5 Ways I Cut Sugar Back In My Diet

One of the things I have struggled with in my life, is sugar consumption.  If I tried to cut back on sugar from my diet, it would come at me like a zillion monsters attacking me.  The more I tried, the more I failed.

Before a dear friend passed away from cancer, one of the last things she said to me was, "cut sugar out".  It hit me hard and I know that she was correct.

Sugar is great.  It tastes so good.  It is addictive.  It gives me a high.  I love it.  I love it.  I love it and I want more of it.

Unfortunately, too much sugar is not healthy for the body in what I've learned.  No, I'm not some doctor of nutrition or anything like that.  I'm really speaking about my own understanding and comprehension.

So, here I am trying to get off the stuff and the harder I tried, it came back at me like a boomerang effect.  The more I tried, the more I craved it and then it left me feeling horrible and weak and defeated.  I knew there had to be a way.

Here's what I did.  While this may not work for everyone, maybe something in what I'm writing about will help you.

1. Mind Body and Mindfulness 

   This was not about some thought philosophy or mantras or meditation.  Not that those things don't help because they do.  What I'm referring to here is something more than the standard mind body and mindfulness thinking we all preach that we do.  In this case, I went in and started working hard on my inner self and from a cellular body component, I learned to release and let go of things.  It was about using Unified Therapy to go in and face the fears and demons of my past so that I could reclaim my life.  These things are essential for true growth into awareness and consciousness.

2. Mindful Of What You Eat

   What I mean by mindful is to be consciously aware of what you eat.  It isn't about chastising yourself and saying "I screwed up".  It isn't about counting calories or how much you consume or finding something to beat yourself up on.  It is about observing and noticing how much sugar you eat.  Become aware of the sugar content and sources in the stuff you buy.  You'll be surprised at how much sugar is in things you would not think it was.  Just observe and be aware of it.

3. What can you cut back?

   Normally there is something you can cut back that starts to drop the sugar consumption.  Make it something that is small and you think you can do without.  See if you can go a day or a few days, then maybe a week and a few weeks.  Try it small, build up on the success and use that to help motivate you further.  For me, I stopped buying these big bags of candy and having them sit around at my house.  If they were in the house, I was going to eat them.  By not having them at my house, it made it much easier to just say no.

4. The First Thing You Eat

   I noticed and found this by an odd observation, that if the first thing I ate in the morning had no sugar, it helped me the rest of the day.  Without that sugar fix first thing, my taste buds and neural pathways had a fighting chance.  It is almost like my brain found a new pathway to what I ate, rather than getting the early morning addictive fix which set me up for the rest of the day.  The more I did this, even if I followed it by some sugar in cereal or something else, I was more empowered.  I found I ate less sugary stuff and had less of a desire for it if the first thing I hate was without sugar.  I've checked this out a few times on myself and I get the same result.
   
   

5. Splurge

   As much as you may want to cut sugar out completely, sometimes you just have to let yourself go and splurge.  If I said to myself that tomorrow there will be absolutely no more sugar, I'm sure I would be beating myself up very hard.  If I just work to cut it back but allow myself to splurge every ONCE in awhile, then I've got the control.  I'm empowered.  Now, I don't mean splurge every day, but begin to limit it.  

Find alternative sugar and sweet sources that are healthy and delicious.  By searching for these things and reading the ingredients on labels of the foodstuffs you buy, you'll be helping yourself help yourself.  Don't just replace sugar with something that is not healthy because there are far too many products that I don't believe are as good for you as they claim to be.

I think we all chastise ourselves far too much and the shame just fuels what we eat, including the sugar we take in.  Sugar is very addictive and I'm sorry if the sugar industry does not like that, but if you see how much is added to everything we eat, I think the evidence speaks for itself.  If the sugar industry really cared about health, they'd be trying to put themselves out of business.

A little sugar can be good, but right now we are addicted to sugar.  The obesity and diabetes rates have skyrocketed which I feel are a direct result of sugar.  If you can just cut the amount of sugar down in your diet, you done so much for yourself to make your mind and body healthier.

These are 5 ways I used to cut sugar back in my diet.  What have you tried that helps you?  Let's all learn together.  Leave a comment of what has worked personally for you.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
• You are welcomed to share the LINK to this blog post.  

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Movement Does A Body Good

We all know this.  It isn't anything new, is it?  Yet, it seems like we all forget about it.  We go through life, sitting on our backsides far too much.  Whether its at the office all day long, or at home in front of the TV and the computer, we are far too sedentary.

Movement does a body good, but in order to do that, you've got to get yourself moving.  You need activity.  Exercise is often considered a negative word and people don't do it, but if you just take a 15 minute walk every day or twice a day, it could really change your life.

I know, I'm just as guilty as the next person.  I either get to busy and forget to do it or I just don't make time to move and get active.  So, while I'm writing this to the "collective blogosphere", I'm really writing this to myself.

Yet, I'm not going to let you off the hook that easily.

We as a society are far too sedentary and it is affecting the health of our country.  If you really want to do something for your health, get moving.  Studies show that you'll help ease chronic pain, diabetes, obesity and weight issues plus overall, you'll just feel better.  Movement does a body good!

You don't have to make it elaborate!  Just get moving your body.  Get out there and find whatever it is that you like to do, and do it.  It could be a 15 minute walk in the morning or at night.  Maybe even taking 15 minutes and going for a walk at lunch could do so much for your mind and body that you would improve your health and well being drastically.

If you're like most, you probably say, but I'm too busy.  I don't doubt that, but if you keep running your car without an oil change, what will most likely happen?  You'll have a major repair.  The same goes for the body.  If you keep pushing it without taking care of it, sooner or later you'll be sitting in the doctor's office with some major health condition.

Find a time, any time of the day that works and make your activity simple.  We all have a few minutes at some point in the day.  Take five minutes every hour and walk up and down several flights of stairs in your office building.  Take 15 minutes at lunch and walk around your office building or workplace.  It can be that easy and it can make a big difference.

I'm personally going to start trying to walk 15 minutes a day in the evening.  It will help me clear my mind and sort of draw my day to an end.  It will give me some activity that may very likely prevent some major health conditions showing up.  Statistics show that if we don't get activity (or exercise) in frequently, we're just setting ourselves up for major medical costs.

So, will you join with me and start doing some activity each day?  Go ahead and leave a comment below and together we can have a great impact on our health.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2016 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
• You are welcomed to share the LINK to this blog post.  

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The Bomb In The Brain

I found this study done on Adverse Childhood Experiences based upon Childhood Abuse. There is a ton of information in this presentation but it really shows the affects of child abuse on the person as they grow older.

To find out what your Adverse Childhood Experience (ACE) score is, go to the following link: www.acestudy.org/calcuator

According to the website of this information, www.acestudy.org , an ACE is described below.

Please note that the above links are no longer valid.  For detailed information on the study, go to http://mindbodythoughts.blogspot.com/2017/01/adverse-childhood-experiences-ace-study.htmll

Growing up experiencing any of the following conditions in the household prior to age 18:
-Recurrent physical abuse
-Recurrent emotional abuse
-Contact sexual abuse
-An alcohol and/or drug abuser in the household
-An incarcerated household member
-Someone who is chronically depressed,mentally ill, institutionalized, or suicidal
-Mother is treated violently
-One or no parents
-Emotional or physical neglect

The ACE Study used a simple scoring method to determine the extent of each study participant's exposure to childhood trauma. Exposure to one category (not incident) of ACE, qualifies as one point. When the points are added up, the ACE Score is achieved. An ACE Score of 0 (zero) would mean that the person reported no exposure to any of the categories of trauma listed as ACEs above. An ACE Score of 9 would mean that the person reported exposure to all of the categories of trauma listed above. The ACE Score is referred to throughout all of the peer-reviewed publications about the ACE Study findings.

Here are some major points highlighted in the presentation that I found of great interest on this topic.

1) Two thirds of girls and one third of boys have been sexually abused.

2) Two thirds of British mothers said they hit they routinely hit their child in the first year of life.

3) Of participants struggling with obesity, 66% reported 1 or more types of abuse.

4) Physical and emotional abuse were most strongly associated with obesity.

5) People with more than a 5 ACE score were 7 to 10 times more likely to have problems with illicit drug use.

6) People with a score of 4 or higher, 16.1% became alcoholics as adults.

7) Adverse child experiences increased the attempted suicide rate two to five times.

8) Adverse child experiences showed a strong relationship to the presence of adult diseases including ischemic heart disease, cancer, chronic lung disease, skeletal fractures and liver disease.

9) Likelihood of becoming an adult smoker having a score of 4 or greater was 12 to 16%.

10) Chronic Depression accounted for 58% of women and 35% of men with a score of 4 or higher.

11) After 50 years from the time of the adverse childhood experience, more than 97% with a score of 4 or higher used antidepressant medications.

12) The more that people have experienced adverse childhood experiences, the more prevalent it is that they have unexplained symptoms when visiting the doctor that cause them pain and discomfort.

13) For a score of 4 or higher, 34% had impaired childhood memory issues.

14) The greater the number of childhood adverse experiences, the higher the absenteeism on the job, the more serious financial problems that exist and the greater the job problems for that individual.

15) The greater the number of childhood adverse experiences, the higher numbers of teens having sexual intercourse by the age of 15, the higher the number of teen pregnancy and teens becoming parents.

16) Having more than 50 sexual partners in your life time (sexual promiscuity) is greater with the increased childhood adverse experiences.

17) For those with a score of 4 or higher, COPD and breathing difficulties are found in 17.5%.

18) The greater the number of adverse conditions, the lower the life expectancy and by a very significant amount. About 20 years gets shaved off of the life expectancy of those with severe child abuse. It is not inevitable and you can do things about it but if you don't, than it is chilling what happens.

19) Exposure to physical abuse, sexual abuse and intimate partner violence in childhood were 3.5 times more likely in women to report victimization and men to be 3.8 times more likely to report intimate partner violence perpetration.

20) Child abuse by relationship to the victim is mostly by the parent (78%). Unknown abusers account for 3.9%, doctors and professionals at 1.1%, and relatives at 6.5%. Clearly, of the people in this study, the parents who are known to the children are the biggest perpetrators. Most child abuse victims know their abusers.

Much of this information is not surprising to me for I have lived through it and know it all too well. Some of the results were more dramatic than I realized but they make perfect sense to me.

Often people think that the unknown sex offender or child abuser living somewhere down the street is the biggest threat and time and time again, I continue to tell people, it is not so! Yes, they do abuse children and they should be watched closely. The bigger problem though is that most child abuse victims no the people abusing them and in this study, 78% of the abusers were parents.

All too often, we fail to open up to what is really going on in our society and until we remove the log from our eyes, child abuse is going to continue. Too much in our society is set up to give protection to those who do this. From churches offering forgiveness hoping the abuser will sin no more to the laws of our land favoring the abuser over the victim.

Please take a moment and view the presentation on YouTube that I have posted below. You will see first hand the stats I was trying to highlight in this blog post. The details are more chilling but again, we as a society need to wake up and say no more! We need to say, no child is going to be abused. Unfortunately we focus on everything else rather than what truly matters and so our children continue to be less than human in the eyes of our society.

How much longer can we continue to hide from the effects of childhood abuse and trauma?


Presentation Video on Youtube: The Bomb In The Brain, Part 1