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Episode 2492:
In this Q&A edition, Dr. Neal answers a listener's health and fitness question. The episode encourages listeners to submit their own questions for a chance to receive a free copy of the Optimal Living Daily workbook. Dr. Neal provides various ways to submit questions and expresses gratitude for listener engagement.
Episode references:
The Optimal Living Daily workbook can be obtained by sending a relevant health-related question to health@oldpodcast.com.
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[00:00:57] Caribbean. Ships registry Bahamas. It's another Q&A edition of Optimal Health Daily, Episode
[00:01:03] 2492 and I'm Dr. Neal, your host of the show. Welcome back to another Friday show where
[00:01:10] I answer your questions. On all the other days, I read health and fitness blogs to you like
[00:01:15] an audiobook with permission from the authors, of course. Now, I'll let you know how you can
[00:01:20] send in your own question at the end of the show and get a copy of our workbook for free.
[00:01:25] But for now, let's hear today's question and start optimizing your life.
[00:01:34] Hi Dr. Neal. Thank you so much for all that you do to make this podcast possible every single day.
[00:01:39] My question is about sugar. I tend to have a sweet tooth, a decent amount of time. So I just
[00:01:44] want to see what your thoughts were on added and regular sugar. And if there is any data or research
[00:01:50] that could be helpful to guide my desire to moderate sugar consumption. Thanks so much for your time.
[00:01:59] Thank you for taking the time to send in your question, Billy. And thank you for your kind words
[00:02:03] and for being a regular listener. Now, I have a sweet tooth too and that usually surprises people.
[00:02:09] Well, I just like all foods actually. Salty, sugary doesn't matter. Now when we wind the
[00:02:14] clocks back 20 years, fat was the main villain. Not sugar. Fat was blamed for everything from
[00:02:21] heart attacks to weight gain because of this. The 1990s became the low fat decade. Many food
[00:02:28] manufacturers jumped on board this low fat train and reformulated their recipes to ensure their
[00:02:34] products fat content were greatly reduced. These items sold like low fat hotcakes. Do you remember a
[00:02:41] dessert line launched by Nabisco called snack wells? If you haven't, don't worry about it.
[00:02:46] These were marketed as low fat desserts that still tasted good. Only they didn't, which is why
[00:02:53] you never hear about them anymore. But at some point we realized that limiting fat in our diets
[00:02:59] didn't lead to a decreased risk of disease. In fact, we saw rates of heart disease and
[00:03:04] diabetes increase. Uh oh, something was wrong with this equation. Maybe limiting fat wasn't the
[00:03:11] answer. What we did learn is that when people began limiting the amounts of fat in their diets,
[00:03:17] they increased their intakes of carbohydrate rich foods to make up for this. Suddenly pasta and
[00:03:23] rice were your friends. So as long as it was low fat, you were good to go. The trouble is
[00:03:29] when folks increase their consumption of carbs, they chose the ones that we don't want people to
[00:03:35] consume all that often like white breads, white rice, white pastas and sugary cereals. The problem
[00:03:42] with these foods is they get converted to sugar in the body very, very quickly, which is not what we
[00:03:48] want. When your blood sugar goes up too quickly, the body has to try and compensate for this,
[00:03:54] which can lead to an increased risk for a number of diseases like heart disease and type 2 diabetes.
[00:04:01] Now the pendulum has swung the other way. Fat is good, sugar is not. When we consume foods that are
[00:04:09] high in fat like avocado, nuts and seeds, for example, it doesn't really affect our blood sugar
[00:04:14] levels. Plus these foods help us feel full longer. Foods that are high in sugar make us feel hungry
[00:04:21] soon after. Ever notice how a bowl of plain white rice never seems to satisfy our appetites?
[00:04:27] So do we need to completely avoid sugar in our diets? Simply put no. In fact, it's impossible
[00:04:33] to remove all sugar from the diet. This is because pretty much everything we eat is composed of sugar
[00:04:40] in one form or another. Fruit for example contains fructose, a type of sugar. Vegetables,
[00:04:47] even green leafy vegetables contain some sugar. Vegetables need sugar to survive and grow.
[00:04:53] Alcohol, whether it's wine, beer or hard liquor contain sugar. The body even converts parts of
[00:05:01] the fats and oils we consume to sugar. Whenever you consume carbohydrate rich foods,
[00:05:06] even whole grains, you are basically eating sugar. They don't get me wrong. These foods have
[00:05:11] vitamins, minerals and some fiber along with them so they are perfectly fine to eat.
[00:05:16] I'm just making the point that it would be impossible to avoid all sugar in our diet.
[00:05:21] So the trick is to reduce the amount of added sugars we consume. Researchers have found that
[00:05:27] regularly consuming lots of added sugar over years and years can increase a person's risk
[00:05:33] for developing many of the chronic diseases that are very common, especially in the US.
[00:05:38] In fact, consuming added sugars has been shown to increase the risk for heart disease,
[00:05:43] stroke, type 2 diabetes and even some forms of cancer. This doesn't mean we need to avoid
[00:05:49] all added sugars all the time. While the body doesn't seem to prefer added sugars,
[00:05:55] it is equipped to handle small doses of it. Added sugars are most commonly found in the foods
[00:06:01] we likely already know we should be consuming less often like sodas, sweet breakfast cereals,
[00:06:08] baked goods like cookies, cakes, donuts, you know most desserts you get the idea.
[00:06:14] The goal really is to try and slow down how quickly that added sugar gets absorbed into the bloodstream.
[00:06:20] To do this, consider consuming some fiber or protein with your meals and snacks.
[00:06:26] Let's use a smoothie with added sugar as the example. If the recipe calls for some plain yogurt
[00:06:31] or leafy greens like kale, that can help slow down the body's absorption of any sugar you added.
[00:06:38] Yogurt is not a great source of fiber but it is a good source of protein. On the contrary,
[00:06:43] kale is not a good source of protein but a good source of fiber so if the recipe calls for one
[00:06:49] or the other or both, it may help. Let's use another example. Having a piece of toast for breakfast.
[00:06:56] If it's a whole grain variety of bread, that means it likely contains some dietary fiber which will
[00:07:02] help slow down the body converting this to sugar. Then if you top it with one tablespoon of nut
[00:07:09] butter, you would add protein and even more fiber. This is good. This will slow down how fast the
[00:07:16] body converts that toast to sugar. Now the American Heart Association recently released their
[00:07:21] guidelines for how much added sugar men and women should limit themselves to consuming each day.
[00:07:27] For guys, the recommendation is no more than 9 teaspoons of added sugar each day or about 36 grams.
[00:07:34] For ladies, no more than 6 teaspoons of added sugar per day or about 25 grams.
[00:07:40] Now I like these guidelines but there's a problem. It gets tricky to follow them because if you
[00:07:45] were to look for added sugars on food labels, it's not always obvious. Not all food manufacturers
[00:07:51] list the amount of added sugars in their products separately. Luckily, the US implemented
[00:07:56] its new food label policy but this policy only applies to large companies. So if we buy a boxed
[00:08:04] product from a small startup food manufacturer, we may have to do a little detective work.
[00:08:10] So whenever you're grocery shopping, take a moment to examine the nutrition facts label on the
[00:08:14] product you're thinking about buying. Along with the calories, total grams of fat, grams of carbohydrates,
[00:08:21] etc, you're going to see sugar listed there as well. Now if the product was made by a large company
[00:08:27] like Nabisco, Kellogg's or Pepsi for example, you'll likely see a separate line that says added
[00:08:34] sugars. But for products made by smaller food manufacturers, you may not see this extra added
[00:08:40] sugars line. Instead, the nutrition facts label will just tell you how many total sugars there are.
[00:08:46] This means you don't know whether these are natural sugars or added sugars.
[00:08:51] For example, if you look at the amount of sugar on a box of raisin brand cereal, it will look like
[00:08:56] a lot initially. Well, where does much of that sugar come from? The raisins. Raisins are dried grapes.
[00:09:04] Grapes are a fruit so they're going to be naturally high in sugar. This is where just looking
[00:09:09] at the nutrition facts label can be misleading. It doesn't always tell you whether these sugars are
[00:09:13] found naturally or whether they've been added. But now, since raisin brand is made by a large company,
[00:09:19] Kellogg's, you should see a separate line that says added sugars. Now you know how many sugars were
[00:09:25] natural like on the raisins and how many were added to help make the cereal taste more sweet.
[00:09:31] If you want a double check and really make sure you're avoiding added sugars, check the ingredients
[00:09:36] list. Why? Each ingredient is listed by weight. This means that the first ingredient listed
[00:09:43] is the one the product is made mostly of. The second ingredient is what the product is made
[00:09:48] second most of and so on. When looking at the ingredients list, if you see the word sugar or any
[00:09:54] of its cousins like honey, molasses, cane sugar, sweeteners, high fructose corn syrup or anything
[00:10:01] else ending in OSE like lactose, maltose, fructose, dextrose, then it's basically sugar.
[00:10:08] There are so many sneaky ways to list sugar on the ingredients list and it's a challenge to keep
[00:10:12] track of them all. But if you find these listed near the top of the ingredients list,
[00:10:17] this food has a lot of added sugar in it and you most likely want to limit how much you consume.
[00:10:23] Again, there is no need to try and avoid sugar in your diet completely. In fact, it's nearly
[00:10:28] impossible to do but if you can limit your intake of added sugars, you're likely going to reduce
[00:10:33] your risk for a number of chronic diseases.
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[00:11:40] Thank you again for the question, Billy. Now if you want a physical copy of our optimal living
[00:11:46] daily workbook shipped to you for free and you're in the US, send in a relevant health-related question.
[00:11:52] It can be about diet, fitness, nutrition, stress management, anything along those lines
[00:11:58] and your question will be answered right here on the show. If you're outside the US,
[00:12:03] we'll send you a digital version of the workbook. So to send in a question, you can email one to
[00:12:09] health at oldepodcast.com or if you want to send in an audio question and have your voice
[00:12:17] played on the show, come by oldepodcast.com slash ask to record from your computer or you can do
[00:12:25] it the old-fashioned way and call in your question. The number is one 61 I love OHD. That's
[00:12:34] one six one four five six eight three six four three. Thank you so much for sending in your questions
[00:12:41] answering them as my favorite part of the show. All right that's another Q&A edition of optimal
[00:12:46] health daily. Thank you so much for listening every day and all the way through. I hope you have
[00:12:51] a great start to your weekend and I'll see you back here tomorrow with your optimal life.
[00:12:56] Awaits!