Sugar, Obesity, and Pain
Why do modern nutritionists want to deprive us of sugar? Are they just mean? Who would “steal candy from a baby”?
Babies love sweets! Kids crave sweets. Lovers gift sweets to demonstrate their “sweet” love. Dieters cheat with sweets. Retired elders happily devour sweets. Stressed people seek solace in sweets. Doesn’t everybody love sweets?
The big food companies love sweets too! Sweets sell! Sweets are so cheap and so profitable!…and so addictive! Start sweets young, in baby formula. Advertise sweets as happy—“Open happiness.”
Package sweets in everything: sports drinks, cookies, donuts, breads, cereals, fast foods, convenience foods, snack foods, expensive coffees. (Name a packaged food that does not contain added sweets.)
Humans have a built-in preference for sweet-tasting foods. Our ancestors learned that a sweet taste meant “safe.” A bitter taste meant “poison.” Our genetic radar always gives sweet foods the “green go-ahead light”!
Sweet foods often grew on trees or bushes in the late summer and early fall. Early humans eating sweet foods stocked up on what key survival substance? Fat!
Our ancestors gained fat rapidly eating fructose rich fruits before the lean winter months. For a Paleolithic human, that meant survival—during a time of poor hunting and near starvation. Having extra body fat was an advantage our genes never “forgot.”
Now fast-forward about 10,000 years to TODAY. Our genetic programming still “thinks” that high sugar consumption has those same survival advantages. Only now, the availability of sugar is not limited to one short period a year.
Recently medical experts in obesity are beginning to use a new term: “the obesogenic environment.” This means there are food cues, food ads, food sales, fast food stores, convenience shops, vending machines, cheap snacks, Big Gulps, and processed foods/drinks…EVERYWHERE and ALWAYS—DAY and NIGHT in the western world.
Fat no longer has survival advantage. Three billion humans are learning that the hard way. (Humans suffering from obesity-related diseases now outnumber humans suffering from poverty-related starvation.)
Just for the record, no one wants to be fat. I repeat, no one wants to be fat!
Being fat (overweight if the BMI is greater than 25; obese if the BMI is greater than 30) means:
PAIN. INFLAMMATION. MORE PAIN. DEPRESSION. EMOTIONAL PAIN. DIABETES. PAINFUL JOINTS. MYSTERIOUS “-ITIS” DISEASES. HEART ATTACKS. FATTY LIVER LEADING TO CIRRHOSIS SLEEP APNEA. CHRONIC FATIGUE. SOCIAL STIGMAS. EARLY DISABILITIES. HIGHER RISK OF CANCERS. MORE PAIN. EARLY DEATH.
No one wants to be fat. Most fat people don’t really know WHY they are fat. They have tried and failed many times to lose their fat. They feel trapped in their overweight bodies.
Fat people are typically blamed for their condition: “You are a glutton and a sloth.” Even trained doctors incorrectly believe that obesity is due to excessive calorie intake in conjunction with inadequate exercise.
Fortunately, science is finally revealing the common denominator to all obesity. It’s literally the elephant in the living room, plain as day. Societally, we’ve refused to look the demon in the eye.
“Oh no…tell me it’s not my dear Sugar,” says that little white devil sitting on one’s chubby shoulder. [Sugar Addiction]
“There’s no proof!” says the sugar lobby, worried that this information might cut into their obese profits. [USDA-Food Conglomerates]
“It’s really just a lack of properly prescribed statins, diabetes medications, antihypertensives, and anti-depressants,” say the drug reps, as more and more expensive meds are introduced to treat symptoms that result from this world-wide adiposity epidemic. [FDA-Pharmaceutical Alliance]
Sugar causes physical, personal, and societal pain on so many levels.
- Overeat sugar -> candida yeast proliferates in the gut -> stomach ache ->irritable bowel ->leaky gut -> immune dysfunction -> neurotransmitter dysregulation ->depression ->profound fatigue ->disabilities -> inability to move -> overload in health care and social support systems ->national budget is overwhelmed by skyrocketing healthcare costs -> a vicious cycle locks in progressive obesity and inevitable pain.
- Overeat sugar -> immune cells lose ability to phagocytize germs -> infections proliferated -> cytokines (cell-signaling peptides) escalate inflammatory response -> C-Reactive Protein goes up -> body produces more cortisol to counterbalance excessive inflammatory response -> Cushingoid response develops -> high blood sugar -> pot belly -> insulin resistance -> leptin resistance -> persistent cravings for more sugar -> a vicious cycle locks in progressive obesity and inevitable pain.
- Overeat sugar -> the fructose component of sugar is sent to the liver -> fructose follows the same pathway as alcohol -> conversion to fat occurs -> fatty liver disease slowly develops -> fat builds up in the abdominal viscera -> pot belly syndrome escalates -> insulin resistance leads to metabolic syndrome -> high triglycerides and cholesterol -> high blood pressure -> high blood sugar -> a vicious cycle locks in progressive obesity and inevitable pain.
Because these consequences develop slowly; because the true cause is fundamentally a lifestyle choice (severely moderate sugar intake by gaining access to healthier food); because the overweight individual’s character is blamed instead of pursuing the correction of the hormonal imbalances that result from insulin resistance; because the many levels of suffering and pain are not addressed the culprit—SUGAR—gets away with murder.
Are the nutritionists who want to take candy away from babies really mean? I don’t think so. Are mothers who don’t let their kids play in busy streets or with sharp knives—“mean?” In my day, we called them “good mothers.”
Good nutritionists don’t give in to immoderate use of sugar.
