December, unsweetened, No. 11

12/16: Movie motivation

This blog chronicles the author's attempt to endure the month of December, 2019, without eating sugary foods or drinks.

Maybe it's too soon to tell, but I'm halfway through my dessert-free holidays and I'm not noticing any particular benefit of having dramatically reduced my sugar intake. In fact, I've felt worse. My mood is flat, my vitality has ebbed and my thoughts are more frequently muddled.

Yesterday, when a perky Panera employee wandered through the shop, offering free bite-sized samples of their "bear claws," I nearly caved in. The samples were each about an inch square, so I almost allowed myself a tiny "cheat."

After pulling myself together and graciously declining one of those sweet little freebies, I realized I needed some sort of extra motivation to maintain my commitment level. So, my evening with Holly featured a full-length documentary movie entitled, "That Sugar Film."

There are, to be sure, at least a dozen films proclaiming the physical and mental health dangers that come with conspicuous sugar consumption. It was pretty much a roll of the dice as to which one we were going to watch. If you're so inclined, check out the trailers and decide for yourself.

That Sugar Film is something along the lines of "Supersize Me." The leading man maintains a healthy diet of whole foods, until trying an experiment with his body. Since the norm for people in America, as well as in his native Australia, is to consume 40 teaspoons of sugar per day, he adjusts his food selections to do the same for 60 days. Most of the food he eats is typically considered "healthful," but contains surprising amounts of added sugar.

I won't spoil the ending, but I suspect you can make a pretty good guess as to how it ends. Along the way, I picked up some interesting tidbits about just how much sugar is added to our processed foods. The answer is way too much. And
if you take everything out of a supermarket that has added sugar, you'd have only about 20 percent of the items left on the shelves.

For me, it was worth watching and confirmed, at least for now, that my unsweetened December idea would eventually prove worth trying. I'm just waiting for that moment when the evidence is clear to me. The film suggests that it generally takes two to four weeks before the "detox" is over and the positive results begin to become apparent.

I just have to have enough patience to wait for the payoff.