Why Avoiding Sugar Is the First Step to Clear HPV

So many women reach out to me and say, Dr. Doni, I got this abnormal Pap smear, tested positive for HPV, or perhaps they've been testing positive for HPV for years and maybe have even been through numerous procedures, and they say, what can I do to start turning this around to prevent HPV from causing abnormal cells? And I'm so glad you're asking that question because I know in the standard doctor's office, they might be telling you to just wait and come back in 6 or 12 months to see if it got worse or see if it turned into cancer. And it's very unsettling to sit with— just sit around and wait to see if this virus causes problems in your body, right? Much more— it feels much better to actually take action and say, what can I do from now until my next appointment to make a difference, to make sure, or at least try to prevent it from progressing? And that's exactly what I help women and men to do. Is to prevent the progression and actually help your body to clear high-risk HPV to negative. Now, in this video, I'm gonna be talking about one step, the first step I would suggest that you take to support your health and help your body clear HPV. And it turns out that this same thing that I'm gonna cover in this video can help with many other health issues at the same time. I encourage you to think about if you also are experiencing fatigue, like feeling tired at different times a day or all day long, or sleep issues, or mood fluctuations like anxiety, depression, irritability. Maybe you're experiencing irregular menstrual cycles or PMS and, and menstrual cramps. Maybe you've been told that you may have PCOS or PMOS. Maybe you have perimenopausal symptoms or postmenopausal symptoms for that matter. Maybe you have bloating, gas, constipation, diarrhea, uh, weight gain, skin issues. Maybe you've been diagnosed with autoimmunity, or maybe you're trying to prevent other health issues like heart disease and dementia and diabetes. Well, it turns out that all of these things can be helped by this one thing I'm going to be talking about in this video. Also, if you're working on fertility, that can be helped by this as well. So what do you say? Let's dive into it. This one step that I encourage you to start with is to identify and eliminate any processed sugar in your diet. Now, when I say sugar, what do I mean? I mean what would be a spoonful of table sugar, that spoonful of white refined sugar that maybe you would put into tea or coffee. But it turns out that the same table sugar, The same refined sugar can be put into a lot of processed and packaged foods, everything from cereals and crackers to even condiments and beverages, and also can be put into foods that you may not even realize that it's there. So I encourage you to— and I'll explain this here in a minute— we're going to be looking at the label of these different packaged foods that you may have in your house, in your kitchen, and you're going to look at the other ingredients and see if it has listed sugar. Now, there's some other names for sugar. It might say cane sugar. That's another version of the same thing. They say these are the sugars we want to eliminate, and I'm going to explain why. We also may want to look for words like dextrose and potentially also anything that may say, uh, high-fructose corn syrup, which is slightly different, but also something that I encourage you to avoid. Now, a lot of people will say to me, "Well, Dr. Doni, do I also need to avoid fruit sugar?" So I want to explain the difference. When we're talking about white sugar that came from sugarcane, it, in the scientific terminology, it's called sucrose, S-U-C-R-O-S-E, sucrose. And sucrose is actually a combination of two sugars. Glucose and fructose. And it's the glucose that spikes our blood sugar levels, right? If you were to consume straight glucose, it's going to raise your blood sugar level, and that requires that your body makes insulin to move the glucose from your blood into your cells. And so when we talk about insulin resistance is that we're having high glucose levels in our blood over time, and the insulin is working so hard that eventually these receptors are not responding as well, and so that glucose is stuck in our blood. It can't get into the cells, and that's what we refer to as high blood sugar or high glucose levels we can measure in our blood. Now, fructose, the other part of sucrose— so when you break down sucrose, it also has fructose in there— fructose does not raise your blood sugar levels, and fructose is the same sugar as what's in fruit and honey and maple syrup. And so I'm not saying that you have to avoid all fructose, although I do want you to be aware that it's also possible to get too much fructose because there's such a thing as overwhelming your body's ability to manage fructose as well. It, it's the liver that ends up having to handle any excess glucose, any excess fructose. Then your liver has to deal with it. And if your liver gets overwhelmed with extra glucose or fructose, that's when something called fatty liver can develop, where the liver is turning all of that glucose and fructose into fat. In your liver, which can be damaging to your liver function. So that's why it's important to become aware of what is too much sucrose, glucose, fructose for your body. And it's unique to each person to some degree based on your genetics, also based on the size of your body and your activity level. There's a lot of things that goes into it. Sometimes I joke that I wish the body had some sort of like blinking red light to tell us when we've had enough for our body at this moment in time. And there isn't such a signal or alert that goes off. And so we have to learn that for ourselves. We have to get to know our bodies and get to understand how much of glucose can we consume at any one time, and at what point is it too much and it's going to start overwhelming our metabolism. Now glucose also comes from the breakdown of carbohydrates in our diet. So anything like rice, potato, anything made from other types of grains, whether it's wheat or millet or barley or oat, those are carbohydrates. Even potatoes, carrots, beets, these all have carbohydrates which break down to glucose, and those also can raise our blood sugar levels. So you want to, when you're thinking about blood sugar levels, you want to be taking into account actual sugar, like a spoonful of white sugar, but you also want to take into account any sugar that might be coming from other sources of carbohydrates, even from vegetables. Now, in this tip that I'm giving you today, I'm encouraging you to start by identifying and really figuring out how you can reduce your exposure to refined processed sugar. So For now, you can leave the fruits and vegetables the way they are. We want to have some fruits and vegetables, not just too much all at once. What we want to do first is we want to start to look at where are you getting exposed to sugar that you maybe didn't realize and that you don't really need it. Because the thing is, is that sucrose or sugar, this white refined sugar, is actually very addictive to humans. So when we consume consume sugar, our bodies become addicted to it and we crave more of it. And then if we don't have it, we experience cravings. And then when we have more of it, it feels good at first, but usually there's kind of like a feel-good time period with— after you eat sugar, right? And then it gets to the point where it's at its height, and then when it starts to come down, then usually we don't feel so good anymore. We go on this sugar roller coaster where then our energy goes down, our mood goes down until we get some more sugar. So literally we can become on this, you know, if we don't get our sugar, then we don't feel good. And it makes us feel like we need more of it in order to keep going. But actually we don't. You can actually reset that whole thing and by— you can do it abruptly. Some people like to just cut sugar overnight and be like, "I'm just stopping," and drop their sugar intake overnight. Now, if you drop your sugar intake quickly, you're more likely to have maybe some withdrawal symptoms. You might feel tired and grumpy the next day or two until your body gets back on track without sugar. So to me, that's a little bit of a stressful way of doing it and could affect your daily activity. So instead, I encourage you to gradually decrease your sugar intake. So that you can each day maybe identify where are you getting sugar that you really don't need it, and you gradually decrease, maybe over a week or two. And so your, your body and your metabolism gets used to a new level, and your insulin can adjust as you decrease your sugar intake. What if you tested positive for high-risk HPV virus and you don't want to wait around and see if it's going to go away on its own? For many women, high-risk HPV can linger for years, taking a toll on their health and their peace of mind. I'm Dr. Doni Wilson, HPV expert, and I've been helping women for over 24 years to clear HPV to negative. I created the HPV Kickstart program as a simple, effective way to support your body's natural ability to clear HPV. This is not about waiting and hoping. This is about taking action. In fact, thousands of women have regained control of their health by following my protocol, and you can too. You deserve to take back control of your health. Join us today. So what I encourage you to do is to write down what you've been eating and drinking each day, and just off the top of your head, you might be able to quickly identify, like, if you know you're putting a sugar cube in your coffee, okay, that's something we could change. You could either change to having coffee that's not sweetened, or you could choose to switch to a different type of sweetening. I don't recommend switching to artificial sweeteners because now you're just adding chemicals to your food and beverages. So I wouldn't switch from sugar to Splenda, for example, which has other health risks associated with it. You could decide to use stevia. Stevia is a plant. It actually grows out of the ground, stevia, and then they grind it into powder, and it's just a plant that happens to be sweet, but it does not raise your blood sugar. So if, if that— if you do like the taste of something sweet, you could start by just switching your sugar ingredient to stevia and see if you like that. Or for some people, you just decide, okay, I'm just going to start to decrease my desire for something sweet. And amazingly, your body will be able to adjust and get used to it. So you can look for where are ways you can remove the sugar. Maybe you're— you keep on reaching for candy or cookies or a beverage that's sweet. A lot of times if you go for a coffee beverage, Or you get a beverage that's in a can. Oftentimes they have sugar or they might have an artificial sugar like sucralose, which I also encourage you avoid sucralose because it's also an artificial sweetener that's going to work against your health. But for now, let's focus on avoiding sugar, cane sugar. And so that's a beginning step, right? You start to go, okay, can I identify one or two things that I can start to take away, do less of? I don't really need it. And then you can look at the back label of your foods that you're often choosing and see, does it say sugar or cane sugar? Or maybe it says dextrose or Dextrin. These also are other words for glucose. And if so, then you're going to want to replace that product. Next time you go to the store, you're going to want to choose a product that doesn't say cane sugar on the back of it. Even, I encourage you to look at salad dressings and ketchup and mustard, everything, because surprisingly, I think you're going to find that they add sugar to a lot of things that you wouldn't even have known there was sugar in. Also, if you have recipes that you make yourself, notice if you're adding sugar unnecessarily. I know that some people, for example, may make a salad, it could even be a healthy broccoli salad, but then if you're adding sugar, That's still sugar, and it's not necessary. The broccoli salad probably tastes good or even better without the sugar in there. Or if you're making a meat sauce and you're adding sugar, maybe it doesn't need to have the sugar in it. And also, if you're eating out at restaurants, you can start to ask, "Is there any added sugar in this?" And I would also recommend you look at if you have a protein shake, like a protein powder that you're using, I would also look on the package at the other ingredients. Does your protein powder contain sugar? Because you can easily switch to a protein powder that does not contain sugar. You see what I mean? It's almost like a game. I look at it like a game. The game is let's identify where the sugar is coming in that's unnecessary. And I think you're going to be so amazed at how when you do that, even if you put this as your main objective over the next couple of weeks, you're going to be amazed at how much you can reduce your sugar intake and how much better you're going to feel. Most people who do this, they end up saying, "Oh my gosh, my— actually, my energy's better. I thought that sugar was giving me energy, but it was actually not helping my energy. It was actually reducing my energy." Usually people lose weight, they'll say to me, "I just lost 10 pounds and all I did was avoid sugar." It's amazing. It's really amazing. So if you're wanting to lose 10 pounds, I would first say, "Let's figure out where the sugar is and take it out." you also likely to sleep better, have your mood be better, your immune system works better. Because what happens is sugar, this refined sugar, it lowers our immune system. There's actually studies that show a teaspoon of sugar lowers your immunity for something like 8 or 10 hours. So why would we want to do that if we're trying to prevent— we're trying to clear HPV, we're trying to prevent any other kinds of infections like cold, flu, COVID, any kind of infection. You want to prevent it. If you're struggling with infections, bladder infections, yeast infections, any kind of infections, we need to reduce the sugar because the sugar drops your immune system, the sugar disrupts your microbiome, and the, the sugar makes it more likely that another microbe is going to be able to survive in your system. So this is especially important if you're dealing with vaginal yeast or overgrowth of bacteria in your gut like SIBO, or, or even sinus infections or bladder infections, for that matter. So this is like— can be life-changing just simply by figuring out where the sugar is coming in. And then you deciding instead of letting the sugar decide, right? If we let the sugar decide, sugar is going to want us to have more of it because, because sugar creates this craving and we keep wanting more and more and more, right? And the food industry has made plenty of options with sugar in there for us to choose. So if you want to change this, it's going to have to be a matter of you deciding, hey, this is my human body, my human experience. I don't want it to be run by sugar. I want it to be me determining what's going on and not be run by these sugar cravings and then leading to other health issues. Actually, sugar can lead to more health issues than most any other substance, and it's more addictive than many other even scheduled substances. So that's why I say, listen, this is like, once you start to be aware of it and once you start to say, hey, I'm going to, I'm going to play this game, I'm going to work toward identifying sugar and eliminating it wherever I can. I think you're going to be pleasantly surprised, even when it comes to chocolate. Like if you're like, but I really want something yummy and sweet. Well, there's a lot of ways that you can have something yummy without sugar. You could get cacao, which is what's used to make dark chocolate. You can also buy dark chocolate that's a high percentage, like 85% dark chocolate. Then you're getting 85% dark chocolate, and you can find dark chocolate that doesn't have refined sugar in it, that maybe is sweetened with coconut sugar, for example. Although you have to be careful with coconut sugar too. But you can find dark chocolate that isn't sweetened, and you can also make your own. You can make a recipe with cacao and maybe you end up sweetening it with a little bit of dates. Dates are very sweet. So when you put cacao and dates together, it can be so delicious, you won't even miss the sugar. I think you're going to be surprised and you're going to be amazed at how simple it can be to make these recipes without yourself, with even just 2, 3, 4 ingredients, including baked items and something like ice cream that doesn't have to include sugar in order for it to taste good. And I'll share down in the notes below here a cookbook that I've been using recently that I'm actually going to be interviewing the author and creator of that cookbook on How Humans Heal very soon, so watch for that episode, but I'll put the the link to the book down below. It's actually a book about fiber, but in this book about fiber, it actually helps you to reduce your intake of inflammatory foods like sugar, dairy, and gluten at the same time. So it's pretty amazing. And my friend Farzana wrote the book, so I'm excited to share it, and I'm excited for you to see the interview with her very soon. So in the meantime, while you're looking out for that interview, you can get started with reducing your refined sugar intake. And I can't wait to hear from you what a difference it makes, because then you're going to be ready for the next step. This is the thing is I know whenever we're trying to change our health, it can seem like a mountain and we're like, how am I going to do all of this at once? I'm— while still running my life, you know, working and taking care of my family and so on. And so the way that I have found to do that is to take it in small steps. You don't have to do everything at once. You don't even have to cut sugar overnight. You can do it gradually. You just put the— put it in front of you as your goal, and day by day, week by week, you work toward this. And as you get really good at avoiding sugar and finding replacements that don't contain sugar, then you're going to be ready for the next step. And we go step by step, and that's exactly how I guide you in my programs. I have a program called the 30-Day Heal HPV Kickstart Program, and it starts with diet changes like helping you balance your blood sugar, as well as helping you to avoid inflammatory foods like gluten, dairy. And then we talk about how to start to bring in supplements that help support your immune system and help your body heal. We bring in those supplements one by one. So you can start to introduce these changes little by little. We— I also guide you to start recovering from stress exposure little by little. In fact, I have in the Heal HPV Kickstart program a whole 30-day schedule to guide you over 30 days to make small incremental changes. And you're going to be amazed at the end of 30 days how much of a difference you can make in your routine, but in your diet, but also in the way you feel., and then you can go, okay, now am I ready for the next step, right? So we go step by step, and that's how we prevent overwhelm, and that's how we prevent the paralysis and fear about HPV keeping you stuck in this repeat abnormal pap smears. We want to break that cycle by getting smart about this, by taking incremental steps to create change, and actually, as you create those changes, you feel so much better that you want to keep going. And then you keep making the next step and the next step, and it becomes a way of life that ends up transforming your whole health. You start to get more empowered too, because you realize you can make the choice. This is your body. You get to decide what you're putting into it, right? We can, we can decide what we're going to swallow. We don't have to just go based on what's sitting in front of us. We can actually make those choices and make a difference in, in how our body feels. And how our body can protect us from microbes, including high-risk HPV virus. So I'm so glad you're here to join me today. I welcome you to subscribe so you don't miss the next episode and join me on my newsletter list so that you'll receive an email from me every Thursday with the next episode and any other resources that I have to share with you that week. I look forward to connecting with you all very soon. Thanks for joining me. Thanks for listening to How Humans Heal. If you liked this episode, leave a rating and a review. And for more resources, visit drdoni.com.