Sugar Is Killing Us — and Our Kids, Too

Most of us think sugar adds sweetness to life, but nothing could be farther from the truth.

Sugar is an artificial food that is not only addictive, it causes diabetes and weight gain.

Ask anyone who “needs” that boost of a Coke at 4 p.m. or who can’t get through a day without a donut or piece of cake or handful of cookies.

What’s happening when you get that sugar jolt? The sugar travels fairly quickly through your system and gets to your brain, which loves sugar because it actually causes a “high.”

Sugar highs and lows

The high doesn’t last long because blood sugars begin to crash and so, a couple of hours later, you find yourself looking for another sugar high. Maybe this time it’s a cocktail or a pre-dinner snack because you’re tired and need energy to get dinner ready. Dinner, presumably containing a little protein, will even out the sugars for a few hours, but the inevitable crash comes again, perhaps just before bedtime, so you need a little “midnight snack,” and on and on.

If you think you’re not addicted to sugar, try this test: Go completely without sugar for three days. If you don’t want it, crave it and eventually find yourself feeling cranky, sleepy and unfocussed, you’re not addicted. But if you’re like the average Joe who eats 1/4 pound of sugar every day, you’re addicted.

What is this doing to your body?

Insulin resistance

Well, among other things, it’s causing insulin resistance. That means your pancreas is producing the insulin you need to properly metabolize glucose in its many forms, but your body has lost the tools it needs to balance out those sugars, causing a vicious cycle of high blood sugar, sugar crashes, low blood sugar and sugar cravings which, when they’re satisfied, lead to sugar highs and crashes. Over and over until your body can no longer handle sugars at all.

You can find this and lots more at Dr. Scott Olson’s website.

Obesity

Among other things, that sugar is making you fat. Yes, sugar is in itself high in calories and completely without any nutritional value. But even worse, the most common types of sugars like high fructose corn syrup actually convert to fat much more quickly than any other type of food.

Genetic damage?

Now comes a new piece of research that suggests that sugar not only hurts you, it can hurt your children and grandchildren.

No, I’m not talking about Moms and Nanas who stuff the kids and grandkids with sweets. I’m talking about sugar causing genetic damage.

The Australian research team found that one hit of sugar can affect you for as long as two weeks. Furthermore, regularly eating sugar can actually cause permanent genetic damage that passed along bloodlines.

“We now know that chocolate bar you had this morning can have very acute effect, and those effects can continue to up to two weeks,” said lead researcher Sam El-Osta, for Australia’s Baker IDI Heart and Diabetes Institute.

Regular poor eating habits amplify the sugar damage, said El-Osta, with genetic damage that can last month or years and can potentially be passed along bloodlines into children.

If you can’t stop eating sugar for yourself, do it for your future children.