The 'Towards a Sugar-Free Future' Challenge

Honey_Bear

Hi Polly Bear, and thanks for 'fessing up to your secret vice - it's one I share!  I love the stuff.  When I started this Challenge I was eating far too much sugar - desserts every night, sweets when I felt like it (I have a bit of a weakness for fruit pastilles, or at least I did until very recently), cakes, biscuits, whatever was lying around I'd happily eat.  A year into the Challenge it's just chocolate, nothing else.  When I bought some fruit pastilles as a treat for hiking days when I needed an instant sugar hit I was surprised to find they didn't taste of very much any more.  I think that's likely to be a change in the formulation / recipe more than anything else but either way I'll finish what I bought at some point but I won't bother with them again. 

(As an aside, I wanted to put 'shant' instead of won't there, but I can't work out the punctuation.  It's techncially two contractions - shall not - so technically it should be sha'n't but that looked odd.  Has anyone any thoughts about it?)

So, chocolate.  I can now resist it most of the time, so I've gone back to keeping some in the house and I'm ashamed to admit that I've now eaten a whole 200g bar so frequently that I can't pretend to myself that I don't feel sick afterwards.  Doing it twice too often was the breaking point, and it was very recent.  I can still manage a 100g bar in one hit but I can't face feeling that sick again and having to eat an evening meal on top of it because I can't bring myself to confess to Belovéd what I did earlier. 

Polly Bear, you are never, ever too old for anything.  We might be past the age when we can run marathons competatively, but if we had a mind to, we could actually train ourselves to run a marathon and you never know, we might be able to run competetively in our age group.  In my case I doubt it at the best of times and most certainly not at the moment with a broken ankle, but if my ambition were running I'd set that as my goal for getting this ankle better.  I do have a goal and it's exactly the same as before I broke it - I want to walk the Dartmoor Way in sections, and I'm setting my target as next spring to get back out there and get going on it again.  I've done Ivybridge to Shipley Bridge, and Shipley Bridge to Ashburton and I absolutely loved it, although it took me three goes rather than two because I started late and am not exactly fit. 

What I'm saying is if you set yourself a goal, and I have a few in my life, if you don't crack it the first time there's absolutely no reason to give up on it.  There's every reason to rethink how you're going to deal with it so that you can succeed which is exactly why I created this Challenge.

It's about setting achieveable goals on the way to reaching the real, ultimate goal. 

This time last year I couldn't have gone five days without sugar and now I know I can.  I may not make the full five days every week but I have, several times.  This week I'm going to reach four and almost five days because I'm planning on allowing myself a m@gnum this evening and I may also allow myself a bar of chocolate over the weekend but that's it.  I don't intend to allow myself much more than that.  If kind friends bring cake I have absolutely no intention of saying I can't eat it at any stage over the next few weeks but as yet no-one has and Belovéd hasn't tried to cheer me up by presenting me with anything tempting like that, so I'm doing okay.  I've only reached this stage because I had the support of Belovéd and everyone who's contributed to this Thread, because doing this kind of thing, which involves denial, is extremely tough on one's own.  If you'd like to join us and post about it, that would strengthen us and might help you get to the point where you can feel confident you could have some chocolate in the house, ready for when you've told yourself you're allowed to enjoy it.  I don't feel the slightest twinge of guilt eating a 100g bar of chocolate at the weekends, even if I have one on Saturday and one on Sunday.  The same goes for the salted caramel m@gnums.  I used to feel guilty, all the time, whenever I had one and my appetite for sugar and chocolate was so out of hand in those days that I've been known to scoff to m@gnums in one sitting in the past.  I just don't want to be that person any more.

I either read, or someone told me, years ago, that the saddest words in the English language are 'It's too late.'  I kind of believe that, and as I get older I'm pretty determined that as far as possible I'm not going to allow age alone to make things too late for me.  I may have to do things slightly, or majorly, differently but if I want to do them age alone isn't going to stop me.  I hope you can feel the same way too.

Yesterday was sugar and chocolate free, and was also date bar free.  I'm not particularly interested in eating a date bar today, either, which is rather helpful. 

How are you doing Cookie?  Have yesterday's cravings passed or are you still in the grip of them today?

Pollybear

I managed to give up chocolate for almost two years at one time and lost the weight I wanted to.  But I gave in and I am gradually putting it on again.  I don't even mind if I stay the weight I cam now, although lower would be better, but I just wish I could get rid of the cravings followed by the guilt.  Eating chocolate doesn't make me feel sick, feeling guilty about it does.

I will keep trying and reading how well you are all doing.  Thank you for your support.

Honey_Bear

Polly Bear I gave up sugar for about five years back in the early 1990s, and that was around the time I met Belovéd.  I did a huge amount of reading of labels because I discovered sugar in all sorts of food like mayonaise that I hadn't realised had it, roast chickens from the supermarket, you name it, sugar.  For the first few months I was incredibly strict about it but after a while I allowed myself mayo and other condiments, but until I gave up alcohol my sugar consumption was okay.  Stopping drinking eight years ago changed everything, and I've been scoffing sugar but also chocolate ever since, although stopping smoking 14 years was when I put on an extra stone that I've never lost but that was pure over-eating of everything, not really an excess of sugar or chocolate.

Ideally I'd like to shed that stone and the extra half I've put on since stopping drinking but I don't stand a chance of getting it off or keeping it off if I don't get the chocolate consumption under control.  It's my one last vice.

Small achievable goals is the only way forward for me and if I slip up it's not a matter of life or death, it's not worth beating myself up about a bar of chocolate, but I know I've got willpower, it's just a question of directing to this goal. 

I haven't put any weight on since I started this Challenge and that's the most important thing for me to remember.  I was 68.8kgs for months, if not years, and fluctuated up and down all the time but the monotony of that figure is engraved on my soul.  I'm lighter than that now, but 600g the last time I weighed myself but I can't at the moment because of the wretched plaster cast.  If I'm moderate with the amount I eat and don't go mad with the things I should be avoiding I'm hoping by the time the plaster comes off I won't have put too much on even if I haven't lost any. 

The ultimate goal is therefore 9 stone.  It seems a reasonable one to me, and while I'd like instant results I'm happy to trundle along finding my way gradually for two or three years if that's what it takes. 

Pollybear

I hope your ankle injury doesn't set you back when you've worked so hard.

Honey_Bear

So do I Polly Bear.  I built up to those walks, and I was a bit muscle achey in a completely new place after the first 10 mile day but absolutely fine after the 15 mile day about 10 days later.  Walking off weight is harder than a big day here and there, but I hadn't fully understood that.  My steps app tells me that I burnt about 1000 calories on that 15 mile day which seems incredibly mean!   Hey ho, it looks as though eating less really is the answer to losing a bit of weight - who knew?!

Pollybear

I read that a while ago, you can only really lose weight by eating less.  The exercise is good for you in other ways though.....so they tell me.  I get out for a walk every day even if it's not far but I never want to.  I hate walking.

Morning_walker

Hiya, fellow chocaholic here. Chocolate is my thing too, and have also come to the conclusion that not having it at home is the best way forward. I had a very pressurised week for one reason and another last week, so made a decision to try to reduce chocolate instead of totally cutting it as was the plan. I managed that pretty well by only buying mini bars when out and about. 

I agree that some sugary things are more or less tasteless to me now - for example, I remember loving Feasts as a child, and bought one the other day... it didn't really taste of much - just cold. 

Next week's goal is to try to not have chocolate Weds - Friday. Let's see how that goes. 

I feel fortunate that I can walk and I really enjoy it - hence my username! 

Honey-Bear: I hope you are on the mend. Take care.

Good luck everyone with your goals for next week. 

Honey_Bear

It sounds as though once adults have a stab at lowering their sugar consumption we all seem to find it renders former commercially available favourites as pretty tasteless, Morning Walker.  That bodes well for the future for all of us.

But chocolate.  Yes.  It's not just sugar plus some flavouring, is it?  It's something far more important.

So here's my dilemma today.  Being confined to barracks (ie the bedroom) means I'm beginning to lose track of the days a bit and I got a bit confused yesterday about whether it was Thursday or Friday.  Now, obviously, in the grand scheme of things that doesn't really matter but I was intending to make the most of it being Friday except that:

1.  I forgot it was Friday, and

2.  I didn't feel the need or want of any chocolate, ie my Friday after dinner treat, my salted caramel m@gnum.  So I went without, which means I did the full five days without sugar and didn't mind at all.  Breaking an ankle is a fairly extreme form of sugar consumption moderation but it works very well apparently - who knew?

So today, obviously, I'm allowed chocolate and have been looking forward to a 100g of milk chocolate in due course all day, if you see what I mean.  Except this.  The bars are in a tin on a high shelf in my office and I can bottom shuffle into that room but there's no way I can reach up to get the tin.  Belovéd is looking after me beautifully but he's got his own ideas about what he needs to do and he's spent all day running around doing things and is pretty shattered now.  He's taking the dog to the vet as I type, and will be going out again later to have dinner and see a film with a friend (in my place) and asking him to get the bar of chocolate would just be one thing too much.  I know this because I know him. 

So, it's Saturday, I'm allowed chocolate, I missed out on m@gnum Friday and I've got some of the good stuff less than five yards away and I'm going to have to go without!

Pollybear

That sounds like torture!  You need a walking stick or something to knock it down from the shelf

Honey_Bear

The crutches are downstairs, too!