Too much sugar?!?

jannapurna

Hello everyone.
I've been tracking my diet, eating well and exercising daily. I feel healthier, and I've noticed a tiny difference in how my clothes look, but that damn scale hasn't budged. :sad:
Today I changed my food diary settings to include the amount of sugar I consume every day, and I was shocked to see that I ALWAYS go over the allowed sugar amount by quite a bit! Mind you, the sugar is mostly coming from fruits, and I haven't eaten ANY candy or chocolate in weeks.
So, could my sugar level be one of the reasons why my weight loss has been so slow? And if so, how I could possibly cut down the sugar without being unhealthy?! Fruit sugar is 'good' sugar, right? :embarassed:
I have my diary open to all, so feel free to snoop around. Any advice regarding sugar or otherwise would be greatly appreciated. I know I should just be patient, but I don't want to waste my time when I'm doing something wrong.
Thanks!
p.s. OK, today's sugar level is especially high because I had maple syrup with my breakfast...:blushing:

robertf57

yes.But it is more likely that you are consuming more calories than you think and estimating your exercise calories in excess. Do you MEASURE EVERYTHING that passes your lips and have an accurate calorie burn estimate (i.e. via a HRM)?

jannapurna

robert: Thanks for responding. I don't have a HRM nor do I measure what I eat. I suppose this could be an issue...but I usually underrate my exercise calories burned for that very reason. Overall I eat well and exercise a good amount; I don't overeat nor undereat, and I listen to my body.

Anyone else have any input?

Sezmo83

If you're not measuring your food it could well be that you're eating more than you think. A single portion of something is usually quite a bit smaller than people think.

kristidem

Measuring / weighing all meals for a week sounds like a good idea. You'd be surprised how small a half cup of something really is. I started my weight loss journey with Weight Watchers and was SHOCKED that I had no clue what a "serving" was and how much I really was eating. I'm a starch lover and the first time I cooked rice I read a serving is half cup. That seemed small, so I figured a cup would be good. When I actually measured it out I discovered my old servings were 2.5-3 cups! Yikes. Even now, a year maintaining weight I still need to measure things as visual measure creeps up little by little over time.

Sezmo83

Measuring / weighing all meals for a week sounds like a good idea. You'd be surprised how small a half cup of something really is. I started my weight loss journey with Weight Watchers and was SHOCKED that I had no clue what a "serving" was and how much I really was eating. I'm a starch lover and the first time I cooked rice I read a serving is half cup. That seemed small, so I figured a cup would be good. When I actually measured it out I discovered my old servings were 2.5-3 cups! Yikes. Even now, a year maintaining weight I still need to measure things as visual measure creeps up little by little over time.

Same thing here. I did WW a few years ago and had the same problem. Even now I'll look at a serving of something and thing "wow, that looks like nothing!". I think we're all just so used to oversized servings that it's difficult to see that we're over eating without actually weighing or measuring our portions.

jannapurna

Thanks for the input, everyone.
Starting this morning I'm going to measure my food the best that I can. Also, I'm going to log my food entries more carefully by finding exactly what I'm eating and not just picking something 'similar' - for example, when I made vegetarian ratatouille I just chose the Martha Stewart recipe as it seemed close enough.
This is going to be tough!
For breakfast I measured my cereal, milk and juice. My cereal seemed a bit less than usual but nothing crazy. I did realize, though, that I was only drinking 125ml of juice every morning but logging it as 250ml. I thought this might be the source of the crazy sugar level...then I realized I was also logging the wrong type of juice, and the calorie and sugar levels were higher! :noway:

Anyways, thanks for leading me towards measuring my food. Hopefully it helps me see some results.

About the sugar problem, though: Is it OK to go over your sugar levels if it's only sugar from fruit???

mocha76

There are varying arguments on the sugar in fruit. I personally think one can overdo it with sugar in fruit. Actually sugar in anything. I do not believe your body knows the difference between the sugar in fruit/milk and candy. Therefore, I am beginning to limit my sugar intake. I have never been a juice drinker, so I only drink water and coffee. I use Stevia for my sugar. I am trying to limit my fruit to one serving a day. Not sure it this helps, but hopefully it does. :-)

KTalada

Same here as mocha76--limiting my fruit to one serving per day. I've also noticed that a lot of the fat free yogurts with fruit in them seem to have a very high sugar content. So maybe there is a correlation there too? My mother-in-law is diabetic & even the sugar in fruit affects your blood sugar, so the body must not know the difference. I'm focusing on trying to get more veggies into my diet to make up for the fruit I'm limiting.

Best wishes all on this journey! :happy:

kathyhull

Thanks for the input, everyone.
Starting this morning I'm going to measure my food the best that I can. Also, I'm going to log my food entries more carefully by finding exactly what I'm eating and not just picking something 'similar' - for example, when I made vegetarian ratatouille I just chose the Martha Stewart recipe as it seemed close enough.
This is going to be tough!
For breakfast I measured my cereal, milk and juice. My cereal seemed a bit less than usual but nothing crazy. I did realize, though, that I was only drinking 125ml of juice every morning but logging it as 250ml. I thought this might be the source of the crazy sugar level...then I realized I was also logging the wrong type of juice, and the calorie and sugar levels were higher! :noway:

Anyways, thanks for leading me towards measuring my food. Hopefully it helps me see some results.

About the sugar problem, though: Is it OK to go over your sugar levels if it's only sugar from fruit???

First, let me say that it gets easier to measure and weigh after a while. Also, yes, sugar is sugar, even from fruit. Try to limit your fruits to no more than 2 or 3 at the most per day. Whole fruit is more filling and better for you than juice. I also believe we need more protein than this site calls for.