I’ve been a sugar addict since I was a baby.

In the early 60’s most bottle-fed babies were fed homemade formula. Here’s the recipe from my baby health record book:

Heat 17 ounces water with

2 tablespoons Karo syrup and

10 ounces of evaporated milk

My sweet tooth was solidly in place with rice cereal, applesauce and bananas prescribed by the doctor as my first foods. In elementary school, I stole silver coins from my mom’s closet to buy chocolate bars from the vending machine across the street. By high school I was eating Twix bars washed down with Dr. Pepper for lunch. 

In recent years, I would watch tv at night, stress eating from a plastic bucket of Trader Joe’s itty bitty chocolate chip cookies while watching the Crawley family sip tea at Downton Abbey. I told myself that I would quit eating late night desserts tomorrow or the day after. I always had time to quit…

Tomorrow.

My baby health record book

Americans eat a stupid amount of added sugar- 57 pounds a year on average. And as news about the dangers of excessive sugar consumption became widespread; risks like inflammation, heart disease, diabetes, cellular aging, and more…I knew I had to break my sugar addiction to age better.

So I decided to go cold turkey. 

I landed on Dr. Mark Hyman’s The Blood Sugar Solution 10 Day Detox Diet. Dr. Hyman is a family physician and a leading advocate in the field of functional medicine. 

He doesn’t believe that food is like medicine, it is medicine.

The goal- 

To reset metabolism, balance insulin, break unhealthy food addictions, regulate hormones and rid the system of hidden inflammation. 

The plan- 

Eliminate all sugar, processed foods, gluten, grains, dairy, beans, refined and processed vegetable oils, alcohol, and caffeine for 10 days.

I got my husband and daughter on board for selfish reasons; I wanted an accountability group, and didn’t want to prepare separate meals. The diet wasn’t easy, but it wasn’t outrageously hard either. The shopping lists and prep were specific, we were never hungry, and it was for only 10 days which made it bearable. 

By the time we crossed the finish line, I was sick of smoothies (the daily breakfast was a detox shake) but we got through it with just a tiny bit of cheating, and we felt great. The 3 of us lost a few pounds and got sugar out of our system. 

More than a year later, we’re back to eating desserts on the daily.

Here’s the truth for anyone trying to make big changes. It’s effin’ hard. Your brain is wired to resist change and stay in homeostasis (a process to actively maintain equilibrium and stable conditions).

And sugar is awesome: 

dopamine hit…

energy boost…

yummy…

What’s not to love?

For 8 months after the detox I kept sugary foods out of our kitchen. We made exceptions only when we went out to eat. Then we made additional exceptions like “healthy granola” and dark chocolate, but when Covid-19 hit, it was over. The home bake shop opened for business. 

Like millions of others, I turned to stress-baking when shelter in place was ordered: chocolate chip cookies, banana bread, blueberry muffins, and when stores ran out of flour? Duh, flourless chocolate cake! We needed the dopamine hit…energy boost…comfort.

But the experiment was not a failure. The best takeaway is that I have a heightened awareness of what I’m eating and what it’s doing to my body. For instance, last night I ate a huge homemade chocolate chip cookie at 9:30, and then couldn’t fall asleep until 3:30 in the morning because I’m sensitive to caffeine. oops.

For now I’m chipping away at sugary habits bit by bit.

Since we’re at home, there’s time to cook so we rarely have processed food. We don’t have fruit juices or ice cream on the regular anymore. I read labels to watch out for sneaky added sugar in condiments and pasta sauces. Bottled salad dressings have lots of sugar so I make my own. I satisfy my afternoon sugar cravings with my own version of green juice that I saw on Reese Witherspoon’s Instagram, and I try to fulfill my after dinner dessert cravings with fruit before going straight for the sugar. 

I’ll add not eating giant cookies before bed to the list.