Is this your breakfast, or could it be?
Could you be eating the equivalent of this for breakfast?
This piece of chocolate cake contains roughly the same amount of sugar as eight of the top selling breakfast cereals.
That is not including the extra sugar put on top of your breakfast cereal, so many people do this before eating.
Actually when sugar is added, it can contain more sugar than a piece of chocolate cake.
Shocking!
We are as a nation addicted to this substance.
SUGAR!
Its hidden in foods so when we try to avoid it we are tricked into having It again. Avoiding processed foods or at least cutting back is essential if you want to maintain a healthy lifestyle.
The world demand for this amazing sweet white stuff is the primary driver of sugar cane agriculture.
Cane accounts for 80% of sugar produced most of the rest is made from sugar beets.
Little bit of history.
Christopher Columbus was an Italian explorer and he left for the new world on his second journey (1492/1493) which is the most apt sentence for this post. This is because he carried sugarcane seedlings with him, to an area where sugarcane was not native. It was cultivated in Santo Domingo.
Now if you wish to read more on sugar cane and it’s interesting history click below
https://www.livescience.com/4949-sugar-changed-world.html
Ok back to the family breakfasts!
So most of us wouldn’t start the day off with a piece of breakfast chocolate cake, did you know that to your body, most breakfast cereals are the same as starting your body off on chocolate cake. The body will still react the same.
Lets have a look at what happens.
1/You eat sugar (YUM) your taste buds go crazy with messages to the brain saying YUM YUM YUM YUMMMMMMM!
2/Dopamine is released as a reward. (The “I feel good” emotion after cake is eaten)
3/The sugar lands in the stomach and is diluted by digestive juices
4/It’s then shuttled into your small intestine and broken into two molecules
5/Fructose and Glucose are those two molecules
Most added sugar comes from sugar cane or sugar beets and is equal parts glucose and fructose.
HFCS that you see on labels is high fructose corn syrup, this is a lab processed sugar and will hit the body hard as its fructose and glucose are processed.
6/Glucose will seep through small intestine and trigger an insulin response.
Glucose is used for energy, some foods contain so much it can give you a temporary high. Chocolate cake for example.
7/Fructose seeps through the small intestine too into the bloodstream but delivers fructose directly to the liver
8/The liver works hard trying to use the fructose as best it can, the liver can easily be overwhelmed if you keep supplying it with fructose.
9/Too much fructose also lowers HDL, or “good” cholesterol, and spurs the production of triglycerides, a type of fat that can migrate from the liver to the arteries, raising your risk for heart attacks or strokes.
10/Now the liver needs the pancreas to help out and sends an SOS and the pancreas then is in overdrive. Stressed and over whelmed too.
All in all this leads to Inflammation in the body and that in itself comes with an entirely new post on obesity and diabetes.
Not great if this is happening all the time:(
You cannot out run a bad diet.
Now what if you ate an apple?
Thats 15 grams of sugar?
Ok it is fructose, to the body though its still sugar.
The same sugar content as Freddo here.
fibre
How does that make sense?
Refined sugar which is what freddo is, is processed quicker.
The body breaks down refined sugar rapidly, causing insulin and blood sugar levels to skyrocket. Because refined sugar is digested quickly, you don’t feel full after you’ve eaten. It doesn’t matter how many calories you consumed.
Luckily the difference is that the fibre in fruit slows down metabolism, as fruit in the gut expands to make you feel fuller.
BAD NEWS
Once the sugar passes through the stomach and reaches the small intestine, it doesn’t really matter if it came from an apple or freddo. The sugar spike is still a spike leading to inflammation further along the line.
WHAT TO DO?
Accompany fruit with a few nuts. This will stabilise blood sugar and reap the benefits of the added protein to the snack.
Nut butter/seeds butter on the apple slices or banana.
A boiled egg with some pomegranate seeds.
So many ways to avoid the blood sugar spikes.
Don’t think if you eat a few nuts you can eat a chocolate bar too.
Aha…. I could sense people thinking that.
My last Hertford Nutrition group tried this one on me;)xxx
It’s not the same, sorry!
If you would like to have a friendly chat over ways to avoid refined sugar and how to balance your blood sugar levels by taking easy steps.
Please email direct.
maria1tait@gmail.com
Have a great weekend
Maria
x
Ref used….cancer centre.com
drMercola.com
