Fruit sugar
dstedman62
Posts: 11 Member
My meals allow me 25 my of sugar per day. If I eat 3 fruits a day, like all nutritionists say I should, I’m over 25mg of sugar. My question: should I not count fruit sugar?
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There is a big difference in glycemic index of raw fruit versus processed fruit or other added sugars. Unless you are diabetic and your doctor says no to raw fruit, I wouldn't worry about the sugars from a couple pieces of raw fruit. I have a cup of mixed fruit in my morning smoothie plus I always keep a banana and apple in my office for a mid-morning or late afternoon snack if I am hungry. If I stick to that and keep added sugars to a minimum I have no issue losing or maintaining weight.1
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Are you diabetic or diagnosed insulin resistant? If so, how much fruit to eat would be a good question for your doctor or a registered dietitian to whom s/he refers you. Some diabetics are able to use blood sugar testing to see what spikes their insulin levels, and adjust accordingly. (That can be about individual foods, or about how they're combined in individual meals/snacks.) If you're in this category, ask explicitly whether the limit is for added sugars, or total sugars (added sugar and sugar inherent in foods).
If you're not diabetic or insulin resistant, getting medical guidance on your eating routine, where did that 25g limit come from?
A non-diabetic, non-IR person typically doesn't need to worry about inherent sugars in fruits, veggies or dairy. Even some added sugars are not a big deal, as long as they don't drive out other essential nutrition (protein, fats, micronutrients) or put a person over a sensible calorie level.
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Not enough information to make a judgement. Anyway, high glycemic carbs like bread or pasta are far more implicit than a few pieces of fruit a day if you're a diabetic or have insulin resistant so it's important to understand what sugar in a nutritional and health context, is.
Also, nutritionists saying people should eat 3 fruit a day has no basis other than we know replacing processed foods with whole food is recommended and arbitrarily broken down between fruit and vegetables. There is no actual science in eating 3 fruit a day and there's really nothing in fruit that can't be found in vegetables, except maybe the amount of sugars, for the most part, well except fruit tastes great. Cheers1 -
First off, do you subscribe to myfitnesspale? If you do, then you should know how my sugar goal is calculated. No, I'm not a diabetic. I simply asked if I should count the sugar calories in fruit.0
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dstedman62 wrote: »First off, do you subscribe to myfitnesspale? If you do, then you should know how my sugar goal is calculated. No, I'm not a diabetic. I simply asked if I should count the sugar calories in fruit.
Some MFP users customize their sugar goal or other goals: That's why I asked. The default goals are not inviolable, and some matter more than others, nutritionally. They can be changed. Some people get special goals from a health professional or just personal preference.
My advice, as in more detail above, is not to worry about the sugar goal at all, since you're not diabetic or IR.
That, as long as:
* You're not eating so many sweet things - fruit or otherwise - that they drive out other essential nutrition (protein, fats, micronutrients) or put a you over a sensible calorie level.
* Doing so doesn't have some subjective negative effect on your appetite or energy level.
I ate more than the MFP default sugar goal pretty much every day during weight loss from obese to healthy weight. Almost all of it was fruit, no sugar added dairy, and veggies. I lost weight fine - quite rapidly, for my size. My health markers improved dramatically - cholesterol, blood pressure (from the weight loss). I felt great. My blood sugar levels were good.
I've maintained weight and health just fine for 7 years since the same way, in fact eating a bit more added sugar now that my calorie budget is bigger.
Sugar is much demonized these days, but it's not the devil, be kept in perspective.
Mainstream nutritional guidance (USDA, WHO) is to limit added sugar, not inherent sugar like in fruit. MFP couldn't count added sugar separately because it wasn't on good labels on the US until very recently.
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dstedman62 wrote: »First off, do you subscribe to myfitnesspale? If you do, then you should know how my sugar goal is calculated. No, I'm not a diabetic. I simply asked if I should count the sugar calories in fruit.
We're all just fellow MFP users, like you.
My sugar goal/limit (automatically calculated by MFP) is 60 grams for a calorie goal of 1600 calories. So if MFP is giving you only 25 grams, I'm not sure why (unless you're following a low sugar plan or something, I don't use MFP meal plans myself).
Whether or not you should count the sugars in fruit is purely up to you and your goals.
If you want to focus on general health guidelines, logic would dictate that you would ignore the natural sugars in fruit. Ideally you would use an 'added sugar' field for that, but unfortunately most food database entries don't have that info yet, so it requires a bit of mental math.
Fruit is nutritious, I certainly wouldn't stop eating it to follow MFP's sugar goal.
I'm not a diabetic and no history of diabetes in my family, so I don't even look at my sugar intake honestly.3 -
dstedman62 wrote: »First off, do you subscribe to myfitnesspale? If you do, then you should know how my sugar goal is calculated. No, I'm not a diabetic. I simply asked if I should count the sugar calories in fruit.
I'm not diabetic (or IR) either and found fiber a far more useful micro to track so swapped it out for sugar:
https://www.myfitnesspal.com/account/diary-settings2 -
dstedman62 wrote: »My meals allow me 25 my of sugar per day. If I eat 3 fruits a day, like all nutritionists say I should, I’m over 25mg of sugar. My question: should I not count fruit sugar?dstedman62 wrote: »First off, do you subscribe to myfitnesspale? If you do, then you should know how my sugar goal is calculated. No, I'm not a diabetic. I simply asked if I should count the sugar calories in fruit.
I don't see how MFP gave you 25 g of sugar per day. Even when I put my calories as low as 1200 per day, (and use the default macros) I get 84 g of sugar.
Perhaps you meant 25 g of sugar per meal with some leftover for a snack?
Either way, see my previous post as to why I don't use the sugar micro.
https://www.myfitnesspal.com/account/my-goals
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kshama2001 wrote: »dstedman62 wrote: »My meals allow me 25 my of sugar per day. If I eat 3 fruits a day, like all nutritionists say I should, I’m over 25mg of sugar. My question: should I not count fruit sugar?dstedman62 wrote: »First off, do you subscribe to myfitnesspale? If you do, then you should know how my sugar goal is calculated. No, I'm not a diabetic. I simply asked if I should count the sugar calories in fruit.
I don't see how MFP gave you 25 g of sugar per day. Even when I put my calories as low as 1200 per day, (and use the default macros) I get 84 g of sugar.
I'm very confused now, why is my goal so much lower with a higher calorie allowance? And my saturated fat number is lower as well
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kshama2001 wrote: »dstedman62 wrote: »My meals allow me 25 my of sugar per day. If I eat 3 fruits a day, like all nutritionists say I should, I’m over 25mg of sugar. My question: should I not count fruit sugar?dstedman62 wrote: »First off, do you subscribe to myfitnesspale? If you do, then you should know how my sugar goal is calculated. No, I'm not a diabetic. I simply asked if I should count the sugar calories in fruit.
I don't see how MFP gave you 25 g of sugar per day. Even when I put my calories as low as 1200 per day, (and use the default macros) I get 84 g of sugar.
I'm very confused now, why is my goal so much lower with a higher calorie allowance? And my saturated fat number is lower as well
Had you edited them at any point in the past?0 -
My Calories are 1325
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dstedman62 wrote: »My Calories are 1325
That is not the standard default, for sure. I won't even speculate about why, but perhaps - if you're OK with MFP default values - you could try going back through guided setup to restore the defaults, see if it changes?
My sincere advice would still be to ignore the sugar goal (as long as not diabetic or IR), and focus on calories, and - if more than weight loss is important to you, as it is to many of us - adequate protein, adequate fats (especially some monounsaturated/polyunsaturated), and plenty of varied, colorful veggies and fruits.
I'm another person who changed my diary view to show fiber, and hide sugar. (That, even though if I get lots of veggies/fruits, my fiber falls into place nicely without attention.) I think other things are much higher in importance than sugars . . . and I'm saying that from the perspective of losing from class 1 obese to a healthy weight, which in itself put all my diagnostic health markers in solidly normal range after previously being very bad . . . plus the perspective of maintaining that healthy weight for around 7 years now.
We're all different in preferences and goals, so that's just my opinion, based on n=1 experience. I'd sincerely like to see you succeed, truly!0 -
kshama2001 wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »dstedman62 wrote: »My meals allow me 25 my of sugar per day. If I eat 3 fruits a day, like all nutritionists say I should, I’m over 25mg of sugar. My question: should I not count fruit sugar?dstedman62 wrote: »First off, do you subscribe to myfitnesspale? If you do, then you should know how my sugar goal is calculated. No, I'm not a diabetic. I simply asked if I should count the sugar calories in fruit.
I don't see how MFP gave you 25 g of sugar per day. Even when I put my calories as low as 1200 per day, (and use the default macros) I get 84 g of sugar.
I'm very confused now, why is my goal so much lower with a higher calorie allowance? And my saturated fat number is lower as well
Had you edited them at any point in the past?
Nope, i barely even look at those goals usually. Strange!0 -
kshama2001 wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »dstedman62 wrote: »My meals allow me 25 my of sugar per day. If I eat 3 fruits a day, like all nutritionists say I should, I’m over 25mg of sugar. My question: should I not count fruit sugar?dstedman62 wrote: »First off, do you subscribe to myfitnesspale? If you do, then you should know how my sugar goal is calculated. No, I'm not a diabetic. I simply asked if I should count the sugar calories in fruit.
I don't see how MFP gave you 25 g of sugar per day. Even when I put my calories as low as 1200 per day, (and use the default macros) I get 84 g of sugar.
I'm very confused now, why is my goal so much lower with a higher calorie allowance? And my saturated fat number is lower as well
Had you edited them at any point in the past?
PS my goal/limit of 60gr seems to be in line with MFP's default of 15% of calorie intake:
https://support.myfitnesspal.com/hc/en-us/articles/360032626031-A-Message-about-MyFitnessPal-s-updated-nutrition-goals0 -
AnnPT77 Thx you so much for your insightful knowledge. I will hide the sugar values that way I won't be fixated on them. 🥰2
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