earth: a guide for aliens

The Sugar Reds

In Today’s Stress Tip, I talk about waking up with fear, especially when there’s no real basis for it, an angst you experience even when things are going well.

Let me tell you a personal story. I used to wake up like this fairly often. Sometimes I could attribute it to a bad dream, but mostly there was no explaining it. I’d open my eyes with a presentiment that something bad would happen. Activity would soon shake it off, and reality would take hold, but it was unsettling.

The feeling is what Holly Golightly, played by Audrey Hepburn, describes in the movie Breakfast at Tiffany’s: “Listen…you know those days when you get the mean reds? The blues are because you’re getting fat or because it’s been raining too long. You’re just sad, that’s all. The mean reds are horrible. Suddenly you’re afraid and you don’t know what you’re afraid of. Do you ever get that feeling?”

Yes, I do! The mean reds. The expression has stuck with me since I first heard it years ago, because I knew exactly what she was talking about.

Then a year and a half ago when I was getting my annual physical, my doctor, a rarity these days who actually spends time chatting with you in his office, asked me if I had any concerns, either physical or mental. I told him about my rude awakenings. Immediately, he asked: “Do you eat anything sweet before you go to bed?”

“Yes,” I blurted. “I have a bowl of ice cream every night around 10 pm.” He told me to try cutting out sweets before bedtime and see what would happen. I did better. I cut out virtually all refined sugar, honey, even fruit juices from my diet. At first it was difficult since I’ve always loved sweets and had to overcome some intense cravings. But after a couple of weeks those urges diminished. I had always suspected that sugar is addictive in some way, what we euphemistically call a sweet tooth, and after going through my “withdrawal,” I’m convinced. 

In lieu of sugary treats, I eat all manner of fruits, whole-grain snacks and nuts. It’s amazing how naturally delicious an apple, banana, cantaloupe, or grape tomatos (which I eat like grapes) can taste when they don’t have to compete with cloyingly sweet concoctions for your attention.

Yes, on special occasions like holidays or parties I’ll indulge in a piece of cake, a slice of pie, perhaps a dollop of ice cream. (You don’t want to diss your host.) But on the whole, these permitted exceptions help me to enforce the rule.  

And you know what? Not only don’t I wake up with the mean reds anymore, I have a higher, steadier level of energy day and night, fewer mood swings and low points, and can handle a stressful situation with a lot more equanimity and poise. I’ve noticed also, but don’t have an explanation for this, that my skin dries out less during the winter months and a persistent patch of eczema on my hand has cleared up. It feeds my suspicion that sugar causes dehydration, too; when I was a kid we drank voluminous quantities of soft drinks on hot summer days but they never really quenched our thirst, and I swear made us even thirstier.

Maybe all this is why advertisers spend billions of dollars each year to convince us we should consume their sugar-saturated products. Where’s the balance? Who’s advising us to limit our intake of refined sugars? The current diabetes epidemic alone should be enough to get health officials off the dime. But I don’t see it.

I don’t know what effect cutting out refined sugar will have on you. But the way I’m feeling now, I’m not going back to being a sweet tooth anytime soon.

I’d be interested to hear your comments on this. And please pass along this page’s link to anyone you feel it might help.

January 27th, 2007 Posted by Jerry at 09:50pm | Stress Stuff | 4 comments