Day 4: Dangers of Sugar II
Tuesday, September 10, 2013
8:00 am
I discuss a relatively recent second theory on the dangers of refined sugar and high fructose corn syrup: both contain fructose which is toxic to the body and readily converted into fat.
Video Summary:
Today I have 13 1/2 tsp or 54 grams of sugar, still about equivalent to one large energy drink. Drinks are still really sweet. I’m getting into a rhythm with the program: the bottle lasts all day and I just take sips throughout the day ,and each sip is like eating a piece of candy. Whenever I have a sugar craving I just take a sip of the drink. I leave a little bit left at the end of the day as dessert after dinner. I’m supplementing the drinks with fruit if I have additional sugar cravings. Later in the program, when I hit the recommended daily intake of sugar – which is 9 tsp. – I’ll definitely be supplementing with fruit. I don’t want to cut out sugar entirely, I just want to cut out added refined sugar.
I think my sleep is getting a bit better. I think also that I’m consuming less sugar on this program than I was before. Its hard to know how much sugar I was drinking before I started this program, but probably a lot. I think since I have an urge for a sugar hit in the morning I am consuming less than I’m used to.
Yesterday I talked about the three main food groups: fats, carbohydrates and proteins and I focused in on carbohydrates ,and within that group I focussed on the tiny sliver that is refined sugars. It seems that that is what many are now saying is the danger area. Also I just want to lose weight. I weigh about 200 pounds and I want to lose 20 pounds to get down to 180, which I haven’t weighed in 20 years or more.
I talked yesterday about how refined carbohydrates get quickly converted into glucose, which is the food of the body. This glucose gets into the bloodstream and insulin is produced to allow the glucose to get into the cells of the body. You end up with blood sugar and insulin spikes all day. Theoretically this is not good for your body since it can lead to type II diabetes and metabolic syndrome. In particular these spikes contribute to increased fat, which is a precursor to metabolic syndrome and diabetes.
This has been known for quite a while, but now there is a second theory that has been introduced in the last four years by a guy named Robert Lustig from California. He has a long and technical speech on YouTube that has over 3 million hits, which is pretty good for an academic speech. He may be on to something and he has been featured on Sixty Minutes. His theory goes beyond the idea of blood sugar spikes. He points out that sucrose and high fructose corn syrup contain “fructose.” His whole thesis is that fructose is a poison and is toxic to the body. The reason is that fructose is not metabolized by the body the same way that glucose is.
(BTW, fructose is a natural sugar found in fruits, and my initial thought was that that is about as natural as you can get, so how can fructose be bad? But I’ll get back to that later.)
One problem with fructose is that the body does not respond by producing insulin as it does with glucose and your body doesn’t register that it is full, causing you to continue feeling hungry and to coninue eating. Secondarily, the fructose doesn’t enter the cells as glucose does, but immediately heads to the liver and gets stored as fat. In other words fructose equals fat, almost directly.
I will get more into this theory in later videos. I just wanted to say there are now at least two theories on why sugar is bad for your. The first is that it spikes your blood sugar, and the second is that it contains fructose which is toxic to the body. This second theory is relatively recent so it will take time to tell if its true or not, but either way I want to quit sugar. I think there is plenty of evidence that it is bad for you.