Sugar has been sorely maligned. It is blamed for everything from cancer, diabetes, heart disease, obesity and more.  One health writer has a book and a website that give 141 reasons sugar ruins your health. Robert Lustig’s 2009 video on YouTube - Sugar, the Bitter Truth, started the recent anti-sugar trend. He states that the Japanese don’t have obesity because their diet is low in fructose. If you conduct research, you will find this is not true. The Japanese eat quite a bit of sugar from fruit, white sugar and honey.

As with most issues; the truth is found somewhere in the middle. The issue with refined sugar is complex. There are a few unique ways that I view it. 

Excessive amounts of refined sugars can be harmful to one’s health. When people eat refined white sugar in donuts, pastries, candy bars and desserts, there are also other harmful ingredients in these products that impact health. The flour in dessert is bleached or bromated. Bromated flour, if taken in regularly will weaken the thyroid. A weak thyroid will cause weight gain and a lowered metabolism that causes immune weakness, fatigue, brain fog and even possibly heart disease.

White refined flour contains high amounts of iron as it is fortified. This type of inorganic iron is absorbed into the body weather you need it or not. Excessive iron has been implicated in heart disease, cancer, infections and numerous other health issues.

The fats in pastries with sugar are often highly processed, bleached and rancid. We can say the same thing about candies with its different types of harmful ingredients to health.

You can see now that the intake of sugar is more complex than it is made out to be. Sugars have important roles in the body that make it a valuable addition in different forms to one’s diet.  Complex sugars are important as staples such as the starches in whole grains, grain products and some natural refined grain products as they raise the blood sugar more slowly.

Simple sugars from sweeteners, fruit, and fruit juice raise the blood sugar more quickly. This is beneficial for several reasons. Simple sugar can get the body out of the stress mode. When the body is in the stress mode, sugars are used up in the blood and from storage; the body then turns to fat for energy. This puts the body and mind further into stress. By taking simple sugars, especially fruit and fruit juice, the body gets out of the stress mode.

Simple sugars boost energy levels for active people, as they are quickly digested, increase your metabolic rate and increase your calories. Yes, I said, increase your calories. An overly low-calorie diet causes fatigue and signs of low metabolism such as: anxiety, depression, low libido, weak immunity, insomnia and many other signs.

Sugar is essential because your body with its trillions of cells needs energy. Cells are the building blocks for the tissues and organs of our body. Cell health is critical to overall health. If the cells are nourished we have the right foundation for a nourished body.

The cell’s ability to produce energy is critical. Every minute of every day, cells must convert nutrients from the foods we eat into usable energy to power growth, repair, reproduction and movement. When our cells don’t have enough glucose to do their job they find alternative means by which to get their energy, particularly through either Lipolysis (fat breakdown) and Gluconeogenesis (new sugar creation from our own body tissue). These processes require the release of adrenaline and cortisol—our “fight or flight” hormonal responses.

Stress hormones that are produced in this low calorie and low sugar diet initially feel fantastic. This is why so many people have sensations of clarity, easy weight loss, and boundless energy when turning to a no-sugar or low-carb diet. Their bodies are thriving off of adrenaline and cortisol. And while these positive effects can possibly last many months or longer depending on the strength of the adrenals of the individual; ultimately the body is not designed to live off of these stress hormones. 

The long-term results are bad in many ways including damaging the adrenals. In fact, ditching sugar can destroy metabolism and lead to a weakened immune system, poor digestion, impaired sexual/reproductive function, and accelerated aging. After a period of time of doing this, people start to run into numerous health issues. Some of which are the very ones they started with when they began these regimens.

When people go on natural low carb and low sugar diets, other harmful ingredients (chemicals, additives etc.) are also taken out of their diet and healthy components are added. This is another important aspect of why they feel improvement.

Despite all the theories of what primitive people ate, humans need both simple sugars and starches to function.  Our bodies have adapted quite well to these foods from an evolutionary view.

With all the benefits of simple sugars, I feel that the majority of natural sugars are best to come from sources such as fruit, fruit juices and natural sweeteners - maple syrup, raw honey, and others.  For healthy people, even occasional white sugar in some good quality dessert like a natural ice cream, would not be harmful as sacrilegious as this may sound.

Some athletes doing high intensity sports have even used high fructose coke sodas as sports drinks. Coke has electrolytes, sodium, and sugar. I don’t suggest this for people with normal activities. Theoretically, it makes sense because it would be impossible for high powered athletes to get enough calories without refined sugar. My sense is that being a high-powered athlete is not the best for health as it stresses the body.

In my Full Spectrum Macrobiotic Approach understanding, I look at food energetically. The body is a store house of energy. Simple sugars bring out energy to the surface and then disperse energy. If simple sugars are eaten excessively, they over-activate the body weakening the organ functions. Eaten in the right amounts for the body, they strengthen bodily functions.

Since the beginning of the 20th century diets composed mostly of refined sugar and white flour products, versus nutritious healthy diets with moderate amounts of sugar included, have had poor health consequences. They displaced nutritious foods creating nutritional deficiencies when eaten in excessive amounts. From this view, eating extremely high amounts of refined sugar will weaken the body on a deep level leading to the diseases mentioned in the beginning of the article that the anti- sugar advocates talk about. 

Recommended Reading:
 
Paleofantasy: What Evolution Really Tells Us about Sex, Diet, and How We Live
By Marlene Zuk
 
The 10,000 Year Explosion
By Gregory Cochran and Henry Harpending

We live in a highly polarized world. Opposites in politics, diet, lifestyles and many aspects of life are considered wrong or bad.  Beyond the extremes in these opposites, which most of us would agree are bad, the truth is often in the middle.

With foods there is a tendency to classify specific ones or food categories as evil and absolutely horrible for health. Think sugar, fats, carbs. Other foods or food categories are considered incredibly and absolutely beneficial such as raw salads, kale, raw foods, chocolate, olive oil and others.

For many decades, I demonized certain foods and food categories such as meats, fats, sugars and dairy products. I compiled evidence from studies and nutritional sources that these foods were horrendous for health and the cause of all major diseases such as cancer, heart disease and other degenerative illnesses that we suffer from in the modern world.  I taught these in classes until a series of events led me to question this and many other ideas of about diet.

The major events that led me to seek other views was the deaths of several long time macrobiotic teachers from cancer and heart disease. All of these teachers were very careful about their diets, primarily eating a vegan style macrobiotic diet centered around grains, beans and vegetables with rare or no amounts of fish.

These events inspired me to look at different viewpoints of natural eating, such as the work of Dr. Weston A Price, and others who had studied traditional cultures’ healthy eating patterns. What I discovered amazed me because although healthy traditional cultures centered their diets around whole grains and vegetables, they valued and ate regularly natural dairy products, animal products, vegetable and animal fats, and sugars. I started to incorporate these foods into my diet and recommend them to my counseling clients with great benefits to myself, my family and the people I work with.

After studying, and practicing eating these foods, I started to see the major problems with ignoring the nuances in diet. For example, modern dairy products have been creating minor and serious health problems for people. I discovered that this had to do with the quality and processing of milk and milk products and not the milk alone. Unhomogenized or raw milk from grass fed cows naturally raised is highly nutritious and delicious.

Xanthine oxidase is a substance created when milk is homogenized. This substance has been implicated in causing forms of heart disease.

Low fat milk causes the minerals, calcium and magnesium not to be absorbed and is very hard on the digestive tract. Many nutrients are destroyed in the process of creating low fat milk including the oxidation of cholesterol which has been implicated in heart disease.

Milk from cows that are fed commercial grains creates milk that is high in pesticides that cause numerous health problems.

Pasteurization of milk creates digestive issues for many. If you have ever tasted raw milk from grass fed cows, you wouldn’t believe that you are drinking milk. To learn more about modern milk and the benefits of milk from healthy cows, read “The Untold Story of Milk” by Ron Schmid.

Red meat has been demonized. The problems with meat consumption are in reality much more nuanced. Modern meat is high in pesticides and has a different make up of fats because in order to fatten up the cattle, they are fed a high grain diet.

The natural diet of cows and steers is grass. When given grains as a main food, the fat content changes. It becomes higher in fat and higher in omega 6 fats. Pesticides concentrate in the fats from commercial grains. These pesticides act like an estrogen hormone throwing off hormonal balance and weakening the immunity if over consumed.

Natural meats such as pork, buffalo and lamb have an incredible array of nutrients that strengthen the body including b vitamins, mineral and amino acids. These meats are some of the most nutrient dense foods. As nutrient dense foods they have amazing strengthening and building effects on the body.

Arachidonic acid (AA) is often cited as a source of inflammation. Because AA is found primarily in eggs and meat, this concern could contribute to the view that red meat is inflammatory. AA is an essential omega-6 fatty acid that is a vital component of cell membranes and plays an important role in the inflammatory response. It’s especially necessary during periods of bodily growth or repair and is thus a natural and important component of breast milk. AA is sometimes portrayed as an acid to be avoided entirely simply because it is ‘inflammatory,’ but as usual, that view drastically oversimplifies what actually happens in the body.

It’s true that AA plays a role in inflammation, but that’s a good thing! It ensures that our body responds properly to a physical insult or pathogen, and it also helps ensure that the inflammatory response is turned off when it’s no longer needed. AA interacts with other omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids in intricate and subtle ways. An imbalance in any of those fats has undesirable effects.

So the inflammatory effects of red meat are exaggerated. The way to balance this effect is to have some bone broths or gelatin powder regularly in your diet. The amino acids in bone broth and gelatin powder calm inflammation. This is why traditional people ate all parts of the animal to ensure balance.

Moderation is the key. I think it is important if one eats natural meats and animal products to have moderate portions such as 4-6 oz. servings and to vary the kinds you eat between fish, poultry and red meats. For therapeutic purposes, red meat is sometimes helpful to eat more often.

The over consumption of concentrated proteins can overstimulate the adrenal glands causing a stress reaction. This effect becomes worse when doing this in combination with emphasizing a low carbohydrate diet.

Diets that are truly plant based with natural animal foods daily have been the dietary foundations of the longevity cultures and other long-lived cultures around the world. Balance is more important than ideology.

For those who don’t wish to eat animals, I suggest either including high quality dairy products and eggs in the diet daily or to use supplements especially food concentrates to get nutrients that only come from animal source foods.

Many of the issues that are promoted as problematic with meat are completely false. Meat doesn’t rot in the gut, is not hard to digest, and doesn’t cause osteoporosis and many other health problems that it is blamed for. I address each of these myths in my Diagnosis+Nutrition TM Health Coach Training Program classes.
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Beyond meats and dairy products, there are more nuances about the quantity and quality of foods that are considered the devil today or at least a close relative. The list includes for starters: sugars, gluten, fats and salt. In each of these food areas, the quality and quantity of the food you eat makes a difference. Sugars, gluten rich foods, fats and salt are all beneficial foods for health when they originate from particular natural foods.