Sugar is something we as humans all have indulged in and enjoyed. For the most part, it is usually viewed as a treat or reward for something, maybe something you have after a nice dinner for dessert, it's a very enjoyable experience. There is also the well known fact that too much sugar is bad, our moms would tell us it would rot our teeth while she made us ration our halloween candy but how bad is sugar for us? What if I told you it is very possible to become addicted to sugar? Let's take a closer look at sugar.
How Does Sugar Affect Our Brain?
Think about when it's dessert time and you order that ice cream or eat those delicious cookies. Upon the first bite it legitimately makes you feel good. There's a reason behind that, sugar released a large amount of dopamine into your brain. Dopamine is the chemical that tells your brain to experience pleasure. So when you are eating those sweets the reason it is so enjoyable is that the sugar is actually letting a flood of dopamine into your brain. Who doesn't want that?
What Can Sugar Do To The Body?
Sugar can really have quite the impact on ones body. A big reason our country is facing an obesity problem is because of our overindulgence of sugar. Sugar packs a lot of calories into it but they are very empty calories meaning your body does not need it and therefore doesn't use/burn them. So where do those unused calories go? They stick inside you can make you heavier! Sugar also can give you a quick energy spike which feels nice but shortly after that our cells suck up all that sugar which results in us getting a nasty crash feeling that nobody likes.
What To Do About Sugar?
The American Heart Association recommends people to have 9 teaspoons of sugar at the most. Americans average out to 3 lbs of sugar per week. A staggering number when you look at it like that. It's not fair nor logical to try and completely cut out sugar but the best thing you can do is to start reading food nutritional value labels. Next time you go shopping, read each label to anything you are considering buying and you will be appalled at what the sugar content is in some items. Even items that are claiming to be healthy! Reading food labels can begin a certain lifestyle for yourself where you are much more aware of what you are putting into your body. Being more aware doesn't mean never look at sweets ever again, but to only treat yourself once in a while instead of every day.
Cutting back on sugar can have wonderful results in your mood, weight, energy levels, and many other things. The hardest part is the first few days, find someone to hold you accountable for cutting out sugar or find someone who wants to do it with you!
Comments (0)