This podcast episode (host Josh Trent with guest Kara) discusses how to stop sugar cravings and how continuous glucose monitors (CGMs) can help. Kara frames sugar as an addictive substance and emphasizes controlling the environment (remove temptations), choosing whole foods, and using short experiments (e.g., three days without an afternoon treat) to build intrinsically motivating, sticky habits. They explain that CGMs create awareness by showing how snacks or substitutions affect glucose and behavior, enabling informed choices. They also note that acute or chronic stress can produce glucose spikes similar to eating sugary foods, making CGMs useful for revealing mind–body links and identifying non-food drivers of glucose rises.
Chapters
How to stop eating sugar. It is probably, I would say, in our community, the number one thing, people are stressed not sleeping enough, and a lot of that is driven by sugar. So how do you answer this question? How do you stop eating sugar? And also, where does the CGM play into this?
Yeah, and again, I always say there's no one size fits all. Some people are more all or nothing than others. But with sugar especially, it truly is an addictive substance. You know, it lights up the same pathways as a drug does. And so we don't tell those who feel like they're addicted to drugs to have a little bit each day in order to wean themselves off. We cut that off and we go through a period where it kind of sucks and then you feel better. And I really recommend that if you feel like you are truly addicted to sugar, because that happens, that's a real thing. And that first starts with controlling your environment. So if you're working at home, you're home all the time, and in your pantry that you can walk to at any second of any day is a bunch of candy and chips and pretzels. And that's going to be calling you again, just like social media or technology like we were talking about. These food products are literally designed to be addictive. There's nothing natural about them. And that's. I take your similar point of view of that's part of the problem with trying only to go through intuitive eating, because it's very hard to intuitively eat candy because it's not a natural food that our body is prepared to handle. So I really think, first, having control of your environment, don't purchase those things, don't have them right next to you where it's tempting and you're having a hard time saying no. And instead focus on choosing whole foods as much as possible. And truly, when you get in that routine and then you taste that candy again, it tastes so much sweeter, it tastes so much different than when you were eating it all the time. And it was just part of this lighting up my dopamine system type of behavior. So then you can eat something mindfully and every once in a while, because you can sit there and eat it slowly and enjoy it, rather than it's something that your brain is driving you to do. So there's a long process, I think, in breaking a sugar addiction, but the first step is taking control of your environment and removing temptations that are calling at you every day.
So the CGM adds a window of awareness to why someone's eating Sugar in the first place.
Yeah, absolutely. And again, it helps enhance that intrinsic motivation where it's like, maybe before it was just a mindless habit that every day at 4pm I grab whatever XYZ temptation I have. But then when you make this connection of, whoa, that's really what's happening. It's not just this harmless habit. It's actually affecting my whole day. And for a lot of people, then when they've started that temptation, it ends a trickle effect of them craving more carbs, more sugar of the similar type of when instead, if they don't have that habit, then it sets the pace for the rest of the day. So it brings that awareness, just like you were saying.
And with increased awareness comes different choices, different behaviors. So it is literally. I can't stress this enough. It is literally the power of technology that is helping human beings reconnect with themselves. Like, I'm a very deep guy, I'm a spiritual guy, I'm an emotional guy, but I enjoy science. I think there's a war right now between, like, that's how I started our podcast together, right? Like, you. What I love about you and what I loved in just knowing you, before we even got into more knowing of you in this podcast, was when I looked at your work and I looked at the other media you had done, it was like, you take religion and science, you throw them off the table, and you're like, hold on, what's the real truth? How can we use the data of what's coming out of people's bodies to then apply what? The emotional intelligence, the science intelligence, and also the anecdotal intelligence that you've developed from working with so many people. So to round out the sugar question, because I want to dig just a little bit deeper. When people are addicted to sugar, there's the microbiome element, but there's also the behavioral element. How do they use the CGM and the phone to address both of those? When it comes to choosing new foods, obviously there's a human connection.
Yeah, absolutely. So I think, again, the behavior component to that is being able to make the connection of what's actually happening when you're reaching for that snack, a lot of people think it's like, it's a small amount of food, it's not really doing that much, but it might be having a ripple effect that lasts six hours. That's a huge chunk of your day. So it's building that awareness of truly what's going on on the inside and. And then also allowing you the ability to make some substitutions, try something different the next day and see how things differ. Like, you are in control. It brings the control back to the person because they can easily see what a substitution or what a switch might actually do to their body. So again, it's an immediate gratification that helps. Build sticky habits is what we call them. What we're trying to do is build sticky habits because they're intrinsically motivating and you realize you can do it. A lot of times from a coaching perspective, we'll just say this is just an experiment. I'm not telling you you can never eat sweets again. But let's just experiment for three days in a row, not having that treat in the afternoon, and let's just see what happens, let's see how you feel, let's see how the data changes. And when things feel like an experiment, they don't feel as scary or as difficult because you just trying something. And then maybe at the end of those three days, you see what a dramatic change it makes. You're much more motivated, you're more bought in that you're like, this actually worked. Maybe this is something I should stick to. So a lot of it is really finding ways for people to understand what's going on and to find something healthy to replace it with.
One thing that was burning in my mind too, when I was doing my research for this conversation was the element of stress and the element of food. Like, for example, if you have, if you ate a donut, maybe you're in a weak moment or maybe it's just the right time because you love yourself and eating a donut is the best choice in that moment. I'm not here to demonize donuts, but let's just say that somebody ate a donut and it gave them a spike. Would it be very similar from a CGM reading if they had acute or chronic stress? Like, are those similar in some way?
They are. So an acute stress moment. And we see this all the time. You'll have a huge glucose spike just like you ate a donut. So we see this when people are having a fight with someone when they got in a traffic jam and they're mad and they're yelling at the car in front of them when they're giving a presentation and they're nervous and they're stressed. We'll see that glucose spike just like you ate something sugary, which is amazing. And that's another mind body connection where you're like, whoa, I did not realize what this might be doing. And for Some people that might be every single morning on their commitment commute to work. And it's not just this isolated, random, stressful event. And so when you can make that connection, that this is really what's happening on the inside, maybe this is more impactful than I might have believed it was. That to me is just like a huge moment of connection and how you're feeling, how you're dealing with the events that are thrown at you and what's really going on. Wow.
And what a nuanced conversation that is. Right? There is no way that we could bullet that in one show. But if you could give some guidance to maybe somebody who is struggling right at that point. And obviously if you're feeling inspired like I have been just in even learning about Nutrisense, let alone using it. Wellnessforce.com397 you can go, there's a very special deal there for you there. And also there's a place where you can ask questions like, this is a open dialogue. This isn't Kara sitting on a mountain telling you what you, quote, should do. This is a loving, communication feedback here. But with that said, you know, is there a piece of guidance you could give somebody who is dealing with, should it be the donut or should it be the stress response? You know, they're fighting, they're in that moment of decision. That inflection point of like, should I eat the food or should I take the nap? What guidance could you give to them right there in that choice point?
I think it's really helpful when you're faced with tough decisions where the whatever's happening in the moment might be pulling you more than that. Bigger picture goal, to have a bigger picture motivation front and center. For some of our clients that struggle with actually executing those things, I always go back to the big picture goal, like, what are you doing this for? Why do you want to be healthy? Why do you want to have good control of your stress? And for someone, it might be because I want to be a good example for my children or because I want to have a loving relationship with my spouse or. Or because I want to be in control at work, feel confident, whatever that big picture motivation is. I think it's much more important to keep that front and center when you're in moments that are difficult. It's like, okay, I'm not doing this because I want to lose 5 pounds for bikini season. I'm not doing this because of XYZ short term reason. I'm doing this for something much more meaningful and that helps. I think, overcome, be in the moment. Temptations that will come up all the time in modern lifestyles.
