No-Sugar Diet: How to get started and stick to it
What's the story
Excessive sugar consumption is linked to obesity, heart diseases, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, and several other diseases.
Avoiding sugar aka a no-sugar diet is a great way to significantly decrease your risk of such diseases.
However, sticking to this diet is a tough feat and requires a certain resolve.
Read on to know how to get started, sweet substitutes to try, and more.
Plan
Begin with an easy plan that you can stick to
The first step toward following a successful no-sugar diet is creating a plan that you can stick to.
To make the process easier, it is best to consume a lower quantity of sugar in the first few weeks instead of going for no sugar at all.
This helps the taste buds to adapt to a less sugary lifestyle, and eventually, cravings reduce as well.
Flavor
Add more flavor to your foods; eat more fruits
Removing sugar from the diet is often confused with eliminating flavor. In fact, spices and seasonings will help add variety to your meals.
Vanilla is a great option to substitute in those foods that you sweeten with sugar.
Having fruits like banana, mangoes, jackfruit, etc. that are naturally high in sugar will also help you in satiating the appetite when you crave sugar.
Sugar substitutes
Artificial sweeteners are 200 times sweeter than sugar
Artificial sweeteners are about 200 to 13,000 times sweeter than real sugar.
And while you may be tempted to these "healthy" options, in the longer run, they can trigger sugar cravings.
Some common sugar substitutes that must be avoided include Stevia, Splenda, NutraSweet, etc.
You must also avoid foods that mention that many aliases of sugar such as glucose, maltose, dextrose, lactose, etc.
Celebrate
Make sugar consumption an occasional treat
All said and done, fully eliminating natural and added sugars is not easy to do and total abstinence may not be necessary.
However, once you retrain your palate, you will not be as tempted to consume sugar.
Even while sticking to the plan, you can also celebrate a "sugar day" every month where you can treat yourself to limited portions of your favorite treats.