You may be consuming high amounts of sugar and it's unhealthy for you

A lot of us must have heard that much sugar is not healthy, but a good number of persons still consume a large amount of it. Sugar is a carbohydrate and we have simple sugars (glucose, fructose, galactose) and more complex forms of it (sucrose, lactose, maltose). The sugar we consume is mostly in the form of sucrose, a disaccharide made up of glucose and fructose. When we consume sugar, it is metabolized to give us energy, but when high amounts of it is consumed, the body converts to body fats and store them.

Sugar (sucrose) contains about 50% fructose, and fructose, which is actually the sweet part of sugar, responsible for the sweetness we taste when we take sugar is not good for us. Fructose is metabolized only by the liver which means there's a lot of work for one's liver to do. It is toxic to the liver especially in those who consume large amount of sugar (the human body is not meant to consume so much fructose). Also, sugar is ADDICTIVE due to fructose. Fructose suppresses the stimulation of a hormone, leptin, that indicates satisfaction, so even when you're full, you keep taking in more sugar and this affects another hormone, insulin, responsible for regulating the body's blood sugar levels. A study also showed that fructose supports the spread of cancer cells.. these few negatives about fructose are good reasons for one to minimize or completely avoid its consumption.

A lot of us may restrict sugar to the normal sugar we see and use, but it's important to know that sugar is hidden in some of the stuffs we consume daily, such as sodas (soft drinks), fruit juices, processed food, etc. A lot of us have this habit of buying and eating without checking up the contents of what we eat. Even when we buy stuffs with no label of ingredients, we should learn to check up the content, we surely have the internet to assist with that. Doing this little research has thought me a lot and I have to modify my food and eating lifestyle.

Fruit juices? Yes. It's much better obtaining fructose from fruits than fruit juices. Fruits contain fiber (indigestible portion of food derived from plants), which is absent in fruit juices. In the making fruit juices, the fiber has been taken out because fiber encourages faster spoilage of the juice. But the advantage of fiber is that it doesn't suppress the stimulation of the hormone, leptin, thus, one can get satisfied and won't get addicted to fruits.

I'll drop some links below. They will be helpful if you want to check up more about sugar. Before I do so, here are some of the negatives of consuming sugar, especially doing so over a long period of time:

sugar affects learning and memory;

can also result in faster ageing of one's skin (sugar affects the protein that promotes good skin);

storage of sugar in the body as fat increases risk of obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases;

liver and kidney diseases are encouraged (remember that fructose is only metabolized by the liver and the liver overworks itself to do so, since fructose is not really meant to be consumed by the human body)

tooth decay is encouraged, since microbes love sugar and would be attracted to wherever sugar is constantly found;

I've already said sugar is addictive..

I hope this helped..

articles.mercola.com/sugar-side-effects.aspx

lifehacker.com/5809331/what-sugar-actually-does-to-your-brain-and-body