Am I Asking for a Sugar Miracle?

You know, I liked my sugar too but SLOWLY I reduced it, little by little and now I hardly take any.
Remember it's a race not a sprint. Small changes add up over time. Good job!!

I put a packet of stevia in my coffee this morning and it was really pretty good. I've used Splenda in the past, but think Stevia tastes much better.

I would suggest Stevia. However, do NOT get the Truvia brand. It is not just stevia, there are also chemicals in it. Get pure stevia. It only takes a tiny amount to sweeten, and it doesn't effect your blood sugar like sugars and other substitutes. Stay away from artificial sweeteners, those are simply dangerous.

ETA: I just came across this article http://www.rodale.com/sweeteners

Get the liquid stevia. All you'll need is a few drops.

I use Stevia for everything. It comes in a liquid or a powder. It's made from a leaf and has no calories. I heard it called an herb which sounds right to me since it is made from the stevia plant.

By the way, stevia is not an artificial sweetener. It's natural and made from a stevia plant.

Sugar can be addictitive. Try cutting your sugar intake a little at a time over a few weeks. You will become used to the taste soon.

Also do some research on 5-HTP. You body makes 5-HTP from tryptophan found in dairy products and turkey and many other things. 5-HTP increases the serritonin (sp --I confused spell check on this one) levels in your brain

I recommend that you do not use a sugar substitute, I honestly feel that they will all end up having side effects that may not show up for several years. One comes in, everyone loves it, someone gets ill, they do tests, it is the sweetener. So another one comes out, same thing happens over and over and over.

My friend Mel has insulin resistant diabetes. Her father died from it, she has nearly died from it many many times, her son has it, etc...it runs in her family.

She drank diet drinks, tried to eat regular foods but was constantly getting sick. Come to find out her stomach was necrotic, it was mostly dead. The surgeon cut her from hip bone to hip bone, sternum to pelvic bone and peeled her open. They found undigested pills inside her, puss, dead tissue, etc...she was weeks away from being dead. The doc cleaned her up as best as he could. There was about 1/4-1/3 of her stomach left. She lived but the item they are tending to blame for the whole mess is sugar substitutes/alternatives.

She went to see a diabetic doc in OKC that was a specialist in her illness, they put in an insulin pump and she started taking U5000, I think, it was several years ago now.

He told her to stop ALL artificial sweeteners, total stop. She was to only eat foods that were natural like real milk (could be skim), sugar, fats, etc...she was to balance her diet and watch the carb intake. She is living now with out oxygen, is able to walk while shopping and not ride in a cart every time, she has the strength to cook and clean, she is living life in a more whole way.

The docs all think that the whole thing was caused by artificial sweeteners. I think they are poison and perhaps the thing we are doing to ourselves that is causing to many illnesses and allergies that we have not seen in such abundance before. It is one thing that most people have done at some time and they have no idea what the side effects will turn out to be.

So again, my advice is to use real sugar, drink your coffee. You need to have extra calories to feed your child.

Go to sparkpeople.com and use it diligently, be truthful about everything you put in your mouth. The one thing you MUST remember to do is measure food. If you are putting in that you ate spaghetti and only at 1 cup but they have 3 cups by the drop down box that would be really incorrect.

My friend JV went out to eat Chinese Food and then went to sparkpeople.com to enter it. She ended up with one meal being over 25,000 calories. You and I both know she'd be in the hospital if she consumed that many calories in one sitting. She went back and put in the portions she ate. They did the automatic measures of a single serving where she may have just had a small amount. She may have eaten 1/4 cup of steamed rice but they had the serving as 1 cup or more. Servings size is paramount to getting the correct amount of calories you are actually taking in.

They will show you your calories taken in, how many you should be eating, it is often more than one is already eating, they will help you design a workout program that is things you like to do, etc...it is free too.

DON'T cut any more calories for at least 90 days.

You've just cut out 1/3 of your caloric intake... let your body adjust to that... or you'll go into starvation mode... and while you may lose weight for a couple months, it'll spring back on as your metabolism crashes.

Ditto... DON'T start an strenuous exercise program unless you want to put those calories BACK in your diet. When you make too many changes too quickly, it's less about willpower and more about your body freaking out and saying to itself "OMG! Famine AND an exploding volcano!"

The reason why gradual change is long shown to be the greatest long term lifestyle change is twofold:

1) Psychological... it's far more easy for people to gradually change habits. Change them all at once and going back to old bad habits is untold relief. The new/better becomes the "Ugh. So much work." instead of "Totally normal just what I do." This is part 1 of why so many diets and lifestyle change become yo-yo diets, with the end result being worse off than when you started.

2) Physiological. The human body reacts to sudden changes BADLY. Our body's first thought is survival... which means a number of things depending on the circumstance. With sudden calorie loss and energy expenditure... it HOARDS calores (by sticking them in it's fat reserves), and ups our stress chemicals... which first off 'gives' us more energy, but then we crash. Same token, the adrenal system and the immune system don't work at the same time but switch off. Major change = getting sick more often since we're less able to fight off infection (our body's rationale is that it doesn't really matter if we don't get a cold when the bear has already eaten us).

GRADUAL change. Cut the calories OR add exercise, but not both at the same time (gradually add both together if you like, but be careful not to do too much at once)... and try to keep your caloric loss low to start out with. And feed yourself constantly (to convince your body not to hoard) even with the lower calorie levels.

So... for right now... KEEP the sugar. In a few months... substitute it out if you like. Try DIFFERENT sugars if you don't want cane sugar (fructose, lactose, galactose, etc.)... or add some vanilla, or honey, or agave, or chocolate, or whatever. But for NOW... hold off. Or you'll lose 5lbs this month, and gain weight next month.

Have you thought about switching to warm tea? I find I do not need near as much sugar to enjoy a cup of tea as I do coffee.

Stevia is a natural sweetener that's completely calorie free because it is composed of protein instead of carbohydrates. There is even some evidence that it helps lower blood sugar in diabetics if enough of it is consumed. It does add a very slight flavor of its own, but not unpleasant. I have found it doesn't take much time to get used to the flavor.

It's also pretty inexpensive – if you get the liquid form, one or two drops will do the job of a spoonful of sugar, so a bottle lasts a long time.

Good luck on your weight loss!

Stevia is the only non-artificial sweetener that I would recommend. I generally use it in a powdered form where 1/3 tsp = 1 cup sugar so you have to use the teeniest amount. But, they also sell packets of truvia and purevia brands that are easier to manage. I don't really like truvia and purevia because they're made by companies I don't trust but the packets work well for things like iced tea for me.

Hi,

I just pulled out my Trader Joe's raw, organic blue agave nectar natural sweetener to check the calories. It has 60 calories for 1 Tablespoon.

Agave can be used to sweeten drinks -- or used in place of sugar.

Good for you for avoiding aspartame. I don't allow my kids to have it. And I can't tolerate it. I felt like I had the flu when I had it once. Scary stuff !

Try to replace 1 cup of coffee a day with a drink like bubbly Perrier Water w/ lemon. That would cut down on your caffeine and sugar intake !

Kristen

Try reducing the amount of sugar you use over time and see if you can get used to not having it.

Use Stevia, palm nectar sugar, coconut sugar or xylitol. If you hit any natural food market like Whole Foods or Trader Joes, they will have plenty of sugar substitutes.

Check out Whey Low. It's natural, not a substitute at all, about 1/4th the calories or maybe 1/3rd, I forget. You can go to whey low dot com to read all about it.

Just reduce the amount of sugar you put in your coffee, I cannot drink my coffee black so I put milk and half-teaspoon of sugar per about 1 1/2 cup. I still can taste the sweet but the sugar intake is low.
I do not recommend sweeteners because they are very acidic and they create huge imbalance in your body making you fatter and sicker.
Another thing, reduce your coffee intake, you crave coffee because you are tired and overweight. I, personally, jog instead of drinking coffee, works much better, I honestly cannot remember when I had a cup of coffee last time. Try to have adequate sleep. I know, it is hard with small kids, try sleeping when they napping instead of doing chores.
Because you are nursing and low energy, try diet first and start exercise later when you've lost 10-12 lbs. Focus on your food intake, 2000 cal is way too much if you want to lose weight you should be around 1600 (providing that you are nursing) drink more than eat to maintain milk supply.
Another advice, is to wait until you done breastfeeding to lose weight. I did that with both children. When you breastfeed the whole hormonal issues make it much harder to loose weight so your best efforts are undermined by your condition. Once you weaned your baby your weight will come off easier. It happened to me. I never gain any weight while pregnant but while breastfeeding I piled weight on like crazy without changing much what I ate. The hormones just made my body think that I am fat lactating cow and I just made peace with that for a while and after I weaned - I started exercise and diet. When you lactating you need a lot of rest, so exercise is not an ideal option at this stage.
Good luck.

I have to put on 15-20lbs so I switched TO sugar. I used to use splendid along with coffee mate sugar free caramel vanilla powder. I do not like splendid by it's self at all.

I always drank my coffee with milk and 1 tsp of sugar. I thought I would hate it without sugar, but after about a week I was used to it. Still don't like it black though. I would try either cutting back 50% on the sugar or going cold turkey. If you are putting 300-400 calories of sugar in your coffee each day that is 14-18 tsp a day - that is a LOT.

When I gave up sugar, I found that I loved treating myself to coffee poured over a stick of cinammon in my cup. I stirred it several times, then rinsed it and used it again and again (cheap, I know). The coffee tastes so rich.

Also, that much decaf isn't especially healthy , so perhaps you might wish to alternate coffee, glass of water, coffee, glass of water.... you'll fill up and use less sugar.

Oh, I almost forgot how I learned to use less (and then no) sugar. My friend told me to change the spoon in my sugar bowl to my baby's first spoon. It worked! And it's still the spoon in my sugar bowl.

All my best.