the things I have learnt.

I have various times over the years tried going sugar free, its easy you just don't eat anything with sugar in it.

It's not easy everything has sugar in it.

Defeated from the start.

I have done a lot of reading over the last few months and learnt the follow….

You can eat anything that is less than 5% sugar – this means having to read a lot of labels, look at the per hundred grams column and check it is less than 5 grams. The "traffic light" system on the front of the package is misleading always look at 100 gram details.

Not all products are equal – just because you have found one cracker that is less than 1 gram of sugar doesn't mean that they are all low in sugar.

Fat is good for you – low fat products have added sugars to compensate for the loss of taste that the lack of fat provides. Also fat is filling, sugar isn't filling and leaves you wanting more.

You can snack on full fat yoghurt, cheese and crackers, avocados, eggs, nuts, hummus and you can have full fat milk on your oats (but be careful what you use to sweeten them with).

Sugar is 8 times more addictive than cocaine.

Ideally you want to aim for 6 – 9 spoonfuls of sugar a day, a spoonful being about 4 grams.

Fructose is the worse kind of Sugar especially if it's not in its natural form. It is ok to have one piece of real fruit as one of your five (or preferably 7) pieces of fruit and veg a day.

When avoiding sugar 80% of supermarkets suddenly become no go areas, avoid the brightly coloured packaging.

Sugar is incredibly damaging to your health.

Sugar weakens your immune system, if you are constantly grazing on sugary snacks (as I was) you will be more prone to illnesses e.g. Colds.

I hope to expand on some of the above points in future posts.

Trying to go sugar free

I have in the past been a yo-yo dieter and always wanted to lose weight and be healthier too.  To cut a long story short three years ago I hit my target weight, I have kept most of it off but feel I failed in the becoming healthier part.

2017 New Years resolution was to quit sugar.  Mid January it wasn't going too well but I was starting to hear that people were planning to have a sugar free February so decided to put resolution plans on hold until then.  Sugar free February didn't start too well and seeing as its only a short month …. you get the idea.

May 2017 I started to get serious, reading books, blogs, articles etc on sugar and the damage it does and have finally cut back on the white stuff.

Hoping that blogging my thoughts and findings will help me in my quest to go sugar free.