Are you a sugar addict? I am.
In 2005 I vowed to quit and began
writing about life without sweets.
This site contains a forum,
product reviews, my journal,
educational Sugar Challenges,
and the Stop Being Sweet ebook.

I Made It Through Another Wedding

August 09, 2009 • Comments (4)

I attended a wedding this weekend. The dessert table was pretty well filled but it was the chocolate cake that attracted my attention. It was a particularly rich (so I was told) chocolate cake that smelled really nice. I didn’t eat it, but boy did I want to.

That looks delicious.

One of the guests at our table commented on how she has met people who claim they don’t like sweets. She said they must be from Mars. I said I don’t believe them. People who claim to not like sweets probably aren’t into chocolate things but they’re probably into something sweet. Some folks lean towards vanilla and berry-flavored stuff. Just because they don’t eat candy doesn’t mean they don’t like sweets. I think humans are hard-wired for eating sweet things.

I can last about a year without sweets before I start to get cravings that push me to the edge of my limit. This summer has gone by surprisingly easier than summers past. I even thought at some point that I’d completely skip eating anything sweet this Halloween. But right about now it doesn’t look like I’ll miss my window of opportunity to at least have some rich chocolate.

One thing is for certain, I am not going to binge on sugar this time around—no, I can’t totally say that for certain. It’s quite possible I’ll eat lots of sugar. I don’t know. But I do know that eating sugar only four days out of each year has changed and continues to change my life for the better. Whatever sugars I eat this year I will balance with real food.

What would your life be like if you stayed away from sugar at least most of the time?

Posted in My Personal Journal on 08/09/09 • Comment

I Still Crave Sweets

June 07, 2009 • Comments (7)

It has been years since I’ve eaten sugar on a regular basis. Still, to this day, when things get stressful I walk into the kitchen and stare at the cupboards. I’m after something. It’s sugar.

Sugar graph

Last night I was telling a friend about how I used to drink iced tea made with powdered ice tea mix. We used to drink the stuff more than water. My friend and I recalled getting to the end of the water part and then drinking up the sugar layer at the bottom.

In my life, I’ve been a sugar fiend longer than I haven’t. The majority of my years have been spent eating and drinking sweets. This whole “no sugar” lifestyle is still relatively new to me. If I were to pie graph my life there’d be a larger area devoted to eating sugar than not.

But that’s not going to stop me.

By the time I’ve lived my entire life, I want at least half of that pie to be sugar free.

Sugar graph

If given the choice, it would seem that living the earlier stages of life without sugar would be the way to go. That way your bones, muscles, and organs would develop sans-sweets. However, for most people, it works the other way around. I’m now attempting to reverse the effects from years of sugar consumption. It’s a slow process.

There will never be a way to tell for certain, but I wonder if I would live longer had I not eaten all that sugar.

What does your pie look like? How many years are you going to remain a sugar addict?

Posted in My Personal Journal on 06/07/09 • Comment

When Did You Discover You Had A Problem?

May 29, 2009 • Comments (2)

It was the nineties and I was conducting computer training at the United States Social Security Administration. There were a team of trainers showing the SSA employees how to use the latest and greatest thing—Microsoft Windows. During lunch break the training team would slip out of the building, down the the streets of Philadelphia’s old town, and grab a bite to eat.

One particular day I had ordered a sandwich and also purchased three giant cookies that came bundled together in plastic wrap. Toward the end of lunch I began to eat the first of the three cookies when it occurred to me that the polite thing to do would be to offer some to the rest of the team. I felt a sense of relief when everyone turned me down because that meant the 3 cookies were all mine. And I ate them, all of them.

As I was finishing up the last of the three cookies one of my coworkers, whose name I cannot recall but whose attitude I can, said something snide about how I scoffed down a whole lot of sugar. I felt badly about eating sweets in a way I had never felt before. That was the first time I had any inkling that my sugar consumption wasn’t normal.

It wasn’t until years later that I realized I had a problem. After a particularly heavy binge I tried to avoid chocolate and sweet snacks for one month. During that time I found myself automatically walking to the kitchen more times than I could count. I noticed how much money I was dropping at Rite Aid on chocolate covered pretzels. What’s more, since I wasn’t eating those foods, I began to transfer my addictive behavior to other sweet foods. That’s when I knew something was up. It took me another several years of trying before I stayed off sugar for any length of time.

Posted in Sweet Stories on 05/29/09 • Comment

Check Out Sugar Stacks

May 07, 2009 • Comments (1)

I’m not sure who they are, but the people behind Sugar Stacks must hate corporate-pushed sugar addiction as much as I!

The website simply shows images of products along with a corresponding amount of sugar cubes representing the amount of sugar in that product, like so:

They’ve also started a new blog called Sugar Delirium that’s worth the read.

I find it interesting that the authors of the site have chosen to remain anonymous (at the time of this writing). Perhaps they’re worried that large corporations will come after them. It sounds like a movie, doesn’t it?

“Corporate hit men raid renegade anti-sugar group’s offices. Says anti-sugar propaganda website was damaging their credibility. The unsweet terrorists have been detained and are being water boarded with High Fructose Corn Syrup. Officials anticipate the terrorists will soon give up the password to their website so the sugar companies can erase the offending website.”

Posted in Tips, Tricks, Info & News on 05/07/09 • Comment

Sugar Challenge: May 2009

May 03, 2009

If you’re still eating sweets (who knows why you would want to do that) then this is challenge is a simple and straight forward spring challenge.

Imagine that sugar is The Stuff* and do not eat it!

I’m serious, pretend that sugar is a monster that will kill you.

Avoid it at all costs. If you happen to eat the stuff, notice how it affects you. It will make you want more and more and you will tell your friends to eat the stuff.

Do whatever it takes to avoid the stuff for one whole month.

* Don’t know what The Stuff is? Watch this video: