Everything You Don’t Know About Sugar

While it may taste good, sugar can actually inflict serious damage on your body.

By Susan B. Sloane, BS, RPh, CDE
Sugar is found in countless foods and goes by many names including dextrose, maltose, fructose, and sucrose, to name just a few. Nowadays, sugar is found in several different food products, many of which may surprise you. Tomato sauce, yogurt, dried fruit, and granola bars are just a few of the common foods that may contain sugar you don’t know about.

Sugar: A Sweet Addiction?
If you enjoy sweet drinks and snacks, you may have often thought to yourself, “I am addicted to sugar.” This is not very far from the truth, as sugar can actually be addictive. Sugar consumption stimulates the body to overproduce dopamine – a pleasure hormone – which causes the body to crave more sugar, and the cycle continues. In this way, sugar behaves like a drug.

In addition, sugars activate sweet taste receptors, sending signals to the brain’s cerebral cortex which activates a reward center in the brain. This gives you the warm and fuzzy feeling we are all familiar with when we eat sweets. If you over-activate this system by eating more and more sugar, you’ll develop a loss of control, craving, and tolerance to sugary foods.

Understanding the Dangers of Sugar
Sugar also stimulates insulin production, which can cause an eventual “burnout” of the pancreas’ ability to produce insulin, which can lead to diabetes. Sugar receptors are found in the mouth and also in the gut. After glucose levels spike, your body may experience a large dip or crash; that dip can leave you feeling weak, shaky, irritable, and leave you with an inability to concentrate.

Refined sugar is found in many food products that contain “simple carbohydrates.” These are carbohydrates that are capable of rapidly breaking down in the body to deliver a burst of sugar, which causes insulin to spike. This can increase the risk of developing diabetes or worsen an existing case of diabetes. Foods that cause glucose spikes include white bread, white rice, pastries, and white pasta. These spikes cause an inflammatory response, which can damage the body.

You may have frequently heard that sugary foods contain a lot of empty calories. This refers to the fact that foods high in sugar content have, in general, very little nutrient value, and eating these foods can lead to weight gain. Protein is stored in the muscle, but sugars are stored as fat in the body, especially around the abdomen.

How Much Sugar is Advised?
Whether intentionally or otherwise, we often consume more than the recommended nutritional values of sugar. The World Health Organization recommends that no more than 5% of daily calorie intake should be from added sugar. In fact, the typical American diet has a whopping 13% of calories from added sugar!

Read your food labels so that you know how much sugar is in the food you are buying. Believe it or not, 74% of packaged foods in supermarkets contain added sugar in one form or another!

Sugar for Thinking Clearly? Think Again.
Some people think that sugary foods make them think more clearly. But evidence shows that the truth may be just the opposite; a study conducted at UCLA in 2012, found that a diet high in sugar actually slows down the brain. Additional studies have even linked sugar consumption to the development of Alzheimer’s disease.[1]

If this information isn’t enough to deter you from eating too much sugar, consider this: Excess sugar consumption can potentially cause premature aging.[2] Yes, you can get those wrinkles from too much sugar!

What About Natural Sugar?
Natural sugars like those found in fruit and milk products don’t behave like added sugars, and these can be incorporated into a healthy diet plan. Many foods, such as apples and oranges, contain natural sugar as well as healthy fiber, which slows the absorption of sugars in the body and helps reduce blood sugar spikes.

It is not only important for people with diabetes to avoid eating large amounts of sugar, but it is important for everyone’s overall health to eat a balanced diet, low in added sugars. So, keep an eye on those nutrition labels, and be sure to understand exactly what you’re putting in your body.

Staying on Track with Dario
Food is an essential part of our lives and making wise choices can help you can stay on track to a healthy life. The Dario mobile app can be a powerful tool to help balance your eating and keep your carb intake in check. Use Dario to start spotting patterns and trends between your food and blood glucose levels!

Next Step: Discover Food Tricks for YOUR Body
Get the one-on-one help you need to find the techniques that work for you, based on your expectations, your goals, and your lifestyle. It’s all here for you in a special Hand-in-Hand Coaching Package, available now. By working with me, as a CDE, you’ll learn how to read between the numbers and understand more about how foods affect your unique body. Click here to learn more and sign up.

I look forward to meeting you!