By Dean L. Jones
As much as we may not want to accept it, our body’s blood sugar shoots up whenever we eat sugary-filled foodstuff. In response to that, our pancreas organ floods the bloodstream with insulin, which may make us feel like our energy is intensified; however, the effects are short-lived. The insulin rapidly lowers the blood sugar and we are left feeling sluggish and/or tired, also known as the crash.
This is the peak time of the year when all things like candies, pies, ice crème, cookies, and sodas are everywhere at the ready. So it is necessary to discipline ourselves to consume processed sugar in very small portions, together with routinely eating a balanced meal and thereby working to achieve a more healthy life.
Especially during the hot days of summer, it is common to be tempted to turn to drinks like Gatorade or Powerade as thirst quenchers. Despite the facts that thirst will end up being neglected drinking these sugary and sodium filled type of beverages, whereas, when you add processed sugar into the body it slows energy levels to a sluggish crawl. Consequently, be mindful that fresh fruit and/or water will resourcefully eliminate thirst.
Do not be hoodwinked by ads from companies like Coke and Pepsi offering their respective Life and True less sugar beverages, as there is still a whole lot of sugar in these products. Less sugar campaigns help soda manufacturing companies distance themselves from being looked at as a major cause of the high American obesity rate, which is roughly 35% of the total population. As a result, beverage companies are striking an improved corporate consciousness today in order to better ensure future revenues from their heavily invested beverage brands.
There are massive business undertakings in play to reduce processed sugar in most of the brands we see on grocery shelves. Even Kool-Aid has jumped on the low-sugar bandwagon in their Kool-Aid Easy Mix by boasting that it has 50% less sugar than regular soda. Their claim states that this mix has much less sugar than a regular glass of cherry-flavored Kool-Aid, which contains 16-grams of processed sugar.
To put this into perspective, summertime festivities brashly share sugary foodstuff, as a 12-ounce Sierra Mist Cranberry Splash is 10-teaspoon (40-grams) of added sugar. One 12-ounce Pepsi Wild Cherry contains 42-grams of processed sugar. A 12-ounce Fanta Orange is 11-teaspoons of sugar (44-grams), and likewise, Coca-Cola’s Mello Yello is a 47-grams of processed sugar, equivalent to nearly 12 full teaspoons of processed sugar.
To it sum up, as listing sugary-filled beverages is dastardly lengthy, the American Heart Association recommends for most women to have no more than about 6-teaspoons of added sugar per day, and 9-teaspoons per day for men. In view of that, keep your energy level up this summer season and eliminate that potential sluggishness by living SugarAlert!
www.SugarAlert.com
Dean Jones is an Ethics Advocate, Southland Partnership Corporation (a public benefit organization), contributing his view on certain aspects of foodstuff.
