Monday, July 12

Sugar Free?

When most people move to a new city, they find a hair stylist, a doctor and maybe a dentist in that order.

I start with the dermatologist (thanks psoriasis)!

Well, thanks to my dermatologist I spent 2+ weeks trying to eliminate all refined sugar from my diet.

Apparently some people think that since psoriasis is auto-immune, diet can have a huge impact on the symptoms. In my case, I do think that it gets worse when I overindulge in certain food/drink items.

In general, I’ve also been a little concerned about the long-term impact of slathering on a variety of pretty strong topical creams.

So I decided to try going sugar free for a few weeks.

It was a very grumpy 2 and half weeks, that culminated in my eating a large piece of (delicious) wedding cake and drinking some champagne.

At first I thought that there was some change.

Then I realized that I was still using the mildest topical cream.

For someone with a science-ish degree, I clearly did not take a very scientific approach to this little experiment.

So basically, I avoided all sorts of foods..grumbled, made B nuts..and then had NO way to determine if the diet did anything useful for my psoriasis.


Perhaps I’ll try again and also go cold-turkey from the meds..but for now, I’m back on the good stuff.

Kind of.

One thing I did realize is that there is refined sugar in EVERYTHING.

It’s actually scary.

Even pita chips have refined sugar. WHY do pita chips need sugar?

The answer is, they don’t!

So although I’m going to start eating some sweet things again when I need a treat, I am going to try and avoid refined sugar in every day items. It’s OK if I eat sugar when I eat a piece of cake. Cake should have sugar.

But pita chips? Bread? Jam? Why do these things need refined sugar, and often lots of it?

No more no-sugar, but definitely less.

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