Day 1: The Beginning of it All

Thursday April 14

It's a weird day to start something so monumental. It’s not New Year’s day; it’s not the beginning of a new season or a new month. It's not even the beginning of the week. There is no reason to start a sugar fast today other than the pure and simple reason that I’m tired of living with constant sugar cravings and don’t want to do it for one more day. 

And...there’s the reason that here in Colorado Springs the bright sun is bringing temperatures in the 60s and 70s. It’s time to be outdoors again, hiking and swimming. I put on 10 wopping pounds over the holidays (which eating-wise went from Thanksgiving to Easter), and I feel sluggish and bloated. All the sugar I consumed over the last 6 months is sticking to me. It left the shelves of the pantry and I carry it with me wherever I go.

But what I really want more than dropping some extra pounds is to feel free from bondage to something, free from constantly thinking about sugar, free from its relentless pull on me.

I read an article today titled The Sugar Conspiracy by Ian Leslie. The thing about science that never ceases to amaze me is how little is set in stone, even when it is pretended to be. This article documents how long-standing evidence has been suppressed showing that sugar not saturated fat is far more dangerous to a nation's overall health, including heart disease, diabetes and obesity rates. It claims that serious evidence is lacking to support the long-standing belief that the fat that clogs arteries is the result of eating excess saturated fat.

What comes to me as a surprise is that there is actually a debate about what foods cause fat to accumulate into our arteries! They've been acting like there was no question it was from saturated fat consumption. It turns out that sugar consumption could be the cause.

But this has been a lesson to me that much can be learned by simple observation of one's own body. I don't mean that I'm going to have someone look inside my arteries after a year of no sugar, but that I can learn some things through observation that science would never be able to tell me. Even if there were a study about how 100 people felt or reacted to a year without sugar, that still would not be as accurate for my own body as doing it myself. I have a unique metabolism and body make-up. So here it goes my own study...