So Sugar Is Bad(?): What Happens When You Avoid It
You've decided to avoid sugar. You’ve read it is bad for you, is fattening and your goal is good health. To avoid sugar, you must look out for it, watch for it, read lables looking for it. But something odd happens.
As you work to avoid sugar, you are actually thinking about it more. And it seems sugar is in everything. In fact, sometimes sugar is the first thing you look for on a label of a new food.
You may have been trying to fix sugar cravings. And you avoid it successfully for a while. But then you start to crave the very foods you were avoiding. You begin to wonder if you can trust yourself -- you set up what seemed to be reasonable parameters to keep your eating on track, and you end up feeling more and more out-of-control. What is going on?!
Sugar and Flying
To understand, let's move away from the topic of food and consider the same scenario with something less emotionally charged than food, such as flying.
Let’s say there is a person who is avoids flying. Maybe she is afraid, maybe she dislikes it; regardless, she doesn't go anywhere that involves flying. Now let’s say she wins a trip to Hawaii that includes airfare from her home in New York.
When she gets this amazing news, what do you think is the first thing she thinks about? Not the gorgeous beaches or beautiful water. Not the hike up the volcano or wonderful meals. She’s thinking about how she would have to fly to get there. "I don't want to fly, is there another way to get there? Can I take a boat? Maybe I should just cancel the trip. Or what if I can can she get some Xanax? That's probably not strong enough. I'll bring some alcohol as well. Maybe I can tolerate the flying then. I really want to go to Hawaii, but OMG, the FLYING!!!!"
Her need to avoid flying makes her think about flying.
Now consider a friend who doesn't love flying, nor does she hate it. Sometimes its fun, mostly it’s neutral. She wins a trip to Hawaii, what is she thinking about? She immediately begins planning the trip, thinking about who she is taking with her, about swimming in those amazing waters, having a drink at the tiki hut, what beaches they will be visiting, etc.
The person who is wants to avoid flying actually thinks about it more than the person who finds flying neutral! The same thing happens with food. The more you try to avoid a food, the more you will think about it. Maybe not today, but eventually.
At the core of the problem is the dichotomy of good/bad, healthy/unhealthy food we use in this culture, ostensibly to keep us on track with healthy eating. But this same dichotomy can be a set up when you feel you must steer clear of the foods labeled bad.
You can fix this by not labeling a food as bad, but instead viewing foods as neutral. You can do this when you realize labeling a food as good or bad causes you to miss a wide variety of variables, all of which impact your health. A food which may benefit you nutritionally one day may not benefit you the next. With this shift in focus, rather than point to the food as the culprit, you must pay attention to your needs and your relationship with the food. Only then can you truly determine if a food will truly nourish you or not.
For instance, if you ate large amounts of vegetables one day, and you have a choice of a hamburger or veggie-stuffed salad for dinner, you may be better off with the burger, which provides nutrients that eating more vegetables could not provide adequately, such as protein and iron.
On the other hand, what if you are very hungry but have been called to a meeting that will likely last at least 2 hours. The only thing available is a chocolate chip muffin. You would be better off eating the cake-like muffin to tide you over than skipping it and ending the meeting ravenous, grabbing whatever you can because your resolve has been pummeled by your extreme hunger.
Sometimes, nutrition must be measured is ways well beyond protein and vitamin D and caloric content. Sometimes you need to take a broader perspective when deciding how to meet your nutritional needs. A good place to start is to quit looking at food as good/bad, and begin looking at it in context with your personal needs and your life.
About Eating Wisdom and Drs Karin and Hannah
We are two PhD level Registered and Licensed Nutritionists whose passion is to help others escape diet culture and to learn to use their natural, innate Eating Wisdom to, finally, find peace with food, eating and weight.
Check out our course, Intuitive Eating: How to Escape Diet Culture and Become an Empowered Eater,. plus we have lots of info and handouts (including the original Hunger Fullness Scale) at our website, www.EatingWisdom.com. We also offer 1:1 nutrition therapy. Take advantage of our combined 40+ years of experience and reach out today!
© 2017 Karin Kratina, PhD, RD, LDN. Adapted from the work of Amy Tuttle RD, LCSW and Karin Kratina.