Dear ,

Do you ever find yourself needing something sweet as a "pick me up" during the day?

Do you experience deep cravings for foods like chocolate or ice cream... or have trouble stopping once you start eating sweets?

Do you have difficulty saying "no" to dessert or candy when it's offered at work or social gatherings?

If so, you're not alone. Most people find that they have a love-hate relationship with sweets. We love the taste and immediate gratification... but we hate the guilt, the way it makes our body feel and the long-term health implications.

Today you'll learn about the damaging effects of sugar and the Why's & How To's of a sugar detox, but before you jump in, I thought this study might be of interest to you...

A breakthrough experiment from Colorado (USA) - which included 45 volunteers -has proven that by eating this prickly flower you can reduce cravings for sugar and starchy foods!
 
It's shown to be 5x more effective than exercise…. 6x more effective than diet...
 
And they found it's 3x MORE effective than gastric bypass surgery at controlling craving urges.
 
==> Prickly Flower Helps Eliminate Food Cravings & Burns Away Fat

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TODAY'S MESSAGE
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Sugar: The Taste of Sweet Survival

As you may know, you have a primal urge to consume sweet foods. This craving is hardwired into your physiology.

When the food supply was very unpredictable - and caloric energy was difficult to come by - calories were an evolutionary advantage. Sweetness represented energy, and energy meant survival.

Of course, in the days of our ancestors, sweet foods were uncommon. They were either available only at certain times of the year (in the case of fruit and berries) or they took a lot of effort to obtain (picture yourself climbing a cliff face to gain access to a beehive full of honey).

Of course, all of that has changed...

Where sweets were once scarce and difficult to obtain, today they are cheap and ubiquitous. Yet, while the landscape of our food supply has changed, the hard-wired survival instinct to consume sugar has not.

The result? A vicious cycle of sugar addiction.

Sugar Addiction & Deafening Leptin's Message

Some people compare eating sweets to "opening Pandora's box". Once they have that brownie, cookie or any form of sweet treat - it's difficult to stop.

But it's not just about a lack of willpower. Your hormones are also to blame.

After eating a sugar-sweetened treat, your blood sugar rises. The hormone insulin (often called the fat-storing hormone) is called upon to mobilize sugar from the blood. As insulin does its job and blood sugar falls, signals are sent to the brain that available energy is dwindling. Hunger ensues.

And what do you reach for? Often a carbohydrate-rich treat - the very type of food that put you in a state of hormonal hunger in the first place.

But there's more to the equation than just blood sugar and insulin.  Eating sugar actually deafens the message sent to your brain that you're full. And it does this by causing leptin resistance.

Leptin (also known as the satiety hormone) is an important regulator of hunger. It monitors the amount of energy we consume and provides feedback to our brain. When leptin works properly, your eating is under control. But as we become resistant to its signals, this important biofeedback mechanism is compromised.

The result is not just that we become hungry again faster after eating a sweet treat - it's also that we tend to eat more on the rebound because we're not satisfied.

Of course, the most visible result of sugar addiction is weight gain. But a high-sugar diet is also closely correlated with chronic disease.

Chronic Disease and a High Sugar Diet

In addition to promoting systemic inflammation and accelerating the aging process, a high-sugar diet is associated with heart disease, declining brain health, cancer and more.

And while I could fill a book with studies that establish the correlation, I'd like to share two that are particularly meaningful:

• Sugar and Declining Brain Health: In a study published in the journal Neurology, researchers found a direct relationship between brain shrinkage and blood sugar. They also found a direct relationship between memory loss and elevated blood sugar. What's more, it wasn't just "diabetic" levels of blood sugar that caused these effects - even relatively moderate elevations caused harm to the brain and memory.

• Sugar and Heart Disease: The Journal of the American Medical Association published a report entitled Added Sugar Intake and Cardiovascular Diseases Mortality among US Adults. The study showed a direct correlation between the amount of dietary sugar and the risk of death from a cardiovascular event. What's more, when the researchers compared people whose dietary sugars accounted for less than 10% of their total calories to those over 25% of daily calories, those consuming the most added sugar had a 300% higher risk of death from a cardiovascular event!

How to Do a Sugar Detox

Detoxing from sugar and adopting a long-term, low-sugar lifestyle isn't just important to improve body your body composition: it is essential to prevent chronic disease.

Doing a sugar detox is especially important if:

• You ever feel controlled by cravings for sweets and carbs - or you just can't say no

• You become irritable or have mood swings based on blood sugar

• You feel you need sweets or carbs for a boost of energy during the day

• You just can't stop once you start eating sweets

If any of these describe you, then your health would greatly benefit from a firm commitment to completely QUIT sugar for at least three to four weeks.

Of course I mean processed foods that contain sugar, like candy and soda. But I'm also talking about natural forms of sugar - honey and maple syrup - as well as starches that are rapidly converted into sugar (like pasta and grains).

And while many "sugar detox" programs still allow some level of carbohydrate and even fruit, this strategy typically isn't sufficient to fully elicit the important metabolic and hormonal changes that can help you break your sugar addiction including:

• Resetting your metabolism from a "sugar burner" to a "fat burner"

• Eliminating wild fluctuations in mood and energy levels

• Resetting appetite and reducing leptin resistance

• Resetting your taste sensation so you no longer require sweet foods to feel satisfied

In fact, most people find they achieve the biggest benefit and quickest results by focusing consumption solely on grass-fed meats, pastured poultry and eggs, wild fish, bone broth and stock, healthy fats (lard, tallow, grass-fed butter, duck fat, coconut oil, avocados) and non-starchy vegetables.

Sugar Detox Sample Menu

Here's what your sample sugar detox daily menu might look like:

• Breakfast: Pastured eggs with grass-fed butter or coconut oil, pastured pork sausage and avocado (or skip breakfast entirely to increase fasting duration, which also helps reset your metabolism)

• Lunch: Atlantic mackerel or wild salmon burger or grass-fed beef burger, mixed green salad with olive oil and vinegar

• Dinner: Duck breasts, leafy greens and bell peppers sautéed in duck fat with garlic

• Snacks: Bone marrow, bone broth, olives, Brazil nuts

To better health... without sugar,

Kelley Herring
Healing Gourmet

P.S. Looking for more ways to alleviate cravings? This ugly "prickly flower" helps kill food cravings. You might even have it in your own backyard - here's what it looks like.

References

1. Lucia Kerti MA, A. Veronica Witte PhD, Angela Winkler MA, Ulrike Grittner PhD, Dan Rujescu MD, Agnes Flöel MD. Higher glucose levels associated with lower memory and reduced hippocampal microstructure. Journal of Neurology. November 12, 2013
    
2. Quanhe Yang, PhD; Zefeng Zhang, MD, PhD; Edward W. Gregg, PhD; W. Dana Flanders, MD, ScD; Robert Merritt, MA; Frank B. Hu, MD, PhD. Added Sugar Intake and Cardiovascular Diseases Mortality Among US Adults. JAMA Internal Medicine. February 3, 2014 
    
3. Banks WA1, Coon AB, Robinson SM, e al. Triglycerides induce leptin resistance at the blood-brain barrier. Diabetes. 2004 May;53(5):1253-60