Controlling sugar intake

emilystammitti
emilystammitti Posts: 7 Member
in Food and Nutrition
Hi everybody,

I've been active in changing my lifestyle (both with and without myfitnesspal) for about 4 years now. Something keeps coming up in my food diary profile though, which is really bothering me: sugar intake. I've noticed a disturbing trend in how much sugar I eat on a daily basis, without adding any to my diet and even after eliminating most processed foods!

Since cutting all of the 'garbage' and processed stuff (all varieties- I even bake most of my own bread with sugar subs), I'm still eating at or just over the limit of daily sugars just from daily fruit and veggie intake. Does anybody have any good advice, besides bordering on the traditional 'low carb' diet, on cutting some of the sugars out? I eat tons of fresh fruit and veg, but never in 'excess'; just a serving at a time for snacks or added into meals. My main fruits are things like berries, apples, grapefruit, and occasionally bananas (they're so high cal for what they give that I eat them sometimes, but sparingly). Veggies are mainly broccoli, sprouts, cauliflower- the cruciferous family.

Anybody notice similar trends?

Happy calorie and weight watching everybody! (And thanks for the time) =)

Replies

  • jennaworksout
    jennaworksout Posts: 1,739 Member
    I am the same way, I don't eat bread by choice and its still hard to cut sugar out completely ....as we all know, but cutting out processed foods and not adding it to your food is a major decrease in your intake alone, just imagine what you ate before you cut those out, fruit is high, and I tend to leave my fruit intake at 1 piece per day because of that....and a lot of people will say its "good sugar"...I don't believe that, your body doesn't know the difference between bad and good sugar, its all sugar to your body and processed the exact same way . I would say though if the majority of your sugars are from fruits and veggies, I wouldn't worry too much about it, at least its coming from whole food.
  • GadgetGuy2
    GadgetGuy2 Posts: 291 Member
    I've also noticed the same thing.

    Its true. Sugar (fructose, sucrose, glucose, lactose, etc) is sugar. What CAN BE DIFFERENT is the rate you absorb that sugar, and therefore the rate your blood sugar levels go up which is where the pancreatic insulin stress thing happens.

    My understanding, is that many, not all, naturally occurring sugars are encapsulated in fiber and other harder to digest "packages" (e.g. the cellulose in green beans, the more complex carbohydrates in fluor, etc.). It thus takes longer for your body to extract and absorb the sugar, and thus minimizes/avoids the insulin stress problem.

    I have not been able to get my total sugar down to the recommended levels. Since most of my sugars consumed now come from unprocessed foods (ok, those buttermilk donuts yesterday are an exception), I'm hoping that is good enough to avoid/postpone the type 2 diabetes thang'.

    Good luck!
  • emilystammitti
    emilystammitti Posts: 7 Member
    Haha, buttermilk doughnuts? That sounds delicious, despite being sugary hell! lol Good on you for giving yourself a treat though.

    Yeah, cutting the sugar out to the recommended level is such a bummer. And thinking back on my intake of everything before, I must have been consuming enough sugar to make a horse diabetic, if my levels are still this high!

    Nevertheless, I don't feel I can cut back on much more fruit because it's a.) so damned tasty when you don't eat anything else naughty and b.) it's still pretty good for you, even if high in sugar (digestible or less so). Looks like I'll just keep up on the running and watching other for other pitfalls.

    If anybody ever manages to find a [safe] anti sugar pill that eats up those sugars while allowing me to binger mercilessly on 3 or 4 servings of fruit a day, send it my way! =D

    Thanks for the nice feedback, and good luck to you guys, too. <3
  • lsmsrbls
    lsmsrbls Posts: 232 Member
    My advice is to ignore the sugar levels provided by mfp. The numbers used by mfp are based on the recommended limits for added sugars, not for sugars naturally occurring in foods.
  • sabified
    sabified Posts: 1,035 Member
    My advice is to ignore the sugar levels provided by mfp. The numbers used by mfp are based on the recommended limits for added sugars, not for sugars naturally occurring in foods.

    Really?? Could we get more info on this?

    That doesn't really seem right to me- from my understanding the stats are what we should consume for the day (granted, I know there's much debate on whether the stats are the proper amounts or not). If the sugar is the additional allowed, how are we supposed to keep track of that when the sugar in the foods we've consumed for that day are all still counted?

    I have serious issues with getting my sugar under control, I'm constantly around 10-20 grams over what I should be having (according to MFP... and also, that's on the better days, not even considering the bad ones). Any clarification here is appreciated!
  • tigersword
    tigersword Posts: 8,059 Member
    Sugar is a carb. Track carbs. Sugar, on its own, is completely irrelevant, barring specific serious medical conditions.
  • jennaworksout
    jennaworksout Posts: 1,739 Member
    My advice is to ignore the sugar levels provided by mfp. The numbers used by mfp are based on the recommended limits for added sugars, not for sugars naturally occurring in foods.

    true , but sugar is sugar, natural or not.....your body does not know where it came from ...I also customized my sugar intake, I don't use the MFP recommended
  • jennaworksout
    jennaworksout Posts: 1,739 Member
    Sugar is a carb. Track carbs. Sugar, on its own, is completely irrelevant, barring specific serious medical conditions.

    exactly, I focus more on carbs than sugar
  • sabified
    sabified Posts: 1,035 Member
    Sugar is a carb. Track carbs. Sugar, on its own, is completely irrelevant, barring specific serious medical conditions.

    Diabetes is a very real threat for me- I don't think only tracking carbs would tell me too much??
    Also, I'm ALWAYS well below my carb allowances... I'm not gluten free, but do feel better when I limit my carbs, so that's been easy to maintain...
  • clemson20
    clemson20 Posts: 13
    I see my sugars sometimes going over. I see it coming from fruits, veggies, and dairy. Is the sugar in dairy bad for you?
  • lsmsrbls
    lsmsrbls Posts: 232 Member
    My advice is to ignore the sugar levels provided by mfp. The numbers used by mfp are based on the recommended limits for added sugars, not for sugars naturally occurring in foods.

    Really?? Could we get more info on this?

    That doesn't really seem right to me- from my understanding the stats are what we should consume for the day (granted, I know there's much debate on whether the stats are the proper amounts or not). If the sugar is the additional allowed, how are we supposed to keep track of that when the sugar in the foods we've consumed for that day are all still counted?

    I have serious issues with getting my sugar under control, I'm constantly around 10-20 grams over what I should be having (according to MFP... and also, that's on the better days, not even considering the bad ones). Any clarification here is appreciated!

    So once upon a time I was concerned that I was eating too much sugar, since I always went over the mfp sugar limits (I eat a lot of fruits and vegetables, though I usually eat very little added sugar). So I tried to look up the RDA for sugar to see what the deal was. It turns out that while I could find lots of limits for added sugar by various organizations (WHO, FDA, USDA, AHA, etc.), I didn't see any reputable organizations during my cursory search that actually provided a recommendation for total sugar.

    However, the number mfp gave me for sugar was right in there with the numbers all of these organizations provide for added sugars. So clearly the number mfp told me to limit myself to for all sugars was not based on scientific consensus!

    Now, I haven't looked at the values mfp uses for people with other stats, so I don't know for sure whether they are using the added sugar numbers for everyone or whether the fact that my number matched it was a coincidence. I'm not going to try to reverse engineer their algorithm. But the number mfp recommends is clearly not any good, and not in agreement with current dietetic guidance.

    Try googling "sugar daily dietary guidelines" if you're interested in reading more.
  • AlabasterVerve
    AlabasterVerve Posts: 3,171 Member
    yarwell put together a great sugar FAQ that gives some guidelines for total sugar, not just added. Well worth the read.
    The EU have discussed a limit of 90g (18% of energy on a 2000 cal diet) for total sugars and observed that 45g is a typical adult intake of intrinsic or naturally occurring sugars from fruit, veg and dairy. http://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/efsajournal/doc/1008.pdf

    Australia has a Dietary Recommended Intake value for total sugars of 90g per day, as has the EU (for a 2000 calorie diet - so 18% of energy). Annex 13 of Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011
    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1017237-so-what-s-with-this-sugar-then-faq
  • lsmsrbls
    lsmsrbls Posts: 232 Member
    yarwell put together a great sugar FAQ that gives some guidelines for total sugar, not just added. Well worth the read.
    The EU have discussed a limit of 90g (18% of energy on a 2000 cal diet) for total sugars and observed that 45g is a typical adult intake of intrinsic or naturally occurring sugars from fruit, veg and dairy. http://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/efsajournal/doc/1008.pdf

    Australia has a Dietary Recommended Intake value for total sugars of 90g per day, as has the EU (for a 2000 calorie diet - so 18% of energy). Annex 13 of Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011
    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1017237-so-what-s-with-this-sugar-then-faq

    Awesome link. Thank you for sharing.
  • tigersword
    tigersword Posts: 8,059 Member
    Sugar is a carb. Track carbs. Sugar, on its own, is completely irrelevant, barring specific serious medical conditions.

    Diabetes is a very real threat for me- I don't think only tracking carbs would tell me too much??
    Also, I'm ALWAYS well below my carb allowances... I'm not gluten free, but do feel better when I limit my carbs, so that's been easy to maintain...
    Most diabetics only track carbs, because carbs are what affect insulin. As I said, sugar IS a carb. And all carbs are a form of sugar. Basically you're counting the same thing twice for no reason.

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