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If you have read my story, you know that I have battled a number of problems, including auto-immune issues. More than one of my immediate relatives has an auto-immune disease. My mom is an undiagnosed celiac with four auto-immune diseases. In fact, I’m close to the age where my mom was diagnosed with her first one.
Like many, if I reverted my diet back to my pre-traditional foods days, I’d go back to being in a world of hurt. I can picture myself with fibromyalgia, infertility, obesity and severe hormone problems.
If I ate a standard American diet, I would have fibromyalgia. As long as I stay on a traditional foods diet I do fine and I don’t have any symptoms. However, if I gorge on white sugar, that will bring on a flare. Last Christmas I put myself into a flare by being stupid and eating too many homemade caramels made with white sugar. My shoulders ached and I couldn’t raise my arms after consuming seriously more than I had any business eating.
I beat myself up over it but it also made me scared. Scared of bringing on another flair from eating the wrong things. Scared of having no choice but to go back to eating a SAD diet due to changing laws or lack of appropriate food being available. Scared of being sick for the rest of my life due to government stupidity factors outside my control.
For a long time, I have feared a repeat of that flare. It put a damper on my holiday to be in pain. So I have avoided sweeteners and kept an eye on my carbs. I assumed that all sweeteners would do the same so I avoided eating more than a small amount of even things like honey.
This year, I made caramels but I made them with rapadura and honey. I made marshmallows but I made them with honey alone. This year, I didn’t get a fibromyalgia flare despite putting on two or three… sigh… five pounds between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day. The only difference was the white sugar. I still ate wayyyy too many carbs overall.
So, what am I going to do with this information? I am no longer going to fear birthdays, anniversaries and holidays. I’ll feel free to enjoy a treat with my eyes only on avoiding weight gain and not on weeks of misery and pain. I’ll stick to T-tapp to avoid the weight gain. In fact, I’ll go kick my own tail and re-start T-tapp this week to loose the five pounds I gained.
No, this isn’t a license to binge or overeat. It isn’t an opportunity to eat too many carbs. I have been overweight and I never want to return to a size 18 again. More carbs WILL make me fat. However, it is a blessing to know that as long as I avoid the white sugar, I can likely avoid the pain. I will now only limit my carbs in the meal before and after a treat instead of being scared and cutting all carbs that day.
Do you have any foods that trigger health problems?
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Excellent post! I just re-started T-tapp myself this past week.
You’re so right about the white sugar. I have always had a sweet tooth, but since I felt a sharp pain in my back molar (impacted wisdom tooth) a couple of months ago, I have found it easy to resist junk sugar. I don’t even eat many healthy sweets now 🙂
White sugar gives me emotional problems, anxiety and deep depression. It also has an addictive quality. Eat some and want more. I had one serving over the holidays which was not enough to trigger me, but I have been off it since the spring, and so it was not compelling later. It’s nice to be past the temptation of the holidays though!
Grains are still a problem for me . . . I experience digestive symptoms, fatigue, brain fog and weight gain. Refined sugar nails me, too . . . I get moody and eventually will get a sore throat and stuffy sinuses. I seem to do fine with honey. If I manage stress really well and get consistently good sleep, it softens the blow of all these grain/sugar effects. I was altogether not brilliant last weekend and went to bed at midnight, two nights in a row. I feel EXHAUSTED. Pummeled. Steam-rollered.
White sugar as well as any type of cane sugar really bother me. I stuggled with a 20 year constant headache, fibromyalgia, as well as many other issues until recently when I discovered the connection to cane sugar. It is truly amazing the difference I feel when I don’t eat that type of sugar. I know some people joke about white sugars being from the devil but for me they truly are! Unfortunately, they are very hard to stay completely away from in our society. I look at all the issues that are related to sugar (specifically white sugar) and think “why is this stuff still around? We are killing ourselves with sugar.”
Great information. My mother-in-law has fibromyalgia and has flare-ups and I never knew white sugar could be the culprit. Look forward to learning more with your blogging Kerry Ann.