But do you know what I discovered along the way?
My love affair with sugar was doing serious damage to my body.
Sure, you hear “it’ll rot your teeth” from the time you’re a little kid. But no one ever tells you it can damage your liver (which happened to me) and contribute to serious conditions like heart disease, diabetes and even cancer. The studies have been done and the information is all out there, it’s just not being advertised as loudly as the new snack cake on the shelves of the grocery store or the new shake at the drive-thru restaurant.
But I’ll admit, even with me, the real “click” didn’t happen until I had to give up sugar as part of a restricted diet my naturopath put me on. I needed to give my GI tract a “break” so it could start to repair itself. So along with sugar, I was also off of alcohol, caffeine, dairy, gluten, eggs and grains.
What does that leave you ask? Not a lot. But I actually got used to it pretty quickly and realized (again, pretty quickly) that this was what my body was craving… vegetables, low-glycemic fruits and lean meats. Not the so-called “food” I had been putting in it for so long.
I have since put a few of those things back in but I am still sugar-free and you know what? It’s crazy what happens when you give it up, even for a few weeks. My body that used to crave something sweet til the sun went down, stopped. I could eat dinner and not be obsessed with having to have something sugary afterward. And even more significant for me, I stopped shaking 24/7. I used to tell people when they’d comment on my shaky hands, “Oh, that’s just me.” Until I realized I didn’t have to shake if I kept my blood sugar at a normal level!
But the most shocking thing for me was my body’s reaction to sugar when I did try to have it. Shortly after I finished the restricted diet, I met a friend at the Cheesecake Factory for dinner. (Side note for the non-gluten folks – they have a fantastic gluten-free menu there!) I realized they had one gluten-free cheesecake on the menu, a Godiva chocolate cheesecake. This is something that prior to my restricted diet would have sent me straight into the heavens. So I was excited to be able to still have it.
It came… I took about two bites and….
UGH.
I could not stand how sweet it tasted. I literally felt nauseous and had to end up getting the rest boxed to take home to my sister. (Note – I’m not saying Cheesecake Factory’s cheesecake is bad!) That break from sugar had reprogrammed my body and brain and stuff like that no longer tasted good. I didn’t have to fight the urge to indulge because even if I gave in, the results were usually not great.
Plus, I didn’t have to worry about what I was actually doing to my body. It’s easy to walk around being blissfully ignorant, but once you’ve been educated on what sugar can really do to your body, it’s hard to go back.
But the good news is there’s plenty of ways for me to still have something sweet when I feel like it – agave, stevia, xylitol, honey or one of my personal favorites, coconut nectar. I can bake with any of them and have a yummy batch of cookies or brownies or a delicious cake in no time. Sure, there’s a little more work involved, but the time and energy put forth are worth it to know I’m not willingly putting my health at risk.
So do I sigh longingly sometimes when I see the picture of the ooey, gooey new dessert on the restaurant menu? Of course, I’m only human.
Do I wish I could go back and un-program my brain about sugar and continue my love affair?
Not a chance.
