Sugar: Too Much of a Good Thing?

I think we can safely say that most of us experience at least a slight guilt after that sweet tooth is satisfied, whether it be a Starbucks Frappuccino, our favorite ice cream or even our favorite cake. But ultimately should we feel guilty about it? What’s really at stake if we indulge once in a while? Or even every day?

Well, after digging my way into this subject a few months back, I began to get these questions answered for myself and I wanted to share some of what I found.

The first thing I had to ask myself was how much sugar should I really be consuming in a given day? According to the American Heart Association (AHA), the maximum amount of added sugar women should consume in a day is 100 calories per day (which is 25 grams or 6 teaspoons), and for men it’s 150 calories per day (which is 37.5 grams or 9 teaspoons).

So then I had to look at how much sugar I was actually consuming in my diet. And I started to realize that common everyday foods like milk and bread have their own sugar content just from the traditional ways these foods are produced. (Lactose naturally contains sugar, and bread needs to have sugar added to it in order to rise in baking.) But this was nothing of major concern. Well then, I started to look at some other sweet products that I would enjoy now and again. And suffice it to say, I found some shocking facts.

Where should I start? That Caramel Frappuccino I would indulge in once in a while? 61 grams of sugar, and that’s just in a tall cup. That Ocean Spray grapefruit juice that looked so perfect on a hot day? 112 grams of sugar (with 28 grams per serving, and 4 servings in just one bottle). Or how about that Snickers chocolate bar as a reward for myself? 27 grams of sugar.

So then I started to realize where the problem really lies. I should be eating a maximum of 25 grams of sugar per day, but what I was actually getting in my diet was much, much more than that…and I didn’t even realize it.

I mean I know that personally I had considered myself to be pretty healthy -- I didn’t eat fast food, I had a salad at every meal, most of my meals were home cooked – but what I hadn’t seen was that the amount of sugar in my food was, to say the least, excessive just based on recognized health standards.

So I started really digging into this, and I wanted to find out what actually happens physiologically in the body when I eat sugar. I found that once consumed, sugar gets converted into glucose in the blood and it gets transported to the body’s cells through the process of circulation. Each cell then uses its mitochondria to convert sugar into ATP, a.k.a the energy molecule. ATP then gets released from the cell generating energy in the body. However, sugar that doesn’t get used for energy, if the body’s not active enough, then gets converted into triglycerides (a type of fat molecule) and stored throughout the body.

So, now, let’s look at an example: if I am supposed to be getting an average of 25 grams of sugar per day, and I do, that should provide me with sufficient energy to burn for the day. But if I go over this and I drink a Frappuccino and maybe have a piece of cake, then we’re looking at upwards of 90 grams of sugar in a day. At which point, not only does it overwhelm my body’s fuel burning system by giving it more sugar than it can possibly convert into energy all at once, but it will most likely also crash my body’s functioning. This is where the tired sort of burnt out feeling comes in. Which can easily be associated with other causes, although, if you take a look, more often than not, is factually associated with sugar.

So, then, at some point, when the body gets back on its feet, so to speak, and does manage to process all that sugar that it was overwhelmed with, it converts it into fat and stores it throughout the body (because the energy from this sugar was far in excess of what the body actually needed, so now it has a reserve). And thus we have weight gain. Simple.

Now, if sugar is what’s causing me to gain weight, what about the fat in my food? Doesn’t that fat contribute to my own body fat?

Well, not exactly. I tended to believe that, “fat in my food would equal fat in my body later.” Well, it doesn’t quite work that way. Animal fats, when they are organic, actually provide many essential amino acids, proteins and fatty acids which the human body needs. In fact, since time immemorial, human bodies have been eating animal fat. But only in the last 50 years or so, has the North American population experienced excessive weight gain and obesity. So these two things wouldn’t appear to be connected, just based on history alone.

Well, what has changed in the last 50 years? The amount of added sugar in the standard North American diet. In the last 50 years companies like Monsanto and Coca Cola have been putting products on the market with excessive amounts of sugar. The question is why? And how are they getting away with it?

I can’t help but think of a quote from two-time Nobel Peace Prize winner, Dr. Linus Pauling where he states, “Nearly all disease can be traced back to a nutritional deficiency.”

And then my mind lingers on the fact that some of the same individuals that were once running the Tobacco companies in the 60s and 70s, when they claimed that “cigarettes don’t cause cancer,” are now running large food corporations like Monsanto.

But for now I leave you with this. Do you think that large food corporations have your best interests in mind? And if not, what are you going to do to take charge of your own health?

Natasha Hall
Health and Nutrition Blogger