I lived most of my life being proud that I’ve never really been addicted to something for a really really long time. I don’t smoke, I don’t drink a lot, I don’t do drugs and yes I was addicted to computer games for a while but I always managed to stop. What I never realized was that I suffered from a type of addiction that never seemed very apparent. Sugar.
I was addicted to sugar all my life but I never thought there was such a thing as a sugar addiction. People say I have a “sweet tooth” and that never sounded like a bad thing. Until one day I decided to try to severely cut down my sugar intake.
- I stopped drinking sugar drinks. Coke, Pepsi, Milk tea, you name it. This was hard for me because I enjoyed my sugar drinks. It’s like a mini reward for myself in the middle of a hard day’s work. I walk into a 7-11 and stand by the fridge for a full 30 seconds looking at all the options there and carefully deciding which cold sugar drink I wanted.
- I limited myself to dessert once a week. This one was harder than stopping the sugar drinks. Dessert was a standard and regular part of my meals. After dinner at home I open up my fridge and pull out a tub of Ben & Jerry’s and feast away. That again I treated as a reward for my day. I would eat cake, Famous Amos cookies, Krispy Kreme… any sweet dessert stuff I would come across.
- I also started paying attention to the sugar contents of everything I took. The Yoplait mango yoghurt I used to take had very very high sugar. So I cut that out.
- I stopped snacking on sweets or chocolates leaving my stockpile at home untouched. Instead I started snacking on nuts. Macadamia (which can be really fattening) but mostly pistachios because I googled around and that seemed to be a healthy nut
- I also cut down my rice because rice turns out to be a big source of sugar in our diet. I started taking brown rice at home and if I’m out for meals I limit the white rice I take.
The first 3-4 days was difficult. I had to constantly fight the urge to go take something sweet and by the beginning of the 5th day I gave up. I justified to myself that I wanted to enjoy my life and enjoying my life meant eating what I wanted. Probably one of the main reasons addicts use to justify their addictions. My Dad once said that if you tell a chain smoker that he was going to die of lung cancer if he didn’t stop smoking today, he would stop cold turkey. No questions asked.
That was what I needed. Well that to a lesser extent. Last month I went for a medical checkup and they found a cyst in my pancreas. Doctor also found my sugar levels to be really high and she said a cyst is normally the result of an injury. An injury from my pancreas working too hard which meant all the sugar I took was making my pancreas work harder than it should be.
That was motivation enough for me. I tried the above routine again and this time I pulled through the point of not being addicted to sugar anymore.
So how does it feel to not be a sugar addict?
It’s weird. I still like ice-cream but I don’t crave donuts or cupcakes or sweet stuff like that anymore. I drank a Pepsi just a couple of days ago because it came with my fast food meal at the airport and I couldn’t finish it. For the first time in my life I found it way too sweet. For the first time in my life I’m finding all my sweet stuff I used to love too sweet for my liking. I never used to find anything too sweet.
I doubt this restriction on sugar would have a significant positive impact on my health so quickly but I think I’m on the right track and I think over time the results will show.
Most importantly this was the hardest addiction I’ve ever had to kick in my life and I’m glad I did it.
I still take some sweet stuff every now and then but now that addiction is passed my body seems to have a natural filter to tell me when something is too sweet or when I’ve had too much sugar. It seems easier now and I know both my Doctor and pancreas will be pleased.
Timothy Tiah – Co-Founder of Colony, Kuala Lumpur Co-Working Space