United States Girevoy Sport Federation -> Articles -> Diet And Nutrition -> Is Sugar Making Me Irrational and Moody?

Is Sugar Making Me Irrational and Moody?

I read a book once called "Potatoes not Prozac." Well...actually I only read the first paragraph and never finished it. It said: "To identify whether or not you have a sugar sensitivity, imagine this: You walk into your house and you're not hungry, but there is a plate on the counter full of warm chocolate chip cookies. What do you do?" um...duh! I thought that everyone knew the answer to that! The next sentence said "A person who doesn't have a sensitivity to sugar would say, "Why would I eat a cookie? You just said that I wasn't hungry." Oh...really?...hmm...and that's as far as I got in the book because I stopped to go to the store to buy ingredients and then made myself some warm chocolate chip cookies... and never went back to the book again. That was a year and a half ago.

What I learned in that moment was that I definitely have sensitivity to sugar. I crave it. Not chocolate like a lot of people, but cookies and carbohydrates such as pasta and bread. The problem was that the more of it I would eat, the more I would want. It takes 48 hours to purge these things from your system, but I would actually feel myself getting anxious to have more once I'd tasted it. The more of it I would eat, the more I wanted it again the next day. At one point, I kept a journal of my thoughts so I could analyze it for a couple months. When I compared the journals on the days I was eating sugar to the ones that I hadn't, the tone of those entries was significantly more depressive than the others. There was a huge difference. I found that for some reason, when I ate those foods, I felt sluggish and moody. This was a very rough cycle to get out of once I had gotten into it. If I was able to make it through 1 whole day without sugar, the next day was easier and then the third was completely without effort. The problem is that each day can easily be justified back into day 1! I would tell myself that I would start tomorrow. I'd start over again in the morning and then by the afternoon, I'd find a reason to feel entitled to eat sugar and start again the next day. The sense of sadness from the sugar as it reacted in my body became a vicious cycle of needing more and more of it.

Unfortunately there are many people who fall into this category and don't even know it. Answer a few questions for yourself and see if you could have sugar sensitivity.

1) Do you reach for sugary food when someone in your life says something to you that you don't feel like you have control over?

2) When you do feel out of control, do you reach for something that you used to eat as a child when you were sick, punished, or hiding from your parents?

3) If you were to analyze your mood swings, could you place them within 10- 12 hours of eating a large amount of sugar?

4) If you removed sugar (cookies, candy, cake, pasta), and only left in natural sugars (fruit, all natural juices) and complex carbohydrates (rice, potatoes), could you make it through the first day in order to analyze a difference in your emotional being?

If you relate to this as a possibility and you can make it through the first day, give me 3 and then check in with yourself to see if you find yourself whistling while you're stuck in traffic or if you are allowing other people's irritating behavior to blow right off of you. Keep a food journal in order to see what foods make you feel the best. This will help you to live the happiest and healthiest life you possibly can live! Like attracts like and starting with making yourself feel great will help to bring the world into clearer focus!

Related Topics :: Diet And Nutrition


Calia is a writer and singer who laughs throughout each day as the lighter side of every possibility presents itself in her path at every turn!

http://www.30somethingsinglegirl.com