On my 5th attempt at a 2-week sugar fast, I realized I could open a jar without weakness in my fingers, I thought “That damned Sugar!” I thought stiff joints was a fact of life, but turns out, overconsumption of sugar is, and THAT’s why humans over 30 years old seems to have stiff fingers because such a substantial percent of the population is ingesting at least some sugar everyday, on top of processed foods, pesticides, and tons of things we cannot pronounce.
What to do about it?
Sugar Fasting 101:
Don’t take it from me, experiencing a life without sugar is the only way to know.
If you are considering a sugar fast, nice work, you will want to prepare, as 75% of success comes from knowing how to set yourself up to leave sugar behind for good. It’s not that you will never have my Aunt’ Katz’s Christmas goodies again, but you certainly will not want to carry even a constant, low level of sugar in your blood stream, as that will continue any symptoms.
Only a total flushing (with 2 weeks of recovery AFTER the 2 week fast will show you what you’re really missing… And honey, this ain’t easy, so put your big girl panties on (Caution: panties may fall off due to incidentally awesome weight loss as well!)
Why “fast” from Sugar?
Fasting comes from the religious concept to remove food in order to “fasten yourself to God.”
Think of your highest self as your inspiration: how do you want to feel? Think of fasting, not as someting being taken away from you, but unfastening from the devil… and fastening yourself to your inspirations goals and dreams, and letting go of those things that are no longer serving you, like sugar 🙂
Why let go of Sugar?
- Refined sugar has no health benefits and is not a “real food” as it has no nutritional value, as everything has been stripped from it
- Lack of nutrients makes your body crave MORE food after eating sugar, because the body is looking for the nutrients promised by the sugar.
- Sugar causes inflammation
- Raises blood Sugar, and thus, lowers immunity
- Turns to fat unless calories are burned equal to the calorie content
- Spikes Insulin-makes it highly addictive
- Increases Lipids
- Type 2 Diabetes is OFTEN AVOIDABLE, but once you have it It sucks, big time.
- May contribute to heart failure
Know This:
- The first 3-5 days will be the hardest. Sugar will call you on the phone and beg you to go to Kwik Trip and get a snickers. Beelzebub will whisper that you deserve to have sugar, and that Anne Adametz is a taskmaster, a charlatan! Stay the course, drink lots of water, go for a bike ride (not past Kwik Trip). This message is not sponsored by KT.
- Speed the healing by using a soil based probiotic: contact me for the prescription I use.
- Day 7 you should start to feel good (journaling, blogging, posting on facebook (social declarations) are all great ways to get support, share your experience, and truly notice the changes that occur)
- Make a pitcher of ice-tea with lemon juice, add pure maple syrup, agave, or stevia if you need the sweeter
- Homeade fruit smoothie:
1 Handful or so of strawberries
Ice
cup of pineapple
almond milk/dairy if you tolerate it
squeeze of agave, pure maple syrup or stevia (if you have to)
THAT’S IT.
READY????? Here we go!
Day 1.
Write a few notes, either a written one or one on the computer. I remember trying to back out, talk myself out of it, oh that sugar is addictive!
Set the intention, I am fastening to my inspiration________________ and this is why I choose to leave sugar behind, these are the issues sugar is creating for me_________________________________
Revive the intention throughout the day by making your intention your screensaver at work, your phone background, etc, and focus on the good things, the excellent foods, and have gratitude for the fabulous nourishment you will be putting into your body.
Cleanse Your Home:
Remind yourself, you’re not throwing away ANYTHING good, you’re basically tossing JUNK, resist the urge to “finish” off anything i.e. asking your body to process more junk. Not cool.
Go through cupboards, refrigerator, all pantries, and remove all foods containing sugar, high fructose corn syrup or aspartame, such as diet foods like diet sodas (aspartame is being shown to cause emotional issues, and has the same negative effects of making us crave more food because the taste is there, but there is no calorie delivery, thus we want food!) Hey, Imma let you keep ketchup, just get the stuff w/no high fructose corn syrup and let it be MINIMAL.
Shopping List: (all are optional)
- Fresh Berries, Fruits
- Stevia: drops, powder, etc. Stevia is a superfood, and is very sweet, use it instead of sugar
- Agave (organic) a honey-like substance that is 2x as sweet as sugar, use in oatmeal, cooking, even to create lemonade, sweetens anything.
- Applesauce can replace oil and butter while adding sweetness in baking.
- Naturally sweet foods to reach for instead of sugar, splurge on good berries, fruits, an all-fruit smoothie prepared (with agave instead), dried apricots, raisins, cranberries, etc. Have them on hand.
Snack on raw nuts, naturally a little sweet, they are very satiating and protein giving, raw still contain good fats. As you go through the fast, you will notice the subtle sweetness in a lot of foods, versus the saccharin sweetness of sugar and the replacements.
Shop the perimeter of the supermarket, sugar is hiding in cereals, etc, so stay with real food, grown, picked or killed food, all living at some point.
What are some foods you might not think of as having SUGAR?
- Obviously-white sugar, refined sugar (that includes brown sugar. It is just white sugar with molasses added to it.)
- Anything with sugar added to it.
- White breads
- White crackers and … snacks. Yep. Full of white flour and yeast and sugar
- Most cold cereals, especially those with the 2nd and 3rd ingredient listed “sugar” or “corn syrup” or “fruitose” or other fancy words for hidden sugars. Read the labels.—have regular instant oatmeal and add dried fruits, cinnamon, and agave.
- -Ose at the end = sugar
What NOT to eat:
Not a DEPRIVATION, but as a liberation from excess weight, inflammation, etc. Come on…
- bread, or refined products (any boxed “food” in the center aisles of the grocery store). So little nutrition, so many calories and carbs=turn into sugar
- sugar, candy, “energy” bars loaded with sugar, anything with SUGAR, or “evaporated cane juice, or “high fructose corn syrup” in it. duh, I know…
- juices (a shaman M.D. once told me: what kinds of fruit do you think they use for juices? No, not the prettiest, they use the damaged, moldy, spotted ones, and then pasturize it to bits. Also, that’s a lot of sugar, without the pulp and fruit to process it.)
More on what you can eat, all in moderation:
and yes, it should all be as organic as you can, cuz poison is poison
- As Fresh as you can get (think garden, farmer’s market) Fruits and Veggies the chinese say picking it and putting it in your mouth is the highest energy content, it’s still living, the more time, travel, and energetic hands touching it, the more loss of vitality.
- Fresh Frozen Fruits
- Meats (no antibiotics) in moderation, like 2-3 x per week, serving size, about 4inx4inches (not much)
- Raw Nuts
- Lentils/beans are superfoods, packed with nutrients
- Quinoa Pasta (quinoa is a super nutrient grain and is gluten free!)
- If you can’t pick it or kill it, it’s probably not real food.
You can do this. The day to begin is when you are ready and have cleaned cupboards and have no sugar food events coming up. i.e. not the week before holidays 🙂
And when you’re clean, just lead by example, repost this blog.
If ever you get “hooked on sugar” again, and you will, the very next time you have some, no problem, don’t waste time beating yourself up, beat sugar, simply repeat said sugar fast, like, immediately.
Make it one or 2 slips in a day, just BITES or bits, less garbage in, less garbage out. Each time will get easier, and each time you will become more aware of the relationship between what you eat and how you feel. It is my wish that you feel amazing.
You’ve got this,
Anne