I know you’d like a profiterole, a milk shake or a banoffee right now, the thing is, according to the American Heart Association (AHA), women are only entitled to 100 calories of sugar a day and men only 150.
What does this mean?
If 1 teaspoon of sugar contains 17-20 calories… do the math to see how much you are entitled to consume.
Keep in mind, however, that sugar is everywhere, not just in sweets, which is probably taken for granted, so without realizing it, you may overindulge.
Specifically, if you drink sweet coffee, i.e. with 1.2 teaspoons of sugar, you should only drink 1.2 coffees a day. If you’re a sweet tooth, limit yourself to 1.2 sweets a week.
Sugar is found in soft drinks, coffee, tea, bread, cereals, cereals, fruit juices, flavoured yoghurts, soups, hamburgers, various sauces, mayonnaise, ketchup and many other things you can’t even think of.
Consequences of excessive sugar
We know, for better or worse, that this delicious white powder makes us fat and raises our blood sugar. As if that wasn’t bad enough, sugar is also bad for the heart. As nutritionist Dr. Kate Patton, from the Department of Preventive Cardiology at the Cleveland Clinic, Ohio, said, “Sugar can increase, directly or indirectly, the risk of developing heart disease.”
This can be either through weight gain, diabetes, hypertension, hypercholesterolemia and other inflammation in the body, factors that increase the risk of heart disease.
Sugar can also directly affect the heart and arteries. Increase triglycerides, bad cholesterol, atherosclerotic plaque, creating narrowing in the arteries and consequently poor to no blood circulation.
Read the packaging of the food you buy so you really know what you are eating.
Read the ingredients and the nutrition labelling table. Find words like “sugar”, “carbohydrates”, or “sugars” and make decisions about whether you want that food.
