…so I guess I must be a giant sugar cube. I’ve never been one for New Years resolutions, rather opting to try to improve myself on a daily basis. While I usually try to eat somewhat healthy, I know I’ve got room for improvement in that field. Recently I was reading through ingredients on several packaged foods and kept noticing one theme pop up way too often….sugar. If you know me, you know I have a pretty bad sweet tooth; gummy bears, Reese’s PB cups, otter pops, ice cream…., but was somewhat surprised how many other things I could add to this list. Items like bread, many salad dressings, granola bars, frozen sweet potato fries, peanut butter (non-natural varieties), 75% dark chocolate, chai tea mix, many almond/soy milks (except unsweetened variety), pasta sauce, and on and on.

Though usually I succeed on consuming these only in moderation, lots of moderation can lead to excess. So I’ve decided to perform a little experiment on myself and take two weeks where I don’t consume anything with added sugar or sweeteners (cane sugar, corn syrup, agave…its all sugar). Before anyone out there launches into a diatribe about eating vegan, or gluten free, or raw, or paleo or whatever else diet you think is best…..that’s not the point of this exercise. It’s simply to become more aware of what I eat and put into my body, and to see how difficult it is (for me) to eliminate such things from my diet and how it makes me feel.

I’m not a dietitian and far from an expert, but simply an observant human being (and scientist) who loves to experiment. I know a lot of this can be remedied by simply cooking for myself more often, but as someone who spends 11hours/day associated with work and likes to recreate/socialize every once and a while, that doesn’t leave an over abundance of time for 3 complex meals a day. Yes yes, excuses excuses, but that’s the goal of this little exercise, to break old habits and negate the excuses for long term change. So let’s see how this goes. Note, I don’t plan on giving up sugar/sweets forever, what fun would that be 🙂

I’ll update on how this little test went in two weeks…..