I have a sweet tooth. A majorly sweet tooth.
Over the past couple months, I've had a few too many cheat days, and I can feel it: after a cheat day, when I want to go do something even a little bit strenuous, the sugar inside me makes itself known. Here's what it feels like: when I'm walking up a hill and breathing hard, there's a sensation like a skeletal hand slowly placing itself around my heart and squeezing. It's an ugly sensation that feels like a distant precursor to a heart attack, and it's amazing how I can behave myself for weeks on end, then fall off the wagon (by having a cheat day), and be right back at that skeletal-hand stage. It doesn't take long to de-train, and it doesn't take long for your body to revert to its old ways when it comes to sugar.
In my conscious mind, I know sugar is a poison. Staying away from it is nonetheless difficult because, I have to admit, I'm an addict. I have this dependency, this craving, and it's hard to shake. I can buckle down for weeks, but the cravings always return. Ideally, I ought to be able to wean myself off sugar, but realistically, this is a battle I'm going to be engaged in until I die.
5 comments:
I'm also an addict, although I can't say I've felt the physical impacts you describe. For me, my love of alcohol empowers my sweet tooth by removing my will to resist cravings.
Example: I came home the other night after a few drinks and wanted a snack. Grabbed the half-gallon container of rocky road ice cream out of the freezer (it was about 3/4 full) and a spoon and started eating out of the box. I didn't stop until it was gone. Oops!
Now, in my mind, I'm wondering how that influx of bad calories works. I bought the ice cream expecting it to last a week. If I eat it in one setting, I'm not getting any more sugar carbs than I would if I had spaced it out over several days, right? That's what I'm trying to tell myself anyway.
If you reckon your calories on a per-week basis, and you don't buy yourself any more ice cream that week, then you're probably OK for your weekly calorie goals. It’s the "no more ice cream this week" part that's hard, though.
Yeah, I can't say that I am familiar with the skeletal hand, either. What a terrifying way of putting it.
I don't necessarily keep a tab on sugars, but I do try to avoid simple carbohydrates and hyper-processed foods when I can. I could probably be a bit stricter, though.
I don’t think cheat days really work.. better to embrace a diet change and cut the sugar. It is very hard to do but, well worth it.
Brandon,
Interesting point, but I don't think dietary absolutism works, either, because it's just not sustainable. People go crazy when they're eternally following the discipline as if they were monks. Ideally, I do only two cheat days per month (I did fall off the wagon recently), but I may switch to a recommendation I've often heard, which is to do cheat meals instead of entire cheat days, maybe following the OMAD format, i.e., One Meal A Day. This means eating everything you're going to eat for that meal within an hour; OMAD is essentially 23:1 intermittent fasting. That actually feels plausible to me, and it would minimize the ruin of a regular cheat day.
As for "cut the sugar," well, no disagreement here. I've generally cut out a lot of the sugar I used to consume. Have you followed my history since last year, when I had my stroke? If you're a newbie to this blog, you've got some catch-up reading to do. Start here.
Post a Comment