Friday, March 14, 2014

"I Used to be a Sugarholic..."

I Used to be a Sugarholic...
Libby Davis

A saying was given to me by friends who often saw me go to the end of a buffet line and get desserts (yes, plural) first. It went something like this:  "Eat dessert first, the world may end soon."

Libby DavisI've always had sugary foods/drinks. When I developed some digestion problems, I got off of the sodas after hearing the LORD tell me to stop carbonation.  I never indulged in diet stuff...I wanted the real deal.That was maybe 15 yrs ago.

Then I got hooked on sweet tea and lemonade. "Oh, that's okay, there's no carbonation in them."  And the message didn't come thru or was ignored about the foods; so I continued the pies, cookies, cakes and other desserts and foods. 

That was until the year I was introduced to  HA. It started with the teaching by Don and Jane.  I learned how much a gram of sugar equaled so I made my own sweet tea and lemonade and counted how many spoonfuls it took to make them 'good'!  That's when I started getting serious with juicing and stopped the tea and lemonade; but still the desserts were around.

Oh, and I stopped buying the sugary stuff for my home but said I'll only eat desserts when I go out (again, plural). I spent a wonderful vacation week at your home. It's true that I couldn't sleep late and had to prepare my own foods during this vacation; but what terrific reasons to get up early! The morning walks were pleasant times to get to know the other people as we looked at the "great outdoors". And the meals were always delightful and surprisingly good to look at and eat. 

The camaraderie around the  food preparation table in the kitchen was filled with laughter (great healing here too). 

So, after I spent that week with you I changed my lazy habits and followed your teachings by eating real live foods. I think it was the greens that finally did it for me, especially the  green smoothies. The craving for sugars disappeared as I included more greens in my day. When a craving would pop up at home (they didn't go away over night)  I'd take some BarleyMax and be 'sane' again. But when I went out and ate an 'old favorite' I found my immune system went down within an hour...sometimes in minutes. After being sick a couple of times I figured out the common error was sugar. Occasionally I'd remember how something tasted...see it...take a bite and relish it in my mouth... like a special treat...and struggle to swallow it. Within a year I was no longer tempted with false memories of taste or blinded by the looks or smells.

From this I learned that my body is smarter than my mind/memory. Although I found myself saying, "Yum, cheesecake!"  or   " That looks soooo good, flan is my number one favorite!" or "Smell that apple pie in the oven!"  They were all not what I remembered or what my mind told me they were but each proved to be disappointing as I evaluated them like every new food my mother used to put on my plate.

During that year I substituted sugar with natural sweeteners (mostly agave) but gradually stopped adding it for months at a time! Now I find desserts with healthy sweetners too sweet for me. I can take one bite and leave the rest. The same is true with dried fruits. One date or fig is sometimes too sweet for me.  I'm a new person and, oh, I threw that saying away!

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