What Is Sugar Addiction? Understanding Sugar Addiction in One Article
Last night my little son Yuming had another sugar frenzy, which left his dad so exhausted that he passed out way too early, so early that by 3:30 this morning he had... slept enough! I quickly got up and, while the whole family was still sound asleep, turned on the computer to write this article that had been brewing in my head for a long time.
Kids and Sugar
Yes, the topic is about kids and sugar. Ever since I was little, I was known for having the nature of an ant, as if an ant had been reincarnated as me, or as if I were possessed by an ant, so obsessed with sweets. I loved candy, chocolate, drinks, red bean soup, mung bean soup, cake, cookies... Luckily, when I was little my mom would not let me have too abundant a supply of desserts, and back in those days the sweet component in these snacks was mostly granulated sugar. Otherwise, the present-day me might be in prison or in the hospital!
As I recall, as a child I had a very bad temper, often up and down, with a feeling I could not control myself, always wanting to yell or vent at something, but I never knew what the reason was.
After I grew up, my finances became more comfortable, and I ran into the "prosperity" of convenience stores blooming everywhere, so the content of my sweets became more substantial and greater in quantity, almost like the urban jungle real-life version of a fairy tale in which the old woman of the candy house opens a chain of stores. Of course, like the protagonist in the book, I wandered into the trap without even realizing it.
Likewise, the old problem of my bad temper followed me as before, but because I had grown up, I would try to attribute the bad temper to the social environment, my own DNA, human nature... or else that there is simply no such thing as a calm mind, that this only exists in Hollywood films, right? I also tried meditation, yoga, breath regulation, and exercise to relieve stress. These all helped, but they still could not improve the emotional outburst that happened once every so often. In the end, I accepted my bad temper and regarded it as my fate.
After I started farming, my sense of taste slowly came back
After I started farming, I became more interested in cooking and where ingredients come from, such as what ingredients make up a given dish, and how these ingredients are produced or manufactured. By unraveling things thread by thread through books and documentaries, I discovered much new knowledge about food that I had not understood before, or that manufacturers did not want consumers to know. But knowing is one thing; the dietary conditioning of the past still constrained me. Eating cheap, mass-produced chocolate, I would think while reading the ingredients, hmm, these things are really not good, this has chemical emulsifier additives, and genetically modified soybean ingredients, and this sugar is made from genetically modified corn; after eating it my blood sugar would rise and fall rapidly like a roller coaster in a short time.
Eating an M burger, I would think, this wrapper is said to contain highly toxic substances, these fries contain many chemical flavorings, this oil is gradually hardening my blood vessels, this meat stood in its own pile of feces and urine while alive and died in that same pile of feces and urine. After eating these things, I felt satisfied, toxic but tasty, and after eating I had not yet died. This is just like a farmer standing in a field spraying pesticide: the pesticide is toxic, but only by spraying can his crops be sold, and after spraying he has not yet died, so he continues the next cycle of toxic circulation and accumulation.
Gradually I ate more natural food than before, and my sense of taste slowly came back. No, I should say I began to have a sense of taste. The number of times I went into convenience stores dropped sharply, and the items I transacted gradually became simply paying parking fees, phone bills, and fines! Eating salt-and-pepper chicken or an M burger, I began to feel it was not so tasty, and the key point was that after eating I actually felt a bit uncomfortable and off. The amazing thing was that my temper seemed to have a tendency to diminish and become controllable! Good heavens, a ray of dawn appeared in my life. Could it be that what is written in books is really true? Does diet affect the mind? Or even, is the content of one's diet equivalent to one's mental state? Are we what we eat?
But even if I had obtained something like an enlightening revelation, the information I learned and what I personally verified both told me the same thing, and I still could not truly escape that powerful dietary conditioning. I guess this force comes from childhood memories and the promotion and advertising of food corporations, and from myself!
Whatever the adults eat, the children eat
What truly saved me was my own child. Whatever the adults eat, of course the child eats too! We ate salt-and-pepper chicken and watched the child break out in a rash after eating it. We ate desserts and drank beverages and watched the child go into a sugar frenzy after eating them. This kind of white-mouse experiment woke me up immediately. A child's body is cleaner than an adult's, so if there is any problem with the food, it will show up immediately!
So then, how many problem children are there whose problems, whether physical or psychological, are actually caused by diet? We cannot know, unless we are willing to maintain an experimental spirit and change our children's diet, giving them more natural original ingredients, vegetables, and fruits, and banning refined, processed, and cooked dishes, especially commercially sold desserts and drinks. Even if this change lasts only one day, I think parents who try this experiment will all gain something.
This is not to say that children should not be given anything sweet at all. In fact, fruit is also very high in sugar, or one can use real honey or maple syrup or cane sugar to replace the current unscrupulous sugars on the market, such as chemical artificial sweeteners, granulated sugar containing heavy metal components, and fructose containing genetically modified ingredients. These sugars are cheap "to the point of being deadly." Sigh, I think I will have to start making sweet potato mash cake and carrot jelly myself again, and also whip up some roselle juice! Ah! And also, when a child is young and has not yet developed his own taste or the ability to say no to others, if you let him visit someone else's house alone, be careful. Someone else's momentary kindness in giving candy and snacks may mean you have to battle his sugar frenzy all night after he comes home!
