I Quit Sugar for 30 Days...Here's What Happened

Hi, my name is Cam, and for the most part, I live a pretty healthy life. I mean, I exercise consistently, drink lots of water, and I eat healthy. However, lately, things have really started to spiral. Cookies, chocolate, donuts, I have quickly become a cereal snacker. And I'm definitely not the only one. In the United States, sugar intake continues to grow each year. For example, 200 years ago, Americans on average ate roughly 2 pounds of sugar a year. Today, the average American consumes 152 pounds of sugar per year. And something's gotta change. So for the next 30 days, I'm gonna cut sugar from my diet to see how it affects my health and hopefully get my eating habits back on track. On day one, I head to the grocery store to stock up on food for the week. And while there are obvious foods with added sugar in them, like breakfast cereals or granola bars, I quickly realize how much added sugar is in the stuff that I normally buy. Normally at this point in my shop, I'd have like eight things in my cart, and I literally just have strawberries. Just strawberries. There's even added sugar in the things that I assumed were healthy. And the more I look at labels, the less things I add to my cart. That was cursed. Literally cursed. Let me show you what I got. Tofu. Cherry tomato. Mixed green. I managed to find oat milk that actually didn't have added sugar in it. Carrots. Peppers. I've got some canned beans and lentils. Pumpernickel bread, which was the only one that I could find with no added sugar in it. And it looks the worst out of all of them. So even though my grocery cart was slashed in half by added sugars, I still feel like I have a pretty decent haul here to make some good, healthy meals without any sugar. So here's to hoping this first week goes pretty well. While my meals typically don't have a lot of sugar in them anyway, I do still have to make some small tweaks to make them sugar free. Things like swapping salad dressings out for lemon juice and salt and pepper. Or for breakfast, swapping out brown sugar with my oatmeal for blueberries instead. And because I can already hear people in the comments being like, uh, it has natural sugar. Yes, it's natural sugar. It is different than added sugar because it comes with fiber and nutrients, antioxidants, things that are going to keep me full. Whereas added sugar is just, it's just added sugar and it really comes with nothing. So I'm going to be eating fruit during this challenge. Okay, now that that's out of the way, back to the video. However, even with some solid meals prepped, I still run into a problem. I did not expect it, but I am having cravings. I think four times today I have gone to the kitchen, opened the fridge, opened every cupboard imaginable, just looking for something sweet that I can snack on. But there's just nothing here and I just keep looking for it. Cravings quickly become a problem. Some small and easy to manage while some are actually a bit more difficult. I'm realizing that maybe I could have planned this a little bit better. Uh, reason being today is, uh, my birthday and I just had a friend stop by. They made me a birthday cake. A beautiful, thoughtful, delicious looking birthday cake. I can't eat my own birthday cake. What the f**k? To try and cut off all cravings, there's really only one thing I can do with my birthday cake. And that's put it in the freezer and save it for later. And y'all are tripping if you think I'm about to throw away a homemade birthday cake. This gonna keep well in the freezer. By day five, I also start to notice a substantial difference in my energy levels, making it hard to focus throughout my work days and even taking a toll on my physical health. I just took an Advil because my head is absolutely pounding right now. And I don't really know if this is related to sugar or not, but I never get headaches like ever. So I don't know what's up, but this is not fun at all. Struggling to figure out why I'm having such a hard time, the next day I go looking for answers. And I think I've figured out my problem. You see, when we eat, our tongue sends signals to our brain about what we're tasting. The brain then sends the feel-good chemical dopamine to your blood, which helps affirm the body that, yes, eating is good. When it comes to sugar, though, that dopamine response drastically increases. And when our body receives high levels of dopamine from something, we want more of it. That's why if you're sitting next to a bowl of sugary candy, it is so hard to eat just one. On top of that, this can lead to overconsumption and then reliance and then withdrawals, which sounds like an addiction. So I did a quick Google search on what some withdrawal symptoms might be, and it said cravings, exhaustion, and headaches. So I hate to say it, but I think I'm addicted to sugar. On the plus side, withdrawal symptoms are supposed to only last a few weeks, so hopefully this is the hardest part and things can only go up from here. Really quickly, I want to say a big thank you to the sponsor of this video, Athletic Greens. Athletic Greens has been a consistent part of my nutrition strategy for multiple years now. And that's because I know I'm staying on top of my nutrition with just a single scoop of their all-in-one supplement, AG1. It's packed with 75 vitamins, minerals, whole foods or superfoods, probiotics, and adaptogens in one convenient daily serving. Taking AG1 lets me know I'm starting each day hydrated with the nutrition I'll need to fuel my exercise and my recovery. And perhaps the most important of all is that it actually tastes good. No, really, the fact that I enjoy drinking AG1 every morning is probably the biggest reason I've been able to stick with it consistently. Introducing AG1 into your mornings is a great way to take control of your daily nutrition. And right now, if you click the link below, Athletic Greens is going to give you a free one-year supply of vitamin D and five free travel packs with your first purchase. So, click the link below to claim this free gift with your first purchase and take control of your daily nutrition with AG1 from Athletic Greens. Now, back to the video. After a tough first couple of weeks, I head back to the grocery store with hopes of finding some good snacks that can help curb my cravings. Starting with the most obvious of choices, kale chips. So, I'm hoping I can turn these tiny little leaves into a delicious snack. I'm gonna try making kale chips. I'm a huge chip lover, but unfortunately, most chips have sugar. So, I'm hoping that these can fill the gap. It doesn't look great. It looks a little bit burnt. Here we go. Yo, I don't love it, but like, I don't, I don't hate it. Let's go, let's go. These work. With the kale chips being an unbelievable success. I'm so sorry, I should not have said that. Anyway, I start trying out new snacks and it actually goes really well. I stock up on fruits that I can reach for when I'm craving something sweet, as well as quick things like hummus to pair with carrots or rice cakes. And I even found some popcorn that didn't have any sugar in it either. And once I get a feel for the snack situation, things really start to look up. I am feeling pretty darn good. I am not getting the cravings that I was in week one. Am I still looking at a chocolate chip cookie and feeling some type of way? Yes. Is it less than it was? Also, yes. The other thing that's been really great so far is I feel like I've overhauled my approach to snacking. It's opened this new door of all these new snack opportunities that are way healthier and don't have added sugar. And it might sound simple, but just having snack options that I'm excited to eat that aren't loaded with added sugar is going to serve me so well because I'm going to start to reach for those things instead of the stuff that's loaded with added sugar. And then I can do a better job balancing my diet. And so if you have options that are healthy and you enjoy them, you're going to be set. You're going to be chilling. And I'm going to be chilling because I'm killing this challenge so far. Let's go! With my withdrawals mostly behind me, in my final two weeks, I really start to notice some positive benefits. I feel like on the whole I'm eating healthier and being more strategic with my meals to help stay full and fend off cravings. I'm also starting to notice my energy levels evening out and I've been able to get some good workouts in without feeling exhausted later on in the day. But with the good, there is definitely some bad. The biggest frustration being that cutting sugar takes a lot of the fun out of eating, making it so you can't try that new donut shop that opened in your neighborhood. And it even limits how you can celebrate special occasions. Closing out this challenge, I think my biggest takeaway from this is number one, holy sh**, everything has sugar in it. What the... Number two, just how unaware I was of how much sugar I was consuming on a regular basis. I think it's important to note that I don't think it's helpful to treat sugar as a bad thing, but what I do think is important is being in control of how much you consume on a regular basis. For me, I feel like these last 30 days have really helped me regain some of that control and build my intuition so that I can be smarter about my eating habits going forward. That way when I decide I want to eat sugar, I can really, really enjoy it. Thank you guys for watching. If you liked this video, then please make sure to hit the like button. It really does help us out a lot. And if you want to see more videos from us, then please consider subscribing. And yeah, I'll see y'all in the next one. Cheers.