Sugar Jones

I am a sugar addict.  I have been a sugar addict as long as I can remember.  When I came home from school I would immediately go to the sugar bowl and help myself to a couple of spoonfuls.  My mother caught on because I would put the wet spoon back in the bowl.  But I learned to outsmart her by pouring the sugar in to my mouth without touching the spoon.  I would search the fridge and cupboards for anything sweet, maraschino cherries being a favourite.  There would always be a jar in there from Christmas.  And I would figure my mother would not miss one.   Or two.  My favourite sandwich as a child was peanut butter and brown sugar.  You would think with all of this sugar I put in to my body I would have had a weight problem.  But I was very underweight most of my life. I weighed 95 lbs when I got married at 20 years old.

I remember going to the store when I had some money and not being able to decide between two chocolate bars, I would buy both.   Or two ice cream treats.  I would frantically search through the family's coat pockets and down in couch cushions to find change so I could feed my addiction.  And I I have kept the beast alive now into my middle age.   Just like an alcoholic I have told myself I could stop the sugar habit if I really wanted to.  And I have quit cold turkey many times.  T he longest I went was 8 months, about 2 years ago.  And I remember the day I fell off the wagon that time.  I was at the cottage playing Yahtzee with my best friend who had brought a bunch of candy, but was hiding it from me because she knew I couldn't have it.   I told her if I got a Yahtzee I would have ONE swedish berry.   Yahtzee for those of you who don't know, is 5 dice of the same value.  It's very hard to get.  But I got one.  And I ate the swedish berry.   And then I ate the Rolo's.  And so it went.  I have not been able to get off the sugar since.

I have been known to pace the floor if I don't have a sugar fix.  And right now there is a container of frosting in my fridge calling my name.  I rarely have sugary food in my apartment, the temptation is too great.   But it was someone's birthday and I was going to make a cake.  I burned the cake, so now I have the frosting.   And I sometimes buy a box of chocolate bars (Halloween is hell for sugar addicts) and fool myself in to believing that I will eat only one a day.   I never do.  The box never lasts the week.  

Now that I do have a weight problem AND am insulin resistant (borderline diabetic) it's really important that I stop this awful addiction once and for all.  But when I do, the detoxing makes me so miserable, friends will actually go and buy me a chocolate bar and insist I eat it.  Seriously. And forget about artificial sweeteners, they do more damage than real sugar and they make the cravings worse.  However, thankfully, fruit will satisfy the sugar craving most of the time.

Coca cola and ice cream (caramel pecan mudslide when I go inside, small vanilla cone at the drive thru) are my drugs of choice.  Not together.  And I am not so much a chocoholic as I am a candyholic.  So why am I like this?   I dont' really get a sugar high.  No burst of energy and then a crash.   The sweetness just fixes something in me, that gets broken by stress.   I crave sugar all the time.  And when I give in to the craving...well...I have to admit the feeling is...orgasmic.  Yes, I went there.

I know all the bad things about sugar.   Just like an alcoholic knows all the bad things about drinking.  And some day I will bite the bullet and quit this habit for good.  But right now there is a box of cookies in the kitchen that needs to be eaten.  Oh...and that frosting........