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Most of us love sweets and we all have our favorites: moist chocolate cake covered in frosting, a towering cone of peppermint stick ice cream, or some delectable sugar cookies perfect for dipping in milk. Whatever your poison, our modern supermarket can supply it in cheap abundance. And it turns out those sweets truly are poison, especially if you overdo it.
Natural health advocates have been saying it for 100 years: sugar is dangerous. It has taken some time but finally the mainstream media such as the New York Times has caught on, thanks in large part to a new study in the journal PLoS One that strongly links increased sugar consumption with increased rates of diabetes. One important take away from this study: you don’t have to be obese to get diabetes. Just eating too much sugar can cause it too. And, the double-edged sword: even if you didn’t start out obese, eating too much sugar can cause you to gain weight, especially in the belly. Worth taking note of here is that sugar doesn’t mean just white table or baking sugar: corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, and sodas all count. So do supposedly healthy sugars that are sometimes added to “health food”: fructose, dextrose, concentrated fruit juice. You really have to become a label detective, since the food manufacturers know that sugar will make you want to eat and buy more of whatever they’re selling.
So how do you protect yourself from diabetes and your waistline from extra inches and pounds? Smart food choices are your best defense.
Healthy carbohydrates such as whole grains (whole wheat bread, brown rice, oatmeal, for instance) and beans and legumes (soy, navy, and kidney beans, and chickpeas, lentils and peas, for instance) are a great place to start. But all the bad carbohydrates have a lot in common with sugars. You can add white flour and white rice to the refined carbohydrate list, and pile them all on the list of what not to eat.
Refined sugars and refined carbohydrates are high on our list of “foods” that contribute to PMS and PMDD symptoms: all contribute to blood sugar spikes and moodiness, and can lead you down the path to hypoglycemia and even eventually diabetes, as we have now learned—conclusively.
