Need serious help with SUGAR!!!!

So would you support the sentence: "A piece of cake or cookie is 100% perfectly healthy provided that the consumption of said cake or cookie does not prevent you from reaching that day's nutritional goals"?

Sure. But I'd recognize that for the vast majority of people in the vast majority of situations, such a statement is irrelevant. As such, defining it as healthy seems, to steal another poster's term, disingenuous, because it's an unhealthy choice in the vast majority of situations.

So your basic answer is "overconsumption", yes? let's leave out the fact that some people, especially those not logging here, eat a lot of calorie dense and less nutritionally dense food, because that's not who we're addressing. We're addressing the people who come here specifically to lose weight, gain a healthy respect for food, and become more healthy. The people who would be reading things like, "sugar is bad for you" or whatever.

I never said sugar is bad for you. I'm saying that certain choices are generally better for your health, making them healthier than other choices as a general matter. As for ignoring the majority of people who don't log their food, I see no reason to ignore them in this discussion. Something doesn't suddenly become "health food" just because you keep a food log.

Again, if you actually read what I'm saying, never did I say sugar is bad, nor have I said you can't fit foods like cake into your macros. I just think there's a middle ground between explicitly saying "cake is healthy!" and saying "cake is always unhealthy and should NEVER be consumed!" Just because you recognize some foods as generally unhealthy doesn't mean you have a "bad relationship" with food, whatever that means.

It's not irrelevant, because telling people "donuts are unhealthy; fruit is healthy" is unproductive fear-mongering. It sets them up to feel guilty about eating "bad" food when they should be eating "good" food.

This stuff matters. I understand you're fairly new here and have a ways to go yourself, but when you've been around and seen person after person after person after person with serious anxiety and fear about "bad food" subsequently fail because of an inability to avoid said "bad food" you will understand why it's not irrelevant or meaningless to tell people "this stuff isn't bad.

As I said, I recognize starches are saccharides. But as I said, simple sugars (monosaccharides and disaccharides) are different. Your body reacts differently to them during the digestion process as simple sugars take a shorter time to become glucose and prompt a reaction from your body.

No, they don't. They're all broken down to the shortest chain possible before being utilised by the body.

The only difference is the amount of work it takes for the body to accomplish this, and therefore - as you said - how quickly they're utilised.

I'm assuming you're referring to spikes in insulin. Insulin also spikes after exercise. Is exercise unhealthy? it spikes after protein intake. Is protein unhealthy?

The basic mechanism is this. You eat something. Your body digests it and moves it into the blood stream. The basal level of insulin in your blood is complemented by an additional release of insulin from the pancreas. The insulin then transports this excess of glucose firstly to the muscles.

Haven't moved today? uh oh! your muscles are still full. No more room at the inn.

So then the next stop on the G-train is the liver. Finally, to fat cells.

auntiebabs

So, too much alcohol, too much [full-fat] Coke, too much cake? etc.

Full-fat Coke???
(when did they start putting fat in coke?)

Am I being picky and mean... I'm sorry I couldn't resist.

It's not irrelevant, because telling people "donuts are unhealthy; fruit is healthy" is unproductive fear-mongering. It sets them up to feel guilty about eating "bad" food when they should be eating "good" food.

This stuff matters. I understand you're fairly new here and have a ways to go yourself, but when you've been around and seen person after person after person after person with serious anxiety and fear about "bad food" subsequently fail because of an inability to avoid said "bad food" you will understand why it's not irrelevant or meaningless to tell people "this stuff isn't bad.

Oh please, spare me the "you're a newbie, I know better." Being on MFP forums for longer than me is hardly a great resume builder, and surely we can have a discussion without you falling back on things like that. If you want to talk about failure, people that count calories and do IIFYM fail in the vast, vast majority of situations. Do you research on long term weight loss success and the numbers are bleak. Suggesting that people fail only because they think of things as "bad food" is silly.

Back to the discussion...

It's not irrelevant, because telling people "donuts are unhealthy; fruit is healthy" is unproductive fear-mongering. It sets them up to feel guilty about eating "bad" food when they should be eating "good" food.

Fear mongering? Where's the fear? I eat foods I consider unhealthy all the time. As I said, I drink several diet cokes each week and I enjoy a glass of bourbon. Do I feel bad about myself when doing this? No, because I do it in moderation. I enjoyed a few glasses of port and a nice cigar on a business trip last fall - was I wracked with guilt the following days or distraught due to anxiety? No, I loved it, and yet I'll admit it was an unhealthy choice.

Like I said, you can admit something isn't good for your health and still do it, and provided you do it in moderation, there's no need to feel guilty. It comes down to balancing enjoying life with improving your health.

So, too much alcohol, too much [full-fat] Coke, too much cake? etc.

Full-fat Coke???
(when did they start putting fat in coke?)

Am I being picky and mean... I'm sorry I couldn't resist.

Haha. It's full-fat Coke or "skinny" Coke where I'm from. I get lost in my colloquialisms sometimes.

It's not irrelevant, because telling people "donuts are unhealthy; fruit is healthy" is unproductive fear-mongering. It sets them up to feel guilty about eating "bad" food when they should be eating "good" food.

This stuff matters. I understand you're fairly new here and have a ways to go yourself, but when you've been around and seen person after person after person after person with serious anxiety and fear about "bad food" subsequently fail because of an inability to avoid said "bad food" you will understand why it's not irrelevant or meaningless to tell people "this stuff isn't bad.

Oh please, spare me the "you're a newbie, I know better." Being on MFP forums for longer than me is hardly a great resume builder, and surely we can have a discussion without you falling back on things like that. If you want to talk about failure, people that count calories and do IIFYM fail in the vast, vast majority of situations. Do you research on long term weight loss success and the numbers are bleak. Suggesting that people fail only because they think of things as "bad food" is silly.

Back to the discussion...

It's not irrelevant, because telling people "donuts are unhealthy; fruit is healthy" is unproductive fear-mongering. It sets them up to feel guilty about eating "bad" food when they should be eating "good" food.

Fear mongering? Where's the fear? I eat foods I consider unhealthy all the time. As I said, I drink several diet cokes each week and I enjoy a glass of bourbon. Do I feel bad about myself when doing this? No, because I do it in moderation. I enjoyed a few glasses of port and a nice cigar on a business trip last fall - was I wracked with guilt the following days or distraught due to anxiety? No, I loved it, and yet I'll admit it was an unhealthy choice.

Like I said, you can admit something isn't good for your health and still do it, and provided you do it in moderation, there's no need to feel guilty. It comes down to balancing enjoying life with improving your health.

I'm amazed that you can spend even this long on the MFP forums and ask "what fear mongering?"

Literally every thread about food has someone saying this food or that food is bad, unhealthy, should be avoided, etc. Every thread, every poster, every single day ever.

The idea that any food is inherently unhealthy is wrong.

Even here you're perpetuating the false, destructive idea that some foods are inherently bad for your health. That is BS, and that exact premise drives enormous numbers of people to fail in their diets.

ndj1979

still going at it, I see....

still going at it, I see....

It's important for you to understand now that it will never end. It will save a lot of exasperation in the future.

I'm amazed that you can spend even this long on the MFP forums and ask "what fear mongering?"

Literally every thread about food has someone saying this food or that food is bad, unhealthy, should be avoided, etc. Every thread, every poster, every single day ever.

The idea that any food is inherently unhealthy is wrong.

I'll rephrase then - where's the fear mongering in what I've been saying over the last few posts. Of course there's fear mongering on MFP forums as a whole, but I'm only referring to what I've been saying, which is NOT that "sugar is bad." I've said over and over it's possible to fit these foods into your diet. I don't even believe I said that any food is "inherently unhealthy." What I've been saying is that for the vast majority of realistic situations, foods like cake are an unhealthy choice. At any rate, what other people do on these forums has little bearing on what I've been saying in my past few posts.

But, at the same time, you can't tell me the average person in the world is making a healthy decision when they consume a piece of cake. When the average person doesn't even hit their RDIs when not eating cake, it's illogical to think they would have a better chance of hitting their RDIs when they do eat cake. As such, I see no problem with the statement that as a general matter fruits and vegetables are better choices than cake.

I suspect the difference is I'm more willing to admit when I do or eat something that's generally unhealthy and I chalk it up as fine in moderation. In my opinion, when someone tells you those foods are fine in moderation, that doesn't mean that those foods are healthy. It means that you won't do any harm by consuming moderate amounts of them.

I'll rephrase then - where's the fear mongering in what I've been saying over the last few posts.

You continue to characterize some foods as simply "unhealthy."

That's what's wrong.

Madmarsha

I am definitely beginning to think when we use words like "healthy" or "unhealthy", they need to come with qualifiers. They are buzz words. Like "organic". If we can debate on what is inherently "unhealthy", then we can debate on something being inherently "healthy" despite plenty of things being labeled just that. Right now, about the only thing I can think of that nearly everyone would agree on is trans fats.

The only thing that I've eaten for a long time that I consider inherently "unhealthy" FOR ME is the one waffle with maple syrup and the half a Grands! biscuit I had last night. (The waffle wasn't last night, just the biscuit. The waffle was weeks ago).

TR0berts

I'll rephrase then - where's the fear mongering in what I've been saying over the last few posts. Of course there's fear mongering on MFP forums as a whole, but I'm only referring to what I've been saying, which is NOT that "sugar is bad." I've said over and over it's possible to fit these foods into your diet. I don't even believe I said that any food is "inherently unhealthy." What I've been saying is that for the vast majority of realistic situations, foods like cake are an unhealthy choice. At any rate, what other people do on these forums has little bearing on what I've been saying in my past few posts.

But, at the same time, you can't tell me the average person in the world is making a healthy decision when they consume a piece of cake. When the average person doesn't even hit their RDIs when not eating cake, it's illogical to think they would have a better chance of hitting their RDIs when they do eat cake. As such, I see no problem with the statement that as a general matter fruits and vegetables are better choices than cake.

I suspect the difference is I'm more willing to admit when I do or eat something that's generally unhealthy and I chalk it up as fine in moderation. In my opinion, when someone tells you those foods are fine in moderation, that doesn't mean that those foods are healthy. It means that you won't do any harm by consuming moderate amounts of them.

There you go.

Cake:
Flour (take your pick)
Sugar
Oil (vegetable, coconut, safflower, anything similar)
Baking Soda
Baking Powder
Eggs
Milk
Flavoring (vanilla, cocoa, fruit, etc)

How, exactly, is that "generally unhealthy?"

And you continue to insist that cookies and cakes are always fine if you hit your macros, ignoring the fact that this thread was started by someone who had serious issues controlling themselves around those very same foods.

I'll rephrase then - where's the fear mongering in what I've been saying over the last few posts.

You continue to characterize some foods as simply "unhealthy."

That's what's wrong.

Am I really calling them simply unhealthy? And here I thought I qualified that statement...

As a general matter, and for the majority of people and situations? Yes. Perhaps we can just agree to put an asterisk next to "healthier" with this as a footnote? tongue

In essence, your argument boils down to these foods are healthy because it's possible to work them into a healthy diet. However, the fact that it's possible does not mean that it's the correct choice in the vast majority of situations. This would be akin to someone asking is it healthy to consume 10,000 calories/day. Is it possible for some people to work this many calories into a healthy diet and lifestyle? Sure, some athletes pull it off and at least stay lean (other health consequences are another matter). Does this mean that as a general matter, it's therefore healthy to consume this many calories in a 24 hour period?

At the end of the day though, I'm just surprised people put up so much resistance to the notion that fruit or kale are, generally speaking, healthier choices than cake and cola. As a practical matter, I don't really see any big conflict between what I'm saying and what you're saying, and the only differences seem to come down to semantics, with me calling some foods "generally unhealthy" and you refusing to label any foods as healthy or unhealthy. In practice though, we're in complete agreement that you can work these foods into an overall healthy diet in moderation, provided you hit your other dietary goals. Given that there are only superficial differences between what we're saying, I find it funny you're so convinced I'm "wrong" and that I'm perpetuating "false, destructive idea", not to mention fear mongering and an ignorant newbie and ... I've lost track. :laugh:

And you continue to insist that cookies and cakes are always fine if you hit your macros, ignoring the fact that this thread was started by someone who had serious issues controlling themselves around those very same foods.

Cutting those foods out or severely restricting them from day #1 doesn't remove that problem, it simply masks it whilst your willpower and determination is at its highest.

This is the very concept of cheat meals and cheat days. Have what you want, in moderation, and you are less likely to find yourself unable to control your "urges" around "unhealthy" foods.

For those arguing in favor of cookies and cakes, can you please tell me what your recommended daily intake for sugar is?

Confuzzled4ever

I'll agree that in your theoretical situation situation it doesn't matter. But let's talk about the more likely situation for the average person. Many people don't even hit their macros needs reliably, much less their micronutrients, so let's assume you haven't hit all your RDIs for the day. Or let's take the average person who doesn't log their food, because let's be honest, we're in the minority here. What's a better snack? Cake? Or fruit? What, on average, would be the better decision? If you take the average person's diet, the fruit wins the vast majority of time - actually, it's hard to conceive of a situation where the cake would be the superior option. Even if your hypo, it's a 50/50 split.

In short, just because you can craft a theoretical situation where it doesn't matter which one you pick, doesn't mean that one isn't the better choice in the vast majority of situations.

If we're getting pernickety, micros and macros are generally more abundant in foods other than fruit. If I was lacking, for example, vit C (a water-soluble vitamin that we do need to consume every day) then I would eat a helping of kale or something similar over an orange.

I just want to say..

Kale is ICKY

that is all..

And you continue to insist that cookies and cakes are always fine if you hit your macros, ignoring the fact that this thread was started by someone who had serious issues controlling themselves around those very same foods.

Cutting those foods out or severely restricting them from day #1 doesn't remove that problem, it simply masks it whilst your willpower and determination is at its highest.

This is the very concept of cheat meals and cheat days. Have what you want, in moderation, and you are less likely to find yourself unable to control your "urges" around "unhealthy" foods.

No one has argued against cheat meals in this thread. My original post was defending someone's choice to eat a piece of fruit rather than a dessert. Choosing a piece of fruit over a dessert to control cravings is a good idea! If it's time for a cheat meal, go ahead and have that (hopefully small) slice of cake. If it's not, then yes, the fruit is the healthier option.

Consider also that the person who started the thread has had a lifelong struggle controlling themselves around sugar. Restricting serving size didn't work. Don't you think a period of cold turkey could potentially be beneficial?

I just want to say..

Kale is ICKY

that is all..

Try it in different ways! It's really versatile and can be prepared in tons of different ways. A personal favorite is kale chips. I could eat several bunches of homemade kale chips.

zyxst

I'm still have my checkerboard cake for dessert.

Oh, my sugar intake for today (not counting the cake because I don't have info on it) is 50. I'm using whatever percentage MFP uses. I don't track sugar.

paganstar71

I can't believe I read all 20 pages of this and no one posted the below study. My head seriously hurts from it, :laugh:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20056521

Conclusion: There is no support from the human literature for the hypothesis that sucrose may be physically addictive or that addiction to sugar plays a role in eating disorders.

So it goes back to a handful of people say, it's a habit. Just like the reason why children become fat when both parents are fat... they form unhealthy habits.

http://www.wsro.org/Portals/12/Docs/position-statement-sugar-and-addiction-2012.pdf

"In summary, the current evidence does not support the idea that human addiction to sugar is a valid concept or that it is a characteristic of individuals who are obese"

While the first study is certainly valid, the second one is literally a position paper from the sugar industry.

And the first study was partially funded by the World Sugar Research Organization. I wonder why?
http://www.clinicalnutritionjournal.com/article/S0261-5614(09)00239-8/fulltext#sec7

No one has argued against cheat meals in this thread. My original post was defending someone's choice to eat a piece of fruit rather than a dessert. Choosing a piece of fruit over a dessert to control cravings is a good idea! If it's time for a cheat meal, go ahead and have that (hopefully small) slice of cake. If it's not, then yes, the fruit is the healthier option.

Consider also that the person who started the thread has had a lifelong struggle controlling themselves around sugar. Restricting serving size didn't work. Don't you think a period of cold turkey could potentially be beneficial?

Potentially. But why partake in something that has a 50/50 chance of failure because of unsustainability? why not increase those chances exponentially by operating in a way that you can still have the things you feel you'll crave, as long as all of your other food goals are in check.

By the way, as I said previously in this thread, sugar and carbs are synonyms. Carbs (as a whole) contain C, H and O atoms in varying amounts. Sugar's molecular formula is C12H22O11.

Greytfish

So would you support the sentence: "A piece of cake or cookie is 100% perfectly healthy provided that the consumption of said cake or cookie does not prevent you from reaching that day's nutritional goals"?

Sure. But I'd recognize that for the vast majority of people in the vast majority of situations, such a statement is irrelevant. As such, defining it as healthy seems, to steal another poster's term, disingenuous, because it's an unhealthy choice in the vast majority of situations.

So your basic answer is "overconsumption", yes? let's leave out the fact that some people, especially those not logging here, eat a lot of calorie dense and less nutritionally dense food, because that's not who we're addressing. We're addressing the people who come here specifically to lose weight, gain a healthy respect for food, and become more healthy. The people who would be reading things like, "sugar is bad for you" or whatever.

I never said sugar is bad for you. I'm saying that certain choices are generally better for your health, making them healthier than other choices as a general matter. As for ignoring the majority of people who don't log their food, I see no reason to ignore them in this discussion. Something doesn't suddenly become "health food" just because you keep a food log.

Again, if you actually read what I'm saying, never did I say sugar is bad, nor have I said you can't fit foods like cake into your macros. I just think there's a middle ground between explicitly saying "cake is healthy!" and saying "cake is always unhealthy and should NEVER be consumed!" Just because you recognize some foods as generally unhealthy doesn't mean you have a "bad relationship" with food, whatever that means.

It's not irrelevant, because telling people "donuts are unhealthy; fruit is healthy" is unproductive fear-mongering. It sets them up to feel guilty about eating "bad" food when they should be eating "good" food.

This stuff matters. I understand you're fairly new here and have a ways to go yourself, but when you've been around and seen person after person after person after person with serious anxiety and fear about "bad food" subsequently fail because of an inability to avoid said "bad food" you will understand why it's not irrelevant or meaningless to tell people "this stuff isn't bad.

It's only unproductive fear-mongering to people who already have a skewed relationship with food intake wherein they eat more for pleasure and misdirected emotions than for the purpose of feeding the body and keeping it healthy.

If you have a healthy relationship with food, you can absolutely acknowledge that a piece of fruit is - in most instances - the healthier and more nutritious choice than a piece of cake without suffering any ill effects. You can then choose to eat the apple or the cake knowing that one single choice will never outweigh all of the other choices you make.

alicebot

I can't believe I read all 20 pages of this and no one posted the below study. My head seriously hurts from it, :laugh:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20056521

Conclusion: There is no support from the human literature for the hypothesis that sucrose may be physically addictive or that addiction to sugar plays a role in eating disorders.

So it goes back to a handful of people say, it's a habit. Just like the reason why children become fat when both parents are fat... they form unhealthy habits.

http://www.wsro.org/Portals/12/Docs/position-statement-sugar-and-addiction-2012.pdf

"In summary, the current evidence does not support the idea that human addiction to sugar is a valid concept or that it is a characteristic of individuals who are obese"

I did refer to this study on page 19 of this discussion.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2235907/

Potentially. But why partake in something that has a 50/50 chance of failure because of unsustainability? why not increase those chances exponentially by operating in a way that you can still have the things you feel you'll crave, as long as all of your other food goals are in check.

By the way, as I said previously in this thread, sugar and carbs are synonyms. Carbs (as a whole) contain C, H and O atoms in varying amounts. Sugar's molecular formula is C12H22O11.

Because it sounds like they tried your way, failed and could benefit from trying something different?

And just because they all contain carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen doesn't mean your body will take them in the same way. Why do medical organizations, including AHA, recommend limiting sugar intake to 36g a day for men? If all carbs are indeed equal, shouldn't I be able to ingest 150g of sugar a day and be ok?

Fragezeichen

OK, I didn't read all of this. But the bits I did - interesting discussion.
I only started on this website a few days ago. And am also wondering about my sugar intake: Calories in check, as are total carbs, fat, protein. Sugars - always more than "allowed" by the website. Looking through what I eat, most of the sugars come from fruit, no "junk" in there. So - do I now feel riddled by guilt because of this high sugar intake, do I cut down fruit and live on cucumber or tomatoes, or do I simply ignore it, because I like fruit and it really is meant to be good for you - whatever that exactly means?

For those arguing in favor of cookies and cakes, can you please tell me what your recommended daily intake for sugar is?

My recommended daily intake of sugar is: exactly the amount you want to consume that makes you happiest while meeting your nutrient goals.

Potentially. But why partake in something that has a 50/50 chance of failure because of unsustainability? why not increase those chances exponentially by operating in a way that you can still have the things you feel you'll crave, as long as all of your other food goals are in check.

By the way, as I said previously in this thread, sugar and carbs are synonyms. Carbs (as a whole) contain C, H and O atoms in varying amounts. Sugar's molecular formula is C12H22O11.

Because it sounds like they tried your way, failed and could benefit from trying something different?

And just because they all contain carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen doesn't mean your body will take them in the same way. Why do medical organizations, including AHA, recommend limiting sugar intake to 36g a day for men? If all carbs are indeed equal, shouldn't I be able to ingest 150g of sugar a day and be ok?

It's probably worth pointing out also that it's nonsense that dieters who don't eat cake have a 50% success rate and those that do don't have an exponentially greater chance of success... whatever that even means, as "exponentially greater" normal applies to a rate and not a percentage chance of success. In any event, the actual odds of long-term success are much more grim, regardless of how you choose to lose weight.

OK, I didn't read all of this. But the bits I did - interesting discussion.
I only started on this website a few days ago. And am also wondering about my sugar intake: Calories in check, as are total carbs, fat, protein. Sugars - always more than "allowed" by the website. Looking through what I eat, most of the sugars come from fruit, no "junk" in there. So - do I now feel riddled by guilt because of this high sugar intake, do I cut down fruit and live on cucumber or tomatoes, or do I simply ignore it, because I like fruit and it really is meant to be good for you - whatever that exactly means?

There's nothing special about MFP's default sugar recommendation, and thus there's no need to feel guilty because you didn't satisfy an arbitrary value. Feel free to customize your macro/micronutrient goals as you see fit and as you discover what works best for you.