Are you addicted to sugar? Do you crave sweets all day? Is it hard for you to eat a meal and skip dessert? Tune in to the Rachael Ray show on Thursday, July 21 to find out how you can cure your sweet tooth. Rachael Ray hosts an expert who says he can help you banish your sugar cravings in just three days!

Plus, learn about the sugars you don’t even realize you’re eating. Many breads, cereals, and even low-fat diet foods are packed can hide loads of lurking sugar.

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By Megan Zehnder for Care2.com

Fruit is no-doubt an important part of our diet. Full of fiber, antioxidants and other phytochemicals, fresh fruit is a great source of sustainable energy. Unlike foods with mostly simple carbohydrates and sugar (like hard candy, cake and donuts) whole fruit contains fiber and other nutrients, which allow the body to feel more full and to absorb the sugar slowly over time, leaving you with lasting energy.

The problem is many people today consume an excess of sugar, which causes inflammation, and can lead to a variety of diseases. (Check out dangers of excess sugar and 7 Tricks to Tame Your Sweet Tooth.)

When it comes to fruit, some choices are better than others. Since dried fruit and fruit juice contain a higher-concentrated sugar content, whole fresh fruit is generally a much better bet. Additionally, prioritizing low-sugar fruit can help keep your overall sugar consumption in check.

Here is a list of fruits that, in their approximate location on the spectrum, are lowest-to-highest in sugar content. Sugar and carb counts vary based on growing conditions, species and other factors.
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By Diana Herrington for Care2.com

OK. I admit it. I’m a little intense about the subject of sugar.

As a child I was practically raised on white sugar and feel that it had a part in my many health problems which took me decades to overcome.  You can read some of my story here: Diana’s Story. It was a different time back then. There was not the awareness about nutrition that there is now.

I’m going to give you strategies to avoid sugar and the cravings, but first I must make a few points about why you would want to do such a thing. This was already dealt with briefly in my previous article on artificial sweeteners.

1. Sugar is Not Food – It is empty calories with little nutritional value and actually causes your body to steal vitamins from other vital organs in attempt to process the sugar, leaving you undernourished.

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Those of us fighting the good fight against unhealthy diets, obesity, and the ailments they cause did a big palm-to-face smack this week.

A KFC franchise in Utah launched a promotional fundraiser to their patrons. It was advertised that with every $2.99 purchase of a KFC 64-ounce Big Jug drink, $1 would go to the Junior Diabetes Research Foundation.

One has to wonder how that planning meeting was conducted and who was the rising star who came up with this idea. However, the franchise owner has a personal connection to the disease and the promotion did run as advertised.

A spokesperson for the Junior Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF) responded after the fundraiser received so much attention. It was clarified that the JDRF supports research for type 1 diabetes and not type 2. Type 1 diabetes is an auto immune disease and not an onset disease caused by obesity or consuming too much junk food.

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There’s potentially good news in regards to teens and their soda consumption. In 2010, 24 percent of teens in the U.S. drank at least one soda on a daily basis, which was down from 29 percent the previous year.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention collected data on 11,429 high school students from across the country. Each of them filled out a questionnaire.

When other sweetened drinks were considered, the teens who drank at least one of those drinks each day was raised to more than 60 percent. However, even with that sharp rise when considering all sweetened drinks, the number is down from 1999, when it was more than 75 percent.

Now for the potentially bad news…

Since awareness of the health dangers of sweetened drinks has risen over the years, some experts are concerned that teens’ knowledge may have skewed the results, since they could have been deceptive in their answers. Or I say, maybe the movement of removing soda from schools is working.
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