Sugar is the devil for a host of reasons. Number one would have to be how much I love it. Hate it. Love it. Hate it. I so loathe having that dialogue with myself about things in my life. Sugar is the devil of late because as the indulgent parents that we are, my wife and I allowed my daughter to have a candy extravaganza for her eighth birthday party.
Sugar is the devil because somehow, post party, my kids listened to us when we said no more candy (not that they haven’t started dreaming of Halloween), and it sits on the top shelf of a cabinet beckoning me with its siren song. Oh the pain.
And I literally mean the pain. I used to consume a lot more sugar than I do these days for no particular reason. Ice cream is still a big part of my life because, well, it is the nectar of the gods, but I let go of most other desserts without thinking about it too much.
Sugar is the devil because last night while watching football and absently eating caramels I noticed an old friend stopped by to say hello. I felt a familiar ache in my right SI that I hadn’t been there in a very long time. Maybe it is because I have been writing about the sacroiliac of late but I think it is because sugar is the devil.
I used to get a lot of this similar pain but it dissipated in the last year or two, which I attributed to walking more and exercising better, and never before connected to the possibility that it came from sugar intake. As with most of my thinking, I am putting this out there without scientific affirmation, I just know in my heart that sugar is the devil and I am making this connection between sweet and my SI.
Not to mention the wealth of existing writing about the demon. I grew up in a house fairly obsessed with food and weight and I remember reading a harrowing book, Sugar Blues, which my parents had lying around. This was the seventies so this concept doesn’t find us in uncharted territory.
What all this means is that it is time for a cleanse. While I know that cleansing/bingeing is not the way to live I don’t really binge much anymore so cleansing/eating seems appealing. On Wednesday I am having dinner at WD-50, a restaurant where I have previously had the wild combination of beef tongue and fried mayonnaise. So Thursday seems a prime time to begin.
There is also the issue of my daughter who seems to have sleep apnea or something like it, and lives with big bags under her eyes. This morning when I returned from walking the dog I posed the question of who would be interested in a sugar, wheat and dairy free month and she took the bait. Not so much for my son but that is cool too.
Sugar is the devil but will be banished for at least a month come Thursday morning. Yippee!