
Unexpected Side Effects of Going Sugar Free - SQL2219
https://www.michaelmackie.com/the-unexpected-side-effects-of-going-sugar-free
======
kstenerud
I dropped sugar and severely reduced carbs 4 years ago. It was hard to do, but
I made a game of it: I'd resist as long as I could, and then binge. Then next
time I had to go that same duration without, plus at least one day. So 5 days,
then binge 1 day, then 6 days, then 7 days, then 12, then 13, etc etc. By the
time I reached 6 months without binging, I'd lost the craving. 2 years later,
I couldn't stand eating it on any quantity over a gram or so. I also increased
my fiber intake when eating carbs to better regulate the insulin response. Oh,
also I eat a mostly veggie diet, with meat protein maybe once or twice a week.

Results:

I have zero body odor. It might be a combination of using water only to wash,
but my wife has marveled on many occasions how I don't smell like anything at
all (except the top of my head apparently, which smells like a baby's). I can
(and have) gone 4 days without bathing and she couldn't tell the difference.

My weight is down to normal. I wear size 33/34 jeans like I did in high
school.

I eat 2 meals a day (breakfast and dinner) and am rarely hungry otherwise.
When I do get hungry, I usually eat figs and nuts. I only drink water and
sometimes tea.

My sleep is about the same as always.

My energy is much higher, although I still like an afternoon nap for 15 mins.
No more carb crashing.

No more acne or skin problems. Another thing my wife marvels e over and is
jealous of is my skin softness.

------
acconrad
Going sugar-free is great and I am certainly not knocking the overall strategy
to reduce wasted/empty carbohydrates. Just understand that not ingesting
something that has sugar in the nutritional facts doesn't mean your body
doesn't produce glucose, the simplest sugar of all.

If your body needs energy it will convert carbohydrate stores to glucose. Even
if you go keto and ingest 0 carbohydrates, you can still convert substrates to
glucose through a process called gluconeogenesis.

I say all of this because I always worry about people who go SOMETHING-free,
whether it's sugar-free, fat-free, carb-free, etc. Someone reads a person is
sugar free but their body isn't exactly free of sugar. They just haven't
ingested it and that's a big difference. And I say this because even if you
don't go sugar free you can achieve roughly the same effects provided you keep
the junk sugar (i.e. candy bars, soda) to a minimum.

I do strength sports and I have 30g of sugar with my workout drink during
every workout. My resting glucose is 90 (near ideal) and all of my blood
markers are healthy. Outside of that I have virtually 0 added sugar but plenty
of carbohydrates from fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes. In other
words, living life in moderation can produce amazing results and doesn't
require a monastic devotion to be completely free of something.

One last thing I will say is that the human body is so complex. The OP isn't
just going sugar free. He is also exercising and making other lifestyle
choices. That combined with the power of all of that positive reinforcement
and changes only magnifies the other effects he is seeing. It's just too hard
to solely attribute a sugar-free diet to all of these positive effects. It's
really that his whole _lifestyle_ has improved so he's seeing positive changes
in lots of places...perhaps even changes where they have nothing to do with
all of this but he attributes it as such (not sure x2 hair growth is really
correlated to reduced sugar intake).

------
TACIXAT
I've also given up sugar (it's been about 2 years). Just wanted to compare
results.

Hair growth - nothing noticeable. Sleep - still tend to being a night owl. No
after-lunch sleepiness - agree on this, I still even eat carbs (no gluten, no
sugar for reasons). Sex drive - no noticeable change. Acne - sugar and
chocolate used to cause breakouts for me. Always hungry - not really, but
again, I eat carbs.

Good for OP for giving that garbage up. It was the hardest of all the foods
I've cut out of my life (gluten, caffeine, sugar, sodium nitrites, msg).
Curious if OP had the same experience, but I went through full withdrawal each
time I cut it out (it took a few tries).

------
swivelmaster
Is there a Chrome extension that blocks any scripts that override scroll
behavior? The scroll behavior on this site is so obnoxious I don't want to
read the article.

~~~
plasma
I literally closed the window because of this as a reflex to knowing ill have
a poor reading experience - surprised me.

