Freely Eating Sugar Ruined Me

[raypeatclips]

Literally a 75% coca-cola diet for weeks, very low caloric intake, and loads of caffeine intake.

This really isn't what the Peat way is about. Why would you do this?

 

[tara]

I started with milk and orange juice at first, but pretty soon I got so sick of them that I would get nauseous even just by looking at them. Plus milk gave me stomach pain, and orange juice gave me high blood pressure if I drank more than 1-2 glasses per day. Orange juice in particular was extremely bad for me... It made my blood pressure hover around 150/80. After stopping orange juice, however, BP is now back to 120/70! Coca cola was the only source of sugar which I could stand, but clearly I overdid it. It seems like starch is a necessary component of my diet.

It's hard to know from that whether the problem was the sugar replacing starch, or the coca cola displacing minerals, vitamins and protein. Did you try other fruits and juices, or just give up and switch to coke when OJ didn't work for you?

I might just have to eat a few meals of just fries. I'm sure PUFA is better than no food at all, especially when I'm getting <1000 calories daily.

Sliced up spuds baked with a bit of coconut oil or beef fat or sauted in butter taste great and beat reloading with PUFA. Yes, they make a meal. Go quite well with lightly fried eggs or liver. I believe poster Jenn has written about rebuilding her health largely on potatoes when she couldn't manage much else.
You could also try baking/frying chips made of whatever other roots and tubers you have available too.

If anything, I'm probably as PUFA depleted as I can get. Literally a 75% coca-cola diet for weeks, very low caloric intake, and loads of caffeine intake.

I imagine you may also be seriously mineral depleted too.
Try making soup out of gelatinous stock and veges or green broth.
And try other kinds of juice and fruit to see if there are some kinds that agree with you. Some people can't cope with OJ but do fine with eg clear apple juice.

I'd consider aiming for some protein every time yout eat, and some fruit/veges/juice/broth for minerals. Maybe 5-6 meals a day each containing some fruits or vegetables, roots or tubers, some protein (cheese/egg/shellfish/fish/liver/meat - gelatinous is good). Use cronometer and check that you are covering basic mineral and vitamin needs.
You can't make good use of sugar without various minerals and vitamins - yes zinc, but also potassium, b-vits, etc. Coke doesn't give you any of that. Oysters are one of the richest natural sources of zinc. Beef has some too. Home grilled steak and chips and tomatoes?

This is true, but without eating the proper food, I won't have the energy to change my life into what I want it to be.

Seems likely.

 

[mujuro]

Maybe try lisuride. It has eliminated any trace of learned helplessness for me. Nothing stresses me. Before lisuride, caffeine would ruin my appetite. The cortisol and estrogen and serotonin would placate me into an apathetic pit of despair. I wouldn't cook or eat properly, which intensified everything, snowballing until a good workout or a good sleep brought me out of it for a day or so.

 

[Dessert_All_Day]

Sugar isn't addictive. Correlation isn't causation.

 

[Lucenzo01]

I felt like ***t for a year when I used to drink coke. I changed to orange juice and I'm better than ever.

 

[kiran]

-Have not eaten anything in 5 days, only drank coca-cola b/c I have no appetite for anything else (never hungry no matter how little I eat)

Have you considered the possibility of gut overgrowth?
Perhaps you should force-feed yourself some protein, eggs are good and easy to eat.

 

[nikolabeacon]

Solid Evidence That Stress Causes Obesity

Your case----"Excess cortisol does not cause overeating, quite to the contrary - it is well known and undisputed that cortisol suppresses appetite because it raises blood sugar. Cortisol does lower metabolism and also raises estrogen. In addition, cortisol suppresses gonadal function, neurosteroid synthesis, and atrophies muscle tissue (which is the primary factor in RMR)."

And cortisol is main driver in craving junk highly palatable foods.

It raises blood sugar so it may be that you were really missing proteins.

I also had issues with table sugar until I upped my protein intake to close to 200 g . Were u eating meat and liver?

 

[sladerunner69]

-Gained 25 pounds
-Lost muscle, gained a massive amount of stomach fat, now have a double-chin
-Lost all motivation, even to eat
-Have not eaten anything in 5 days, only drank coca-cola b/c I have no appetite for anything else (never hungry no matter how little I eat)
-No appetite, no motivation at all, super low energy, sleepiness, etc. are all a sign of massive dopamine receptor downregulation from sugar binging
-400mg of caffeine at once and I feel nothing
-Too lazy to type complete sentences (compare w/ the massive paragraphs I used to write when I first embarked on the Ray Peat journey when I hadn't begun to feel the after effects of replacing starch with sugar and instead felt hypomania like I was high)
-In short, I am a recovering addict
-Sugar really is a drug

I NEED my D2 receptors back, but they take months and years to regenerate even partially and most likely will never fully come back

Eh the concept of a dopamine "receptor" is probably flawed. Where are you getting this information from, source?

 

[sladerunner69]

+1

recently had poor digestion and wintery sickness. mcnuggets got my bowel movements on track. down with the sugar.

Can you elaborate please? What were you eating before mcnuggets and how did you react to it?

 

[EIRE24]

Solid Evidence That Stress Causes Obesity

Your case----"Excess cortisol does not cause overeating, quite to the contrary - it is well known and undisputed that cortisol suppresses appetite because it raises blood sugar. Cortisol does lower metabolism and also raises estrogen. In addition, cortisol suppresses gonadal function, neurosteroid synthesis, and atrophies muscle tissue (which is the primary factor in RMR)."

And cortisol is main driver in craving junk highly palatable foods.

It raises blood sugar so it may be that you were really missing proteins.

I also had issues with table sugar until I upped my protein intake to close to 200 g . Were u eating meat and liver?

Do you still eat 200 grams of protein? What makes up your protein intake?

 

[tara]

Sugar isn't addictive. Correlation isn't causation.

The way I see it, I agree with you in one way that sugar is not an addictive substance. Sugar is part of good food for humans. As shown by many here, eating a fair bit of it can be consistent with good health and function for many people. It's very unlikely that completely giving up all forms of sugar indefinitely would be a health-promoting path.

On the other hand, there's a way that any behaviour that becomes habitual/compulsive despite causing ongoing harm could be considered to be addictive. In some contexts, eating large amounts of refined sugar in forms that don't include the necessary co-nutrients required to use it well, so that this habit instead causes harm, could be reasonably seen as having some features of addiction.

I also agree that correlation is not causation. It seems likely in this case that lack of other nutritious food is key. Not least protein, but also vitamins and minerals.

But I could be projecting. I used to think I was addicted to sugar a long time ago. I now think the problems were more likely caused by a combination of malnourishment in various other nutrients, excess PUFA, and some specific personal intolerances. At the time, I dealt with the 'sugar addiction' by stopping the refined sugar. As a consequence, I ate more other foods, which probably mostly did me good, but also spent more time hungry, which I think did me harm. In retrospect, I think I'd have been better off focusing on eating more regular balanced meals, but not being quite so restrictive on the refined sugar.

 

[Westside PUFAs]

You missed this quote:

"Refined granulated sugar is extremely pure, but it lacks all of the essential nutrients, so it should be considered as a temporary therapeutic material, or as an occasional substitute when good fruit isn't available, or when available honey is allergenic."-RP

Though he has mentioned studies where people were given lots of sucrose and got well.

Sugar really is a drug

So when you don't eat enough food, your body's natural adaptive mechanism to turn your muscle tissue into sugar is really just turning it into a drug?

When they test your blood glucose, they are really testing for a drug?

Your red blood cells, that can only burn sugar, can only burn a drug?

Your brain, which is supposed to burn around 120g of sugar daily and can only burn ketones during a famine state and even then still needs some sugar, is really just addicted to a drug?

replacing starch with sugar

Potatoes and rice convert to the drug very quickly.

.

 

[tara]

Though he has mentioned studies where people were given lots of sucrose and got well.

Yes. The ones I've read involved adding sucrose to a diet containing lots of other nutritious food.

When they test your blood glucose, they are really testing for a drug?

I think you are confounding. Sugars containing fructose, which the OP distinguished from starches, are different in some respects from glucose-only saccharides.

 

[Xisca]

I second @nikolabeacon in saying that you are high on cortisol, lampofred!

What I don't understand is how I'm eating so little but still gaining weight (and my temperature is higher than ever, so metabolism doesn't seem to be slowing...)

high temp is from cortisol. gaining wait might be thyroid issue, and stress sending a message to your body stock fat.
And any way, if you overdo sugar at one time, you are going from hyper to hypo glycemia I guess!
You need to have a real diet so that sugar goes into you more regularly, that is why fruits are better, they are whole and with some fiber.

Coca cola was the only source of sugar which I could stand, but clearly I overdid it. It seems like starch is a necessary component of my diet.

Literally a 75% coca-cola diet for weeks

You know you overdid...

You missed this quote:

"Refined granulated sugar is extremely pure, but it lacks all of the essential nutrients, so it should be considered as a temporary therapeutic material, or as an occasional substitute when good fruit isn't available, or when available honey is allergenic."-RP

Better to remember this instead of thinking "great, I can enjoy sugar on this diet", when you discover RP, and they just go lazy on food cooking at home... Coke is easier for sure!

Now some are better than me at concelling how to lower your cortisol....

 

[Xisca]

-Sugar really is a drug

No, cortisol is, and a drug is useful in the right quantity.

+1 to all what said @tara
choose what you can start with.

I was not ok with sugar, so I use raw honey that is fine, for me...
Egg yolk also helped me, when I could not eat.
and drinking/eating warm broth.

 

[Such_Saturation]

Literally a 75% coca-cola diet for weeks, very low caloric intake, and loads of caffeine intake.

ahahahahhahahahahahahh

 

[Jsaute21]

Food, diet, supps, cannot give you motivation for life. That comes from within, deep within. Food shouldn't be your God. A good diet MAY help some health related problem that was caused by a bad diet. But it can't cure a problem that was caused by something else. Eg incorrect thinking, incorrect philosophy, incorrect attitudes. Good luck.

Amen. Ever wonder why some extremely successful/Happy people eat like ***t? Cause it is a very small piece of the puzzle. Waking up every day motivated & hungry to succeed is farm more powerful and influential than diet. Diet is important dont get me wrong but changing outlook is huge.

 

[MyUsernameHere]

ahahahahhahahahahahahh

I mean, I just... Why would anyone even do that?

It's like reading two sentences of a massive article about Ray Peat's approach, concluding 'sugar = great', going on a month long binge completely devoid of properly balanced micro and macro nutrients and then wondering why you feel like ***t.

 

[Such_Saturation]

I mean, I just... Why would anyone even do that?

It's like reading two sentences of a massive article about Ray Peat's approach, concluding 'sugar = great', going on a month long binge completely devoid of properly balanced micro and macro nutrients and then wondering why you feel like ***t.

I suppose it's good that he is giving in to the mainstream notions if his unconscious was pushing for that. But it's a pity about the search engines, as the thread title will now be associated with this forum.

 

[tca300]

I posted something else but changed it.. I dont want to be associated with such a .... thread.