r/sugarfree

I get so much push back from peers.

-a little won't kill you

-are you phobic of eating calories

-live a little, eat what you want

-do you have an eating disorder?

However, i promise the experiment of cold turkey quitting was HUGE

Of course i lost weight, only because i do other things besides feel bogged down by a toxic substance. I'm not on annoying fad diet. I'm just eating recognizable food.

Did you think you'd actually get back to normal regarding nutrition??

Hello, I’m currently on day three of what I thought was going to be my start on a raw vegan diet. So, I used to eat vegan before, and thrived on it, eating mostly whole food, little refined sugars and lots of vegetables and fruits. But then life happened and my pmdd got worse and I had to start medications, first antidepressants and later hormones. This completely changed my eating habits, cravings, fullness after meals or rather the lack of it. I gained weight and now after quitting all medication finally had the energy and sane mind to make changes. I have lipedema as well and I knew I had to lessen the inflammation in my body to get it under control, and a raw vegan diet seemed like a good option to start. But after two days I felt so sick and shitty I had to google it, which led me to the rabbit hole of sugar withdrawal and it all made sense. I have never cut sugar from my diet before, even in my healthiest days I just naturally ate less but never stopped. So here I am discovering that I’m a full blown addict, reading everyone’s stories and it makes so much sense and I can see how much sugar has affected my life. I have struggled with maintaining diets in the past, it felt like a struggle, like one slip up could ruin everything but I never figured out what trigger was.

Right now I feel so shitty I just want to give up, I will keep reading all the stories you guys post here and try to stay positive though. Is there any advice on how to stay on top of the evil sugar devil telling me it’s okay to have a tiny bit of cake? I saw someone using an app to track cravings, does that work? I really feel that the evil sugar may be the root cause of my problems so I take every advice anyone can give me! And I will try to tell myself this is an actual thing and not just something I made up in my head, sugar addiction exists, I can already hear friends and family say "but a little sugar doesn’t hurt anyone". Ugh. If you read all of this, thank you.

Hiking w a friend, he was flummoxed as I don't eat dates as part of sugar free. He kept asking over & over. I just said, "I eat whole fruits and sparingly, i don't eat concentrated sugary fruits. No biggie"

He brought them to my house and stood in front of me begging me to eat them, and i kept saying, "no thanks". Then he said, "i got it. You're phobic of calories. YOu have an eating disrorder".

Painful then, now i just don't bother w that person.

Your turn!

what day did you guys notice your sugar cravings drop drastically? I’m on day 16 over here and still craving it… honestly feels like it’s getting worse

I followed your suggestions and I've made my way down to 133 pounds within 4 months or so! I'm very close to 130. I was 139 pounds before. I fit into one of the jeans I was having trouble with before 😭 I also genuinely feel better mentally and physically with my diet. Before I felt so bloated and the sugar was causing a myriad of problems to my body (I was eating fast food, chips, soda, and boba daily). I'm definitely in a calorie deficit now and I'm very happy. I still treat myself to desserts every now and then, but I don't go overboard and binge! I try to eat sweets and carbs in moderation. I also have been doing full body workouts.

Variety of foods I eat on a daily basis (interchangeably): 3-4 eggs with avocado, porkchops with rice, curry chicken, plain yogurt with oats, plain earl grey tea, green tea, vinegar apple cider soda (0kal), mango, oatmeal with blueberries, pancakes.

I have completely cut out sugar and carbs for the most part so I call that a success :D!

Just wanted to share my journey because maybe it will help someone else who has struggled with the same thing.

I’ve been a bit overweight since my late teenage years. I don’t really have other bad habits like smoking or drinking, but food has always been something I used for comfort. When I felt stressed, tired, bored, or low, I would usually reach for something sweet.

Sometimes it got out of hand, especially with desserts, soda, chocolate, pastries, and other sugary stuff. Sugar would give me a quick mood boost, especially in the morning or when I felt drained, but then I would crash later and feel even worse. Needless to say, it also wasn’t helping my weight. I gained quite a bit over the last four years.

I tried going cold turkey, replacing sweets with fruit, not keeping snacks at home, setting “cheat days,” drinking more water, making strict meal plans, and just relying on willpower. Some of those things helped for a few days or even a couple weeks, but I always ended up slipping back into the same pattern.

What finally helped me was treating it more like a habit I needed to track, not just a “willpower” problem. I read somewhere that tracking cravings and progress can make it easier to stay consistent, so I searched the App Store for apps that help with quitting sugar. The one I used is called Quit Sugar - SugarLog, but any app or system that helps you track your progress could work, even a physical journal should do.

I started seeing that I usually wanted sugar at specific times, like after lunch, late at night, or when I was stressed. Once I noticed those patterns, it became easier to prepare for them instead of reacting automatically.

It took me about two months to feel like I had really broken the habit. The first couple of weeks were the hardest. But after a while, the cravings became weaker, and I stopped thinking about sugar all the time

I've been avoiding most processed sugar but occasionally I'll have things like cottage cheese, bread or tomato paste with sugar . However I have some almond milk that has sugar added and I wonder if it will ruin everything

I’m on day 15 with no sugar and oh my God, I’m losing it 😭 Days 13/14/15 have honestly been the hardest for me since days 3 and 4. I was doing so well, barely even craving anything, and then out of nowhere all I wanna do is lock myself in a dark room and eat every chocolate bar in existence. Anyone else been through this?

So i was thinking about this at like 11pm last night and I genuinely cant believe this isn't discussed more in the context of sugar elimination protocols. when people go sugar free or cut carbs hard, the first 3-7 days are usually described as withdrawal-headaches, irritability, brain fog, intense cravings-and almost everyone attributes this to either low blood sugar or caloric deficit from removing a food group. but the timeline doesn't actually line up cleanly with either of those explanations. genuine hypoglycemia resolves in hours not days, and caloric deficit symptoms don't typically include the specific craving intensity and mood crashes that look way more like dopaminergic withdrawal than energy deprivation.

the leptin angle is where it gets interesting and honestly underappreciated. leptin is the hormone your adipose tissue releases to signal satiety and energy sufficiency to your hypothalamus-basically telling your brain we have enough stored fuel, you can stop obsessing about food. chronic sugar overconsumption creates leptin resistance in a similar way to insulin resistance, meaning the signal is being sent but the hypothalamus stops responding to it properly. when you cut sugar abruptly you are not just removing calories, youre initiating what might be a leptin sensitivity reset that takes weeks not days, and during that window your brain is genuinely operating as if its in an energy crisis even if you are eating plenty of food. that subjective starvation feeling isn't a deficit, its a recalibration lag.

honestly the dopamine piece is probably the more acutely uncomfortable part of the timeline. sugar consumption reliably triggers dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens-the same reward circuitry involved in substance dependence-and abrupt removal creates a transient dopaminergic deficit that manifests as anhedonia, irritability, and cravings that feel disproportionate to what you are actually giving up. the reset timeline for dopamine receptor sensitivity after chronic sugar exposure in animal models runs roughly 3-4 weeks which maps pretty closely to what people subjectively report when they say it got easier after a month. we keep telling people they are just adjusting to fewer calories when they are probably going through a genuine neurochemical recalibration. has anyone here tracked mood and craving intensity week by week during a sugar elimination and noticed when the inflection point actually hit

Basically as the title say, curious to know how strict everyone is on cutting sugar and why? Keto through to just avoiding refined sugar- there seems like a pretty big grey area

#strict

For those of you who are sugar free and caffeine free how do you get yourself up in the morning?

Like I eat a lot meat, cheese and protein things. It feels like these are the only things for me to be not hungry. I wish I could eat more fruits or vegetables but I kinda don‘t like it ?? Feel childish kinda.

I am addicted to sugar, full stop. I was consuming 52oz’s of simply limeade or cranberry juice every other day on top of a plethora of different desserts like cake, ice cream, and cookies. Most likely around 500g a day

I recently cut out all juice and desserts after switching to caffeine supplements and then primarily water with mio or just plain water. I’m on my first day of my menstrual cycle and I feel great! I have little to no uterine inflammation or cramps, I’m not bloated and let’s just say my gastrointestinal system feels less all over the place. I’m not sure where this journey will lead me, I just know not obsessing over my next sugar fix or going broke on sweets feels good as hell!

Ppl who have successful been refined sugar free (free from ice cream, donuts, cake, chocolates) etc i wanna know a few things.

1. What are the mistakes you made ? Like how’d you do things differently if you were to start again ?

2. Any out of the box learning lessons (not the basic ones OUT OF YHE BOX)

3. Some tips and tricks that everyone should know.

4. What are some common myths about the beginner journey of being sugar free that no one talks about ?

5. Things that make this journey super easy.

Anyone have experience using the above alternative sweeteners in your baking?
I alway measure by weight and although the packaging states 1 for 1, I’ve discovered that 1c of brown sugar is 220g and granulated is 200g.
But 1c of the brown sugar is only 140g and 1c granulated is 120g.
Any experience would be helpful or just use measures due to a sweetness issue?
Thanks

Please advice ?