The I Quit Sugar Program - Week 3 Update

Today marks the end of the third week of the I Quit Sugar program. If you aren't familiar with the I Quit Sugar program, visit their website or see my first post about quitting fuctose here.

This week was a big education sort of week, which was a bit heavy, but thankfully as I've read Sarah's books prior to joining this online program, I was aware of some it previously. Trust me, trying to concentrate on learning about sugar when all you are craving is sugar is a bit tough!

We learnt a few things this week. Firstly, how much sugar we are actually eating. On average we consume around 60kg of sugar a year. That's 1kg a week. That's enough to make me want to spew! We were given examples of how much sugar was in certain kinds of food like Coke (10 teaspoons), apple juice (9 teaspoons), baked beans (4.5 teaspoons), Barbeque sauce (53 teaspoons in a 600ml bottle - seriously wtf!). All this is ADDED sugar. Yuck. It was a real eye opener.

To aid in helping us to work out ourselves how much sugar is in food, and help us make healthier choices, we learnt how to read food labels. This is where it gets tricky. When a food label says sugar they are referring to all sugar - glucose, maltose, fructose and lactose. Different sugars contain different amounts of fructose. For example, table sugar (sucrose) is 50% glucose, 50% fructose, which the sugar in milk is 100% lactose (so therefore contains no fructose). Yep. Confusing. Luckily we were provided with many examples of exactly how to read and understand labels, and were given a few 'rules':

• Eat products with less than 3 - 6g of sugar per 100g/100ml (noting that the first 4.7g of sugar in dairy is lactose)
• Liquids should contain no sugar
• 4g of sugar = 1 teaspoon of sugar

Week 3 looked like this:

• Meal Plan/Shopping List/Sunday Cook Up (Love this - we can prepare some ingredients for the week ahead earlier)
• Weekend read - How to read food labels
• Movement plan - A circuit inspired workout
• Try This - We were given a little 'tester' and had to work out how to read some example food lables and work out if was okay to eat or not. A great little lesson.
• Tuesday Eats - Some easy DIY food (swapping spaghetti for zucchini noodles, making your own dips and crackers)
• Expert Tips - the experts go though what their biggest food blunders have been and why this has inspired them to just eat real food.

Overall, this week has been a good one. Yes I'm still craving sugar, but learning all we have this week has made it easier to really understand WHY i'm craving so bad. I never realised how much sugar I was actually eating! The recipes this week were amazing - I really enjoyed everything and there was actually a fair bit of variety with Quinoa, Fish, Chicken and Sausages making an appearance! The downside - I've had headaches, I've been constipated, I've had diarrea. I'm seriously all over the place but I know that will soon get better and it's just my body withdrawing from sugar. I"m slowly forming different and positive habits around food. I've also learnt the art of distraction, and tea is my biggest! I now have a collection of tea that will rival that of Woolies... but it's helping me get through it!

Thats my wrap of week 3. As always if you have any questions please don't hesitate to ask.