I will just admit this right here and right now. I am a junkie. I have a VERY addictive personality and have been a binge eater since the age of 8. My drug of choice? Sweets. Sugar. Bread. If I could live on those things and not become diabetic, I would. I love to bake. I love to make dessert.
I'm also the heaviest I've ever been. 248 lbs is my top weight. I've been a little heavier (252, I think) while pregnant, but this is the most I can remember weighing while not carrying another human being inside of me. In March of 2011, I stood on the scale and saw that number. I also had been dealing with other health issues. For example, I had just had my second child, and had after much effort and meds and herbs been unable to nurse. Again. I was not able to nurse my first baby either. It was heartbreaking. With much research and consulting with a lactation nurse, I discovered it could be linked to insulin resistance which judging by my weight, body type and other symptoms, I've probably had for awhile. Perhaps since puberty.
Realizing that I had perhaps, by my own need to eat sugar, deprived myself of a beautiful mothering experience, I decided to take action. Lent was coming up, so I went off of sugar for Lent. It was HARD! I had withdrawal. I was pissy and bitchy for about 2 weeks and would pace the kitchen, knowing I had the ingredients and ability to whip up something decadent, but wasn't going to. (I settled for hummus A LOT) But then suddenly it wasn't hard and food began to taste good again. I discovered subtle flavors that had been hiding on my desensitized palate. I could taste the delicate flavor of almonds. Fruit was AMAZING! I also became very sensitive to any sugar in food. I hadn't cut ALL sugar out, just sweets and one night we had hamburgers. I took a big bite and gagged at some sweet flavor hiding between the buns! It was ketchup. Ketchup had NEVER tasted sweet to me, but there on the ingredient list...high fructose corn syrup. Gross.
If you think that I've been clean since Ash Wednesday of 2011, you are wrong. Lent was over and Easter candy came to our house; not by the buckets as it had before, but enough. I broke my fast with cake and chocolate. And promptly felt like crap. My joints hurt. I had a perpetual headache that I refused to attribute to sugar, but as soon as it would fade a little bit, I'd pop another jelly bean and it would come raging back. I began to have sugar crashes again. It took me awhile to admit it to myself, but the answer was there, staring me in the face. I could not keep eating sugar and be healthy. If I continued in this way, I would have diabetes before my 40th birthday. But, you'll remember I told you, I'm a junkie. To say I'm going to give up sugar forever makes my junkie brain freak out and tell me to BINGE, BINGE, BINGE!!
So I'm going to start with a year. And May 11 was the first day of that year. It's gonna be rough. I have a hubs and 2 children who LOVE sweets as much as me (or at least will love it once he is able to eat food, not formula). And Food manufacturers sneak sugar into everything! I mean everything. Sugar substitutes make me feel worse than sugar, so they are out. I'm guessing we'll be doing a lot of things from scratch. I'll be posting recipes of sugar free baking and meals for myself and my family, as well as my own musings on the subject. And who knows where this year will lead! I hope you'll join me.
