Okay, well, it has now been almost three days without sugar. I haven't had any real cravings for candy or treats or anything, which is really surprising. I have had a few inquiries, though, about just how serious this sugar free thing is going to be. To answer that question, I have devised a set of rules I will be using to track my progress. As you will see, it will be very serious indeed!
1. No refined sugar. This means no sugar and no corn syrup (yikes!). It also means no cookies, cakes, pies, or about a million other things. Yes, that is right, if the item has ANY sugar whatsoever, I will not be eating it. Yesterday, I discovered that I will either be eating very dry tuna fish sandwiches, or I will need to learn to make my own mayonnaise, because the mayo we buy (the "healthy" kind with olive oil) has sugar added. My poor wife, who has been on a homemade bread kick, is also going to have to adjust her recipe, since the bread she makes has sugar in it too.
2. No artificial sweeteners or sugar substitutes. This means no NutraSweet, no Splenda, no xylitol, no stevia, etc., etc., etc.. Yes, like you, my first thought was: Hey, no sugar? No problem, I'll just hit the diabetic candy aisle at the store and pick up some Tab on the way out (no artificial sweeteners sadly includes saccharine). The idea behind the no sugar thing is to change how I perceive myself and how I can be happy. That means that I can't sit around eating sweet things and trick myself into believing I am healthy and losing the "sugar bug." The idea is that I am getting rid of all the sweetness in my life!
3. No raw sugars. This includes honey and raw cane sugar. I admit, this one is a little harder to justify. These sugars aren't quite as bad for you, but they still have sweetness and arguably, they don't have much nutritional benefit either. Of course, there are honey nuts out there. In trying to figure out if there was nutritional value in honey, I found a website called the Benefits of Honey. As I figured, the website touted various benefits of honey, from its good taste to its ability to cure: low energy, immune system issues, cancer, cuts, burns, yeast infections, athletes foot, arthritis, hangovers, sore throats, and about fifty other things. It also helps with weight loss (go figure, I find this out two days after I give it up) and one cup of it only has about 1000 calories. By the way, if you want some honey, the Benefits of Honey website sells honey (again, go figure) for between $16 and $150, depending on the grade and amount you want. The bottom line is that honey is sweet, and knowing myself, after about two weeks, I will turn into Winnie the Pooh dunking my entire fist into buckets of honey just to get a little sugar in me.
4. Two fruits a day and a moderate amount of carbohydrates. I thought about banning fruit, but I figured that these natural sugars do come with some nutritional benefits, including necessary vitamins. So, fruits are in! Also, while we are on the topic, I should make clear that this is not a zero-carb diet. I do still intend to drink my milk and eat things like yogurt. Milk products usually have a bit of natural sugar in them, and I will continue to eat them as well. The idea is that I will not be eating anything with sugar added to it through some man-made process or activity. If I can pull it off a tree and pop it into my mouth, it is good.
5. The one exception: dietary supplements. Okay, when I say dietary supplements, I really only mean in one context. I have developed this ridiculous (meaning pretty much not-scientifically-proven) belief that drinking down one packet of Emergen-C every day will keep me from getting sick. I haven't been sick since I started drinking the stuff (knock on wood). Nevertheless, it has a minute amount of fructose (fruit sugar) in it, and I refuse to give it up--at least, I refuse to give it up until I get sick. So, while I will not be eating any sugar, I will continue to drink my daily dose of "dietary supplement" (that is what Emergen-C calls itself). Since the stuff is more sour than it is sweet anyway, and uses sugars from fruit, I figure I am okay drinking 4 ounces of it each morning.
Well, those are the rules. Let's see how things work!
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