Beating Sugar Cravings

One of the biggest parts of getting healthier and in better shape is your diet. Everyone knows that it is important, but not many people manage to keep to what they know is the perfect diet for them. I don't use the word 'diet' in what some of you may consider the normal term here. Your diet is the nutrition that you are feeding your body, not as most people know it, which is as the term used to describe restricting your nutritional intake in an attempt to lose weight.

Regardless of the diet that you choose to adopt, you will invariably experience a period of strong craving for something that is no longer present in your nutritional intake. This craving is usually for sugar. It something that is now included in every day life, yet is not essential for your every day eating. When you eat something that has very high sugar levels, you get a big burst of energy from it, which feels good right? The reason for this is that sugar is near enough instant energy for your body. When it gets into your stomach it doesn't need to be digested so it can be absorbed straight into the blood stream and carried off to all the muscles and cells. A spike in your blood sugar levels happens, causing your body to release insulin to help process this sugar and return your blood sugar levels to a more normal amount. However, insulin cuts the blood sugar levels excessively, leaving you with the 'crash' experienced after having lots of sugar. Most see having more sugar  as the only way of getting past this crash, starting a vicious cycle of highs and lows fueled by an excessive sugar intake. All this time, the insulin levels in your blood are higher than usual, preventing the burning of fats (one of the properties of insulin).

To beat the sugar craving and break out of the cycle you need to be very strict with yourself. Treat it as addiction, you can either go cold turkey (stopping all intake of sugar straight away) or you can gradually decrease your intake until you no longer desire the sugar. Gradually reducing the intake does not mean you have to eat sugar every day. What I recommend is cutting out sugars and finding a very sweet tasting replacement food to have when you feel the craving for sugar. This replacement food can be something like a yogurt, jelly or fruit juice. These all contain a small amount of sugar but taste very sweet, satisfying your taste buds and your bodies call for a sugar hit. Limit yourself to one portion of the replacement food each day for a week, then drop the replacement food all together. You will be surprised when you don't crave the sugar anymore! Beware though, relapsing is very easy....