Do you try to limit your sugar intake or do you only care about calories?

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  • mumblemagic
    mumblemagic Posts: 1,090 Member
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    snickerscharlie wrote: »
    mumblemagic wrote: »
    snickerscharlie wrote: »
    mdrolle wrote: »
    I found that any liquid sugars contribute to visceral fat rather quickly so I cut those sugars out. Maybe once a week I'll have a mocha, or a cocktail with friends, but that's it. I feel the sugar rush now when I do drink and also found that I don't like the feeling. I do LOVE chocolate though...so I don't keep it in the house :)
    Natural sugars from fruits and such, I don't worry about at all.
    Those artificial sugars, which I'm happy I can't stand, were a no-go for me after reading up on them. I don't feel like i'm missing out on anything or sacrificing at all, just a choice.
    Where did you find that out? Never heard of this.

    You've not heard of it because there's no science behind it. The whole "added sugar is evil" thing is massively blown out of proportion. Added sugar is bad not because it is inherently different to natural sugar, but because it's put in foods that don't need additional sugar to be tasty, such as bread, which adds calories which don't need to be there, and people don't pay attention. If added sugars were bad but fruit sugars ok, diabetics wouldn't need to be careful about fruit sugars, but they do have to be.

    Eating too many calories is what causes over-fatness, visceral or otherwise. Whether those calories come from added sugars or bananas it doesn't matter.

    You're preaching to the choir here. ;)

    I was asking the person I quoted about the rather specific reference he made to liquid sugar being the apparent cause of visceral fat. Because that's a new one in my books.

    Yarp. Do you think the poster means melted sugar or dissolved crystalized sugar? The physical and chemical properties are quite different :smile:
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 27,902 Member
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    Molly_234 wrote: »
    Sugar is in everything! I would like to limit my sugar intake to hopefully stop having bad sugar cravings but it's in everything I enjoy. I love fruit, cereals, yogurt, ice cream and sometimes I have really bad chocolate cravings. How did you kick the sugar habit or did you just accept it and fit these foods in your daily calories?

    I swapped out Sodium and Sugar for Fiber and Iron. I reduced baked goods and increased fruit, which gives me plenty of sweetness for less calories. I find dark chocolate scratches the chocolate itch much better than milk chocolate.

    When I do the following, I don't have cravings:

    1. Get sufficient sleep
    2. Exercise regularly - when I get the happy hormones from exercise, I'm not prone to seeking them from food.
    3. Get sufficient protein in relationship to carbs. I'm not low carb, but reducing carbs and upping protein worked for cravings for me. See also http://www.nutrition.org.uk/healthyliving/fuller/understanding-satiety-feeling-full-after-a-meal.html
    4. Eat moderate amounts of fruit. This makes me less interested in higher calorie sweets.
    5. Take a magnesium supplement. This can be especially helpful for women premenstrually.
    6. Save foods like chocolate for after dinner, in small amounts
    7. Stay hydrated
    8. Have a calorie deficit that is appropriate for the amount of weight I need to lose. An overly aggressive goal can definitely lead to cravings.
    9. Eat at maintenance when my appetite goes up premenstrually.
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 32,170 Member
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    I was going over my MFP sugar goal every day while first losing, when the only added sugar I was eating daily was a bit of concentrated fruit juice in the 30-calorie single tablespoon of all-fruit spread I put in my oatmeal. (And the juice concentrate wasn't even the top ingredient in the spread!) All of the other sugar I was eating was from whole fruit, and (mostly) the sugars in no-sugar-added dairy products.

    Solution: Change my MFP diary display to stop tracking sugar, and track fiber instead. ;)

    I still don't eat lots of added sugar, but don't aggressively avoid it, and don't worry at all about the sugars that are inherent in regular single-ingredient foods.

    This doesn't work for everyone, but I found (a long time back, pre-weight-loss) that making it a point to eat 3 servings of whole fruit every day helped to cut down on cravings for less-nutritious sweet foods like baked goods or candy.

    After I'd been focusing on fruit for a couple of months, it was possible to cut down the number of daily fruit servings if I wanted to. In the longer run, a lot of commercial baked goods and candies, when I sampled them, just tasted overwhelmingly, unpleasantly sweet, and kind of too simple - just sweet, not a complex balance of flavors - and I didn't much enjoy them.

    YMMV, of course.

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