Stop what you are doing and put the soda down…or iced coffee …or juice… Or whatever is in your hand that probably has way too much sugar, but… you drink it mindlessly because it tastes good. Wait, is it mindlessly or is it your mind that has everything to do with it? Our bodies are made up of around 60% water and designed to need water in order to live so what makes us crave the sweet invite of Madame Sugar? Well, the answer is simple really because Madame Sugar secretly gets us hooked with her spell---The Dopamine Dance.
There have been articles published over the last few years citing several research studies which claim sugar is just as addictive to the human brain as cocaine and heroin. In these studies, lab rats were more likely to choose sugar over drug injections when given the choice. It seems Madame Sugar’s Dopamine Dance is more powerful than we thought. Her memorizing dance stimulates the “pleasure and reward” center in our brains. It can be a tough connection to associate alcoholics and hard-core drug addicts with a sugar addiction. Have you ever heard of someone losing their life, home or family because of a sugar fix?
Researchers are incredibly fascinated by the behavior of lab rats in response to food rewards. The frequency in which the lab rats press a lever to produce a food reward is eerily similar to the way some humans press buttons on a soda machine. Yet, few humans are willing to closely examine their own behaviors in relationship to sugar. Even if the evidence is in our face, most people do not want to accept they are truly addicted to sugar. Instead they want to continue to self-medicate themselves with high-processed, sugary foods to find comfort or temporarily boost mood and energy. We live in a fast-paced, high energy society where instant gratification is King. When all of life seems out of control, we turn to food as a distorted way regain that loss and bring happiness. In neuroscience, food is called a “natural reward.” Our bodies need things like eating, sex and nurturing others to be pleasurable so our species survives.
Unfortunately, that need to instantly find pleasure in food is killing us faster than we realize. Our Western diet has created a precursor for a life-long addiction to sugar. The majority of our diet in America consists of overly processed foods. In our quest to make food more convenient and accessible, we instead created experiments in labs with dire consequences. Processed foods are purposely laced with sugar in order to mask the chemicals used that allow them to have longer shelf lives. Which simply means Madame Sugar has hidden monsters in plain sight to overpower us. Can you start to understand now why we are destined to develop a sugar addiction?
If you are following a 2,000-calorie diet, women can consume six teaspoons and men nine teaspoons of sugar a day. In this amount, the body can absorb and allocate the sugar respectively so it can then process it into needed fuel. Yet, the average American consumes 19.5 teaspoons or greater of sugar every day. That translates to roughly 66 pounds of added sugar consumed each year, per person! The sugar addiction epidemic is real. Even if you turned off news, social media, and avoided any medical provider or care, you will still see the effects of this epidemic.
Even if we found a magic pill to make diabetes, heart disease and obesity magically disappear overnight, our bodies would still scream for help to escape a high sugar diet. Processed foods are inflammatory. Inflammation in the body is the foundation for chronic illness and causes pain. Continuing to be complacent to the pain will not only shorten your life span but severely reduce the QUALITY of your life. When we talk about what we want to be when we grow up, no one says “obese, chronically sick and immobile” but that is what we are doing to ourselves without even giving it a second thought. So the next time you go to grab something to eat for a quick fix: STOP, take a deep breath, delay the gratification and ask yourself….will this help me or hurt me? And always remember, immediate gratification may feel good in the moment, but it will compromise your health in the long term. Finding the balance between immediate gratification and taking care of your body will reverse Madame Sugar’s spellbinding Dopamine Dance leading to a long, QUALITY, successful life.