My Sweet(s) Story
My name is David. I was am a sugar addict.
For over ten years, I’ve abstained from sugar throughout the year, and eaten whatever I wanted for the few days between Halloween and my birthday on November 3rd.
It all began on a cross-country road trip in 2003 when I purchased and ate six boxes of Girl Scout cookies in one day. Realizing I had a problem, I promised myself I wouldn’t eat any sweets until the Girl Scout cookies appeared for sale the following year.
Those nine months were the longest I’d ever abstained from sugary junk food, and it started me on a roller coaster ride of abstinence and indulgence.
In 2005, I started StopBeingSweet.com as a personal blog detailing my attempt to quit sugar. Blogs were all the rage back then, and people began to email me from all over the world to asking me how they could successfully avoid sugary junk food as I had. My blog helped thousands of people figure out how to cut down their sugar intake.
The whole experience was a wild ride: I ran workshops, support group meetings, and sugar-free challenges. I grew a mailing list, posted weekly blog posts to the website, offered online coaching, built an online forum, and wrote and sold an ebook.
Stop Being Sweet talks were given at Whole Foods, Umpqua Bank, Oregon Health and Science University, and Heritage Point. The project was covered in the Oregonian, Culinate, the Portland Tribune, on KATU TV, and I was a guest on NPR’s Think Out Loud radio show.
A few years ago the web hosting company that hosted Stop Being Sweet went out of business. I had to take the site offline (long story).
While the site was offline, I found myself slipping back into my old habits more easily. Practicing a skill with other people means exchanging ideas, offering and receiving support, and finding community helps us grow. I am slowly rebuilding this website, but this time not as a blog.