There’s a group of changes to your body that point to metabolic disease. Having one of these changes doesn’t mean you have it, but does mean you have an increased risk. High blood sugar levels, high blood pressure abnormal triglyceride or cholesterol levels and carrying most of your weight around your middle are the signs. Metabolic disease leads to increased risk of heart disease and type 2 diabetes. What causes it, there’s a link to high sugar consumption.
Sugar is in everything, adding calories without adding nutrition.
It’s tough not to have a diet high in sugar, since it infiltrates all the food we eat! Take the go to favorite of the fast food world, the hamburger. Sugar is in the bun and the ketchup and mayonnaise. When you top it off with a soft drink, which is carbonated water, artificial flavoring and sugar, you have enough sugar to keep you going for a week. Not only is sugar in everything, it has no nutritional value, just empty calories. Breakfast cereals, jelly, candy, baked goods, sauces, bread and ready-made dinners all contain sugar. Sugar is highly addictive, especially HFCS—high fructose corn syrup. It metabolizes like alcohol and degenerates the liver. It causes inflammation and the symptoms of metabolic disease.
Added sugar is shown to both directly and indirectly account for diabetes and heart disease.
There’s direct evidence that consumption of added sugar is associated with insulin resistance, fatty liver, cardiovascular disease, elevated fat in the blood—dyslipidemia, diabetes and excess uric acid in the blood. These conditions don’t have to be in conjunction with weight gain either. Studies show that insulin resistance can develop without that occurring. While fruit contains fructose, the fiber changes the way the body reacts. The same is not true of HFCS, which is one of the most prominent types of sugar added.
Both the direct effect of sugar and the indirect effect, lead to metabolic disease,
As you can see, directly sugar causes dysregulation of fats and carbohydrate metabolism. However, there’s also an indirect link. Indirectly, high amounts of sugar leads to high calories and few nutrients, which causes weight gain and ultimately obesity. This too, leads to dysregulation of lipids (fats) and carbohydrate metabolism. The direct and indirect path both create the conclusion that eating more whole foods and cutting out added sugar can help prevent metabolic disease.
- One mega study showed that not only sugar, but sugar substitutes in soft drinks can lead to visceral fat—fat around the middle. Rather than switching to diet drinks, switch to the ultimate diet drink, water.
- Eating too much sugar can lead you to fill up on empty calories, leaving no room for nutritious ones that supply the nutrients your body needs to be healthy.
- Not only is it hard to kick the sugar habit, because it seems to be in all processed food, sugar is addictive. It activates the opioid receptors in the brain, stimulating the release of dopamine, like opioids do.
- Men with an apple shape and women with a pear shaped body indicates the potential for metabolic disease. That comes from visceral fat that lies deep in the abdomen and crowds the organs. Sugar consumption increases the tendency for visceral fat.
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