The 'Towards a Sugar-Free Future' Challenge

Pollybear

My week has been rubbish cookie - but thanks for asking .    Tomorrow is another week even though I'm craving magnums.   They seem to be always on the adverts so even when we fast forward I keep seeing them

Saver-upper

Had a good day today.  Had my usual toast for breakfast, 1 slice with Marmalade.

During the morning I started to feel a little "weak".Not trembling, like you can get when your blood glucose gets too low, and not like I was going to faint, but I just knew I needed a bit of sugar. I was working in a client's home, so when I was offered a tea or coffee,  I requested a coffee, which I have with 1 sugar. Felt much better for the rest of the day. 

Wholemeal cheese and tomato sandwich for lunch,  and a ham, scrambled eggs with cheese wrap for tea. 

I hope everyone is doing well.Sorry you have had a bad week Pollybear. I hope this week is better for you  ❤️

cookie02

Sorry to hear you had a rubbish week, Pollybear.  My family eats mini M@gnums year-round but winter is the one time when I'm not remotely interested in them.  If you are really tempted, and you think it might work for you, it might be worth trying the mini ones so you have your treat while reducing the sugar a bit too.  Good luck for this week! 

Saver-upper, well done on your day!  One thing I forgot to mention earlier is protein.  If you're catching-up on the thread, this will come up late in 2022 when Honey_Bear, Making and a few others shared their experiences.  Most of us have found that increasing our protein consumption has helped reduce our sugar cravings or keep them under control.  You seem to have protein in your meals already so you're ahead of where I was when this topic came up!  If you want to experiment too, you could try switching things around and having protein for breakfast (instead of the marmalade on toast) and then maybe having the marmalade toast later as your lunchtime snack.  Using your day as an example, I'd be tempted to have the cheese and tomato sandwich for breakfast (but I'd have it as cheese on toast with the tomato), then I'd have the marmalade toast as lunch and then have your tea.  The earlier protein might stop that 'weak' feeling mid-morning.  

I've managed to be sugar-free so far today.  If I get through today, I'll almost certainly end up having sugar tomorrow due to work so I will try and be sugar-free on Wednesday to try and make it two days this week.   

Saver-upper

cookie02 said:

Saver-upper, well done on your day!  One thing I forgot to mention earlier is protein.  If you're catching-up on the thread, this will come up late in 2022 when Honey_Bear, Making and a few others shared their experiences.  Most of us have found that increasing our protein consumption has helped reduce our sugar cravings or keep them under control.  You seem to have protein in your meals already so you're ahead of where I was when this topic came up!  If you want to experiment too, you could try switching things around and having protein for breakfast (instead of the marmalade on toast) and then maybe having the marmalade toast later as your lunchtime snack.  Using your day as an example, I'd be tempted to have the cheese and tomato sandwich for breakfast (but I'd have it as cheese on toast with the tomato), then I'd have the marmalade toast as lunch and then have your tea.  The earlier protein might stop that 'weak' feeling mid-morning.  

 

Thank you cookie, this is good to know. I will spend some time tomorrow (today??), having a little think. I have the day off and will take some time doing a meal plan to have more protein, and definitely more in the morning. Cheese on toast yum yum. 
I have got up to page 49 on the thread!!

SueP19

Hi everyone, have to say you are doing amazingly well 👏🏻👏🏻 it takes strength to deny yourself, especially as we tend to see a sweet treat as a pick me up, comfort or reward

Do you think it would help if we did an SOA for the days food. In Jan 22 (after DH heart attack) I did a spread sheet of sugar/fat etc really bought home how "in excess" we were of the daily and it shocked me as I thought we ate really well?

@cookie02 glad the info was helpful and quite right mayo is def allowed 

Pollybear

Unfortunately cookie, even a full size magnum doesn't satisfy my craving.  I could eat the whole box and still not be satisfied (or feel sick).  The only thing that works to any extent is not to buy or eat any chocolate.  Obviously that doesn't always happen but the more days I can do this the better.  Yesterday was OK so we'll see how today goes

Honey_Bear

Well done for keeping going over the weekend everyone.  I felt so deflated by having such a rubbish week I had to have a serious think over the weekend.  One of the things I've been doing, particularly on a Sunday afternoon, is having at least half a bar of chocolate, and sometimes even a whole bar, because it's the weekend - and I can because I have given myself permission to indulge.  Sometimes that's happened on a Saturday too.  That's a self-indulgent rather silly habit on my part; even if I'm technically allowed it, and because I don't want to think I'll indulge on Monday, I give myself permission to eat chocolate when, if I'm strictly honest with myself, sometimes I don't really even particularly want to.  So I had a bit of reflection about that and decided this weekend I wasn't going to do it.  I also gave myself permission to buy a Co-0p tiramsu which I absolutely love, and we had that for dessert on both Saturday and Sunday so there was none left for Monday.  Belovéd has dessert pretty much every night of the week which I often make but I always make sure they're things I don't want to eat, so that weekend indulgence doesn't hang heavy on my conscience.  All that to say - I got through Sunday without my usual chocolate binge and that felt like an improvement, and not a painful denial.  It's a start.

When I weighed myself on Monday morning I was extremely glad I'd skipped the chocolate because I am now over 70kgs.  Once again, the heaviest I've ever been.  Not happy.  Not worried, because I know what's doing it, but I feel grim about it.  Moving right along ....

Saver Upper, well done for your lower-to-the-point-of almost-no-sugar days!  I realised some years ago that toast (even my lovely own homemade) toast and marmalade didn't actually suit me at all, so I stopped having carbs and sugary things (even porridge and dried fruit doesn't suit me) for breakfast and turned over to things like scrambled eggs - no toast for me - and that protein hit works much, much better for me.  When I skip it after a few days I feel a bit rubbish, but can now switch the eggs up with either yoghurt and fruit or my current indulgence, half a pot of cottage cheese.  I don't eat breakfast early but I do make sure that when I'm ready for it I have something I want in the house. 

If I'm honest going out for breakfast, a full cooked English breakfast, is an amazing start to my day and I'd rather do that than go out to dinner.  We don't do it very often but when we do it's wonderful.  So, I echo Cookie's comments about possibly thinking about starting the day with a protein breakfast and saving the toast and marmalade for later in the day.  It would be a treat if you, like some of the rest of us, get the sugar munchies at 3.30 pm, and you could think of it as 'tea'.  You could try it for a few days and see if you get that 'weak' feeling again or not. 

Making, I can totally understand why your OH bringing in a bag of QS would throw you.  After dinner I often find myself craving a chocolate hit, and I'm afraid that on bad days I rarely stop at one.  If, like Polly Bear, you know just having it in the house is enough to derail you, could you ask your OH to hide the QS from you until the weekend?  Belovéd knows not to offer me chocolate during the week but I can't ask him not to have any.  It's like booze - he drinks because he's okay with it, I'm not, so when I gave up the booze I had to be okay with it not only being in the house, but also him drinking in front of me.  I just decided that was the way it was going to be from now on, and with booze I'm not even tempted any more, I hardly ever even think about it but chocolate, that's tougher for me, but most of the time it's doable.  (Just!) 

As to the sugar in d0rit0s, crisps and pasta sauce - yes, there is sugar in processed food, it's there to make us enjoy it more and so that they can sell us more because we are pre-programmed by nature to enjoy it.  I will say that even Italians add a pinch of sugar to their tomato sauces.  We've had a lot staying here over the years and I've noticed how they cook; it is literally a pinch of salt in a pan of sauce for two people; it's to take away the acidity of the tomatoes.  Having said all that, it's one of the reasons I avoid processed food as much as I do, although I can eat my fair share of carp if it's in front of me.  I read labels obsessively in the supermarket and nothing makes it into the house with palm oil in it, but if there's a bit of sugar in some of the foods we eat sometimes I ignore that.  It's me adding the sugar that I'm avoiding; a 100% sugar free diet is not what I'm trying to do.  It's important that you find what works for you because each of us is physically different and have very different lives we have to navigate.

Polly Bear, I'm sorry you had a rubbish week.  *snap*  We're in a new week now so I'm putting it behind me and starting fresh and anew.  I'm haunted by m@gnums all the time and it's one of my excessive indulgences.  I couldn't not have them in the house because Belovéd likes them too, so I have to be okay with them being there, in the freezer, waiting to pounce.  I also look forward to having one on Friday evening so I have had to get to grips with being tempted but resisting.  (I'm not always successful.)   I'm glad yesterday was okay for you.

SueP19 I would do an SoA for food if I thought I'd capture anything I haven't already realised.  When I used to keep a food and drink diary to see if there was a reason I felt rubbish all the time I didn't actually record the things that were making me feel rubbish for various different reasons.  It turns out not drinking anything (but one mug of fruit tea at 4.00pm) between 1.00pm when I finish my decaff coffee and next morning at 8.00am was causing me really painful leg muscle aches for 30 years!  It's not the amount of liquid I drink, that was fine - it was the lack of liquids for 19 hours, and I never, ever felt or feel thirsty.  I make myself drink at least three more glasses of water or fruit tea in the afternoons now.  In addition, I never recorded the amount of booze I drank and I never put chocolate on the diary either.  My subconscious was sabotaging me, allowing me to be a bit of a mess if I'm honest.  So, yes, food diaries work, but also careful, patient, honesty, which in my case took rather a long time to admit.  I now know if I eat enough protein three times a day I don't crave sugary treats anywhere near as much most days, and it turns out the human body, a wonderful thing particularly if moderately well-treated, is capable of fixing most every day problems through our own choices.  I actually thought I was having enough protein, because I didn't know enough about it and sometimes it's that lack of curiosity that causes my problems.

I'm so glad you're having a better time of it Cookie, now that you've got your ex-Christmas new year mojo back.  I'm really pleased the protein thing is working for you as well as it does for me on my better days.  It's a huge step forward for me. 

I hope everyone has a reasonably good week and we don't surrender to the cravings too much, or too often.

 

Saver-upper

Honey_Bear said:

Saver Upper, well done for your lower-to-the-point-of almost-no-sugar days!  I realised some years ago that toast (even my lovely own homemade) toast and marmalade didn't actually suit me at all, so I stopped having carbs and sugary things (even porridge and dried fruit doesn't suit me) for breakfast and turned over to things like scrambled eggs - no toast for me - and that protein hit works much, much better for me.  When I skip it after a few days I feel a bit rubbish, but can now switch the eggs up with either yoghurt and fruit or my current indulgence, half a pot of cottage cheese.  I don't eat breakfast early but I do make sure that when I'm ready for it I have something I want in the house. 

If I'm honest going out for breakfast, a full cooked English breakfast, is an amazing start to my day and I'd rather do that than go out to dinner.  We don't do it very often but when we do it's wonderful.  So, I echo Cookie's comments about possibly thinking about starting the day with a protein breakfast and saving the toast and marmalade for later in the day.  It would be a treat if you, like some of the rest of us, get the sugar munchies at 3.30 pm, and you could think of it as 'tea'.  You could try it for a few days and see if you get that 'weak' feeling again or not. 

 

 

Thank you Honey_Bear for this , and to cookie02 for the suggestion also. I like the idea of having marmalade toast as a treat in  the afternoon.

So, I did this today, and it worked really well.

For breakfast (more like late brunch!) I had 2 eggs on seeded toast, and baked beans. I would have normally had bacon, and tomato with it. Didn't fancy bacon, and didn't find the tomato in the fridge until about 10pm tonight  . And it worked- no cravings, and no hunger until I was starting to make tea tonight (during the preparation of which, I had a couple of TUC biscuits with cheese).
I don't imagine I will have time to do this every morning, but I might think of some other high protein foods I could have for breakfast- maybe some protein yoghurt, dried fruit, or nuts. 

I weighed myself for the first time in months this morning. I already knew I had gained about 2 stone during lockdown. And it was all due to sitting around the house eating biscuits and chocolate all day! Even since life has returned to normal, I have only maintained the weight, possibly even gained some more.

I am 5ft 2" tall, and this morning I weighed 12stone, 1 3/4 lb (76.7kg), BMI 31.1. The feedback on the NHS website indicates I am obese, and a healthy weight range for me would be 45.6kg to 61.6kg.

My previous weights (randomly plucked from various notes on my phone,)  have included: 
21st May 2019: 74.09kg (11 stone 8)
29th Sept 2019: 64kg
19th April 2021: 78.3kg (12 stone 5)
24th Oct  2021: 76.6kg (12 stone 1)

And all this after I was about 11 and 1/2 stone when I started a few years of Slimming World in 2010 

Honey_Bear

Well done for giving the protein breakfast such a convincing try Saver, and I'm really pleased it worked out so well for you.  We all get so much information chucked at us that it's really hard to know where to start, but you jumped right in and did it, and it worked - I'm chuffed about that, I really am.

The weight thing is something that I need to deal with as well.  My BMI isn't quite where yours is yet, but I'm fast getting there.  I need to stress here that this is absolutely not a weightloss thread but what I am hoping will happen to me is that if I can get my sugar cravings under control that I will start to lose weight.  That hasn't happened yet but that's because I have been allowing myself to indulge far too often, for far too long, on far too much sugary stuff.  I think I've got it under control and then I suddenly haven't.  However, even though I have put on a bit of weight recently overall I'm getting a much better idea of what foods really suit me, and that's progress.  I didn't get to this weight overnight, it took years, so I won't lose it in a hurry.  The reality of it is that I started putting on weight when I gave up smoking in 2006 and it's been a gradual thing since then, but when I binge like last week it's noticeable that my weight jumps up so I know exactly what's causing it - cheese and chocolate.

The good news is, yesterday was sugar-free.  I'm really pleased about that, because it's two days in a row.  More than that, I'm actually relieved I've managed it.

cookie02

Pollybear, short of having a lockbox that you don't have the keys for, I think you're right and that it's a case of hoping they're not in the house or making sure you don't take money for them like you've been doing with the newspaper.  You're making progress and that's what counts (this is what I keep telling myself ).  

Good to see your initial experiment with protein is working, Saver-upper 🏅.  I have the same challenge with breakfast on days when I have meetings so I try to boil eggs the night before.  I cool them and keep them in the fridge in a sealed plastic tub with a piece of kitchen paper (to absorb any moisture).  I do a few at a time as my family has also got in the habit of grabbing a couple to eat if they're leaving early and need a quick breakfast.  In the morning, I will have one or two of the pre-boiled eggs with a piece of cheese or I'll have yoghurt with some nuts before I go to work.  I also have a couple of small containers that I use to take nuts, seeds and one or two dates with me so I have healthier snacks available.  

SueP19, thank you for your support .  I'm happy to try out the SoA for food but I've never seen this before.  How would this work?  Based on Honey_Bear's comments, it sounds like a kind of food diary.  I track all my food in a spreadsheet but the only food groups that have their own columns are added sugar and protein.  I added protein 'officially' this year after starting to see the benefits during experiments late last year.  I'm trying to see if different types or levels of protein make a difference to how much sugar I eat.  It sounds like this has really worked for you and your OH which is great to hear! 

Honey_Bear, congratulations on achieving two days in a row!  🏅 I'm sorry that you've been having such a hard time of it.  I think the weather might also be a factor as I've found myself wanting sugar more than usual over the last couple of weeks.  The only reason I haven't indulged more is because work has been busy.  

I've managed to stay sugar-free so far today but I have a feeling that's about to change.