Sugar Toxicity

By:  Maria




Perhaps one of the dangerous and even toxic substance we frequently and routinely put into our bodies, is sugar.

On average, an American adult consumes 22 teaspoons of sugar per day and teens consume 34 teaspoons of  sugar per day.  That's staggering, considering the American Heart Association recommends women get only 6.5 teaspoons of added sugar per day and men get only 9.5 teaspoons per day!

When you think about it, however, you can see how easily one could exceed the daily recommended allowances when you consider the following common foods/beverages consumed each day (keep in mind, most people typically consume more than the servings shown below in one sitting):

• 12 oz. can of soda.............................8-12 teaspoons
• Popular breakfast bars (1 bar)..........3-6 teaspoons
• Yogurt (1/2 cup)...............................3-6 teaspoons
• Flavored Vitamin Water (12 oz).......6-8 teaspoons
• Frozen Yogurt Vanilla (1/2 cup).......8-10 teaspoons
• Snapple Ice Tea (12 oz)....................12-14 teaspoons
• Minute Maid Lemonade (12 oz).......13-17 teaspoons

Virtually all processed foods contain a significant amount of added sugar.  Which means, if you're relying on processed foods for the bulk of your nutrition, you are getting enough added sugar to send your health into a crisis situation at some point in your life.

Why?  Consider the follwing:

When you eat food containing added sugar, the rapid absorption of sugar causes a monumental release of insulin. Insulin causes fat metabolism to cease (i.e., your body's ability to utilize fat for fuel) and fat storage to begin. Insulin increases cholesterol reaction in the liver and raises cholesterol levels, particularly bad cholesterol (LDL Cholesterol). Insulin increases inflammation. The constant presence of insulin in our blood leads to insulin insensitivity and this leads to high blood levels of sugar and a state of diabetes, vascular, kidney disease, heart diseases and neurodegenerative diseases. All of these bad events from ingesting too much sugar!!! If you control sugar intake, you will, without question, improve your health.

Here's a relatively easy experiment:

For 1 day, take notes on every food and beverage you consume and figure out how many servings you are consuming per food/beverage item, the grams of sugar per serving and total all numbers for the day.  The results may surprise you.

If you're still not convinced, take a look at this 60 Minutes video on the topic of Sugar.  It's worth the time to listen, trust me.