How can I give up sugar?

[cheeseisthebest]

I'm borderline diabetic and also a tendency to binge eat.
I want to try keto/low carb and give up sugar. But my god its so hard.
There's always lots of chocolate and biscuits in my house and I can't stop that cos it's not just me who lives here!

Has anyone been a chocoholic and managed to quit sugar?

'It's a bit like worrying about drowning in an orange because a large percentage of it is water.'
😂
Thank you @Watchkeys I love it.
Off to eat some mangoes, pomegranate and yogurt, they keep me off the shortbreads.

I managed it by cutting carbs and sugar from my diet .
I set myself a 10 week challenge of no sugar or alcohol and based my diet around salad ,nuts ,fish ,meat ,chicken,eggs ,olives,seeds , berries ,Greek yoghurt ,small amounts of cheese and one square of good quality dark chocolate every day .

The first week or two was hard but then I started losing weight..and that spurred me on .It also became easier as I wasn't experiencing wild spikes in blood sugar.
I am now 3 stone lighter than I was in January this year .

When I look at a Kit Kat chunky now ,I see a waxy brown block ,and believe me ,I could have eaten four of them in one go previously .

I gave up sugar for several months and honestly the cravings were bad for about 5 weeks then they completely disappeared.
I gave up bread, crisps, white rice, pasta etc. too but I kept satsumas at the start as I needed something to stop me reaching for the sweets.
I joined a Fb sugar free group which was a big help.
I felt amazing. My skin was clear snd my insomnia was completely controlled. I lost weight, had more energy and could walk past a chocolate cake without a second glance.You get the picture.
I'm back on the sugar now but my son and I have decided to do it again in January.
I can't cut down. It has to be all or nothing for me. Its bloody hard as sugar is in EVERYTHING but well worth it. Can you get a friend or family member to join you?

What has changed EVERYTHING for me is The Glucose Goddess method. I've been a slave to my sweet tooth all my life & after following this method have had my favourite bar of chocolate sat in my fridge for over a month. I just don't want it or need it! My energy has improved & I'm eating great food. Lost over a stone already & feeling positive about shifting the rest.

Thank you all, really helpful, inspiring advice.
I know it messes up my blood sugars cos I've woken up starving.
What is the Glucise Goddess method?

If you have the cash, I can recommend the Keto Adapt course by Eric Westman. It is bit pricey, but absolutely starightforward and evidence based. Havig said that he has posted almost all the content for free on youtube, so you can also go it alone.
I found that learning the mechanisms behind how carbohydrates function in the body very helpful.

I’ve just looked this up and it looks brilliant, could I just ask how fruit and vegetable heavy the recipes are? I would love to try it but I have crohns and can’t tolerate a lot of fruit and veg frustratingly!

Sorry to hijack OP. I’m in the same position as you with sugar!

I think the best book on this is the sweet poison quit plan by David Gillespie. I think he borrowed from Alan carr’s, easy way to quit smoking in some of his theories. It is a change of mindset that sugar is an addictive substance, that is causing withdrawal symptoms and making you ill. I have done it more than once and need to do it again Once you quit, it does get easier.

My experience is totally at odds with those saying ‘it takes x time and then sunlit uplands’.

I’ve been doing it for 2 years and it’s a fucking battle. Some months are easy peasy, some are reeeeeally hard.

If it’s an addiction, you have to find ways to cope with life without using sugar. If things get really fucking overwhelming, you will have a battle in your hands with your mind that wants what it knows with soothe it - sugar. And if you succumb, you will find the cravings return again and you’ll be in that loop again until you can kick it again.

that’s my experience anyway. Agree with pp’s who say:

a) you need support
b) you need to work out what the hole is and get support for that
c) positive coping mechanisms
d) a more supportive husband

My husband is supportive, where did I say he isn't.

This is the thing, really. It's fine to say 'I did xyz and after abc amount of time, I was cured!', but your parameters aren't universal. Everybody's relationship with every substance is different. Breaking a physical addiction doesn't cut the mustard, otherwise alcohol and drug addiction would be a doddle to fix. (Mustard's probably got sugar in it, anyway...)

We each have to work out what our actual problem is, as an individual. What does the substance give us, that nothing else does? That's what we need to change. We have to find a way to meet that need elsewhere.

This isn't about sugar, @cheeseisthebest , it's about you getting what you need in life, and finding healthy ways to do it.

I think the fear of diabetes & what it might do to my body scared me into changes. I now eat very low carb & focus on eating lots of veg, protein & good fats. I feel 100% better & have lost interest in sugary crap, bread etc. I’m no longer pre-diabetic. Zoe was also very helpful for me, but it costs quite a lot.

Spot on @Watchkeys

Who is Zoe?

You can tell them not to store it anywhere that you would be able to access. If they feel they must buy sugary snacks (which means they too are addicted, sadly) they can at least have some sort of secure storage for it, which you cannot access - and they should be respectful of your needs by not eating it in front of you.

Perhaps, a few months down the line, when they see how you have benefitted from not eating all the sugary crap, they might be inspired to stop buying it for themselves.

She's a biochemist who has developed a relatively easy way of eating to reduce glucose spikes (& get you off the sugar rollercoaster). She has 2 books. I've got the second one which is the Glucose Goddess Method. You introduce one thing a week. It explains very simply what to do each week for example, Week 1 eat a savoury breakfast.
I was such a slave to sugar & snacking. I'm still buying the sugary stuff for family but I'm just not reaching for it at all?

Thank you! I like the sound of one thing a week.

Get them to lock the sweet stuff in the house in a Tim you don’t have the key for. It’ll help when you are finding it hard to resist.

I have realised this week that I just can't have one. The key is not to start on sugary things then I won't have any. I can't do the one square of chocolate thing!

following
I feel amazing when I don't have sugar

Can you wean yourself off? Today no sugar until 9am, tomorrow, no sugar until 9:15am... in a couple of months, you'll make it until bedtime.

That's a good idea.

It is until about 11am ;)

It might work. Worth a go :)

I used to eat so much sugar, then in July I massively cut down on my carb intake plus my daily can of diet soda and my sweet tooth disappeared within two weeks and I have lost 2.5 stone. I still eat sugar in fruit as I really enjoy how eating a lot of fruit and veg makes me feel.

It is worth noting that all carbs (except fibre) turn into sugar in order to be digested. So, if you 'give up sugar', but have bread with one meal, pasta with another, and a croissant with cheese for breakfast, you still have a high sugar diet. It's a good idea to give up/ cut down on flour, when you try to quit sugar, otherwise you're just getting your sugar a different way.

Might that be affecting you, @cheeseisthebest ? Do you try to replace your chocolate bar with a bit of toast, or have some cheese biscuits instead of a Kitkat, for example?