Lets face it, sugar is in everything and to take it out of your daily diet would be a huge task, and very challenging, not impossible, but very challenging. It’s in everything, tomato sauce, bread, cereals, fruits, milk, you name it and there’s a good chance it has sugar. What’s important to know is the difference between processed sugars, and natural sugars or fructose. I’m going to give you four reasons to cut back your sugar intake immediately today. There’s hundreds of reasons why you should, but these four will give you more insight into how it affects your body and why we should protect ourselves from something we’re all very addicted to.
1. Very High in Fructose, which is very harmful to the liver
Lets start with what sugar is made of so you have a better idea of why it can affect us.
Glucose and Fructose are two simple sugars that sugar is broken down into before they enter the bloodstream from the digestive tract.
What is Glucose? Glucose can be found in all living cells. When we don’t get enough in our diet our bodies will naturally produce it.
What is Fructose? Fructose is not the same. The body does not produce it in any noticeable amount and there is no physical need for it.
With fructose the thing to know is that it can only be metabolized by the liver in any significant amounts.
This wont be an issue if you eat it in small amounts, say you had a serving of fruit. When this happens, fructose will be turned into glycogen and stored in the liver until we need it for energy.
Its important to know, if the liver is full of glycogen, eating a lot of fructose overloads the liver, forcing it to turn the fructose into fat.
When repeatedly eating large amounts of sugar, this process can lead to fatty liver and many serious health problems
People who are healthy and active can tolerate more sugar than people who are inactive and eat a Western, high-carb, high-calorie diet.
The important thing to take here is that if you’re not living an active lifestyle, large amounts of fructose will be turned into fat in the liver.
2. The Leading Contributor to Adult and Child Obesity is SUGAR
The biggest reason we have such an obesity epidemic in this country is the way sugar affects hormones and the brain, really is a recipe for over weight disaster.
It leads to decreased satiety, it leads to people becoming addicted so that they lose control over their consumption and gorge!
No matter your age group, people who consume the most sugar are by far the most likely to become overweight or obese.
Recent studies have especially shown this to be strong in your children, where each daily serving of sugar-sweetened beverages increases the risk of obesity by a HUGE 60%.
The best thing you can do for yourself and your family is to cut back on the amount of sugar that you’re consuming daily.
3. Insulin Resistance can be caused by sugar and can lead to Diabetes and Metabolic Syndrome
One of the more important hormones in the body is insulin.
Insulin allows glucose to get into the cells through the bloodstream and communicates to the cells to start burning glucose instead of fat.
Too much glucose in the blood is very toxic to the body and a big reason people have diabetes complications.
Insulin Resistance is when the body stop producing insulin, and is believed to be a leading driver of many diseases… including type 2 diabetes, metabolic syndrome, obesity, and cardiovascular disease
A lot of studies have shown that sugar consumption is associated with insulin resistance, especially when it is consumed in large amounts
So when you eat a lot of sugar you’re messing with and causing resistance to the hormone insulin, which is a leading factor for many diseases.
4. Sugar DOES lead to cancer spreading in the body
Hopefully this one waves the flag for you!
Cancer is one of the leading causes of death worldwide and is characterized by uncontrolled growth and multiplication of cells.
Insulin is one of the key hormones in regulating this sort of growth.
Because of this many scientists believe that having constantly elevated insulin levels, due to high sugar intake, can contribute to cancer spreading faster.
Also, the metabolic problems associated with sugar consumption a leading contributer of inflammation, another potential cause of cancer
Many studies show that people who eat a lot of sugar are absolutely at a high risk of getting cancer and having it spread through the body faster
So with all the studies showing evidence that sugars harmful effects on metabolism can contribute to cancer, its very important that we are more and more careful about how much sugar we are consuming daily!
READ THE LABELS AND LOOK TO SEE JUST HOW MUCH SUGAR YOU’RE EATING!
