Vitaliy

When it comes to diets and eating habits one of the biggest questions that gets asked is what is the difference between vegan and vegetarian diets?

It is a good, controversial question to ask as these two are very different plans and people who are following either of them will be very serious about what they eat or more important, what they do not eat!

This article will explore the similarities and differences between the two diet styles and hopefully, by the end of the article, we will all be able to identify each and the pros and cons of adjusting your lifestyle to accommodate either one.

Let’s start with:

The Vegan Diet:

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This is as much as a lifestyle and a belief system as it is a diet. Most people who call themselves vegan are referring to much more that just how they eat.

This lifestyle is commonly based on one’s view of animal rights and beliefs and has political overtones associated with it.

Vegan diets can be defined in three different categories, a strict vegan, lacto-vegetarian, and lacto-ovo-vegetarian.

Strict Vegan

This means people living this lifestyle will not eat anything that is associated in any way with animals. This means any kinds of products that either come from animals or are tested on animals.

This means no fish, milk, eggs, poultry, or meat may be consumed.

Lacto-vegetarian

This diet will consist of pretty much the same as the Strict one with the exception that lacto-vegetarians will eat dairy products such as yogurt and milk.

Lacto-ovo-vegetarian

This diet will also be pretty close to the same as the strict with the addition of eggs and dairy products are allowed to be eaten.

A good Vegan diet will consist of the following:

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Grains: At least 5 to seven servings of wheat, oats, bread, pasta, and rice

Fruits and Vegetables: Three to four servings of fruit and five to seven servings of vegetables is common.

Proteins: Beans, nuts, and soy are great sources of protein.  Iron is found in dry beans, spinach tofu, soybeans, peas, lentils and fortified oatmeal. Five servings of each group is recommended.

Fats: Two servings of healthy fat should suffice consisting of omega-3 fats from nut butter, canola oil or seeds, and nuts. For more ideas on high fat foods that are good for you, see the Eat Fat, Get Thin plan.

Another fact about this type of lifestyle is many people who follow this also avoid any animal based cleaning products and or clothing made from animals. This also will include any product that is in any way tested on animals.

It is important to not confuse this lifestyle with the plant based lifestyle as they can be similar in how they eat but there are large differences in their belief systems.

Now let’s take a look at…

The Vegetarian Diet

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Basically a vegetarian is very similar to being a vegan. This plan will also exclude meat, seafood, and poultry.

Some will eat eggs and some will not and the same goes for dairy and seafood products.

The rest of their diet will be very much similar to the vegan diet above without the political associations or the animal rights issues.

Is Using Supplements on these plans allowed & wise?

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The simple answer to this is yes. 

For example, because vitamin B-12 is found mostly in animal foods and it is vital in the body to combat depression, fatigue, anemia and it is also vital for the creation of red blood cells and proper brain functions so it is vital to make sure your body is getting enough of this vitamin.

It is wise to include a daily supplement to make up for any lost B-12 from lack of animal food, and maybe an all-purpose multi-vitamin for all around good health would also be wise.

The advantages of each lifestyle:

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By following the proper servings and making sure you get the required nutrients and fats in your daily intake converting to one of these two types of lifestyles will have huge benefits in not only a healthy weight management but also in all around health.

Many types of health issues like high blood pressure, heart health and diabetes can be eliminated by eating right. Another great plan known to help combat those 3 particular conditions/diseases is the DASH diet.

There have been people who have changed their lifestyle plant-based food intake and have eliminated the need for taking many medications associated with unhealthy eating.

The disadvantages of living these lifestyles:

There have been many reports of broken bones associated with this type of lifestyle and in our research, we have found that as long a person consumes a minimum of 525 MG of calcium a day, all should be well as far as bone strength and development is concerned.

Another worry that is associated with both lifestyles is the lack of vitamin D consumption. This can be put to rest by eating plenty of vitamin D-fortified cereals, margarines, and soy beverages.

As mentioned above a good multi-purpose vitamin a day will also help combat any loss of vitamins and iron lost from not eating animal based foods.

Should anyone go on either plan/lifestyle?

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The choice of which direction to go with your eating and lifestyle habits can determine whether you become a vegetarian or a vegan. Your belief system will have a huge part in your decision and once made you will be well on your way to a healthy lifestyle.

People who have made the switch have reported less sick days, more energy and an all around better mental outlook of their surroundings. They claim to live in the positive and seem to happy and healthy often.

Some have even reported the reversal of heart issues, digestive issues, and diabetes with many completely eliminating associated medicines.

Although other plans that mix in meat, fish and poultry, something frowned upon by these diets can also bring up healthy changes.

My beliefs on these lifestyle choices:

Personally, I am not in either category and believe in eating foods that are of different groups. Since the beginning of mankind, we have eaten this way and in my personal opinion, trying to become a herbivore or something of a quasi herbivore (basically that’s what we’re doing) is unnatural and there is evidence which suggests it may not be manageable.

One thing I will absolutely agree with any vegetarian and vegan proponent on is the part about animal cruelty. If I know that a certain food was made through the torture and suffering of an animal, I will avoid eating it (veal for example). 

I also am the type who believes that even plant based foods are also lifeforms. In short, my belief is more of an in between. As long as the food we eat is humanely gathered and is healthy, I will eat it. 

The Lose Your Belly Diet was a much anticipated book on Amazon at the start of this year and I just finished reading it. It was written by Dr. Travis Stork who is also known to be a celebrity Doctor as well as health and weight loss specialist. 

Now I had read Dr. Stork’s previous book, called the Doctor’s Diet a few years ago and that book was very popular, provided a pretty great overall guide to a healthy lifestyle that combined both dieting and eating tips with exercise methods. That book almost felt “complete”.

But what could Dr. Stork’s new book possibly add to the old? Well he actually mentions that it’s an update to the other one in the first few pages, so let me share what’s inside this book and if it’s information can REALLY help you burn fat.

What is this book about and what is the actual strategy for losing belly fat that it uses?

Well this is the first book I’ve read where the supposed culprit of fat, diseases and health issues is the lack of having enough healthy bacteria in your body known as microbes, although I have personally been told this by various natural health practitioners so the content is something I personally know about.

Basically, healthy people, fit people are said to have a higher amount of healthy bacteria in their body. This bacteria, contrary to what you may think isn’t bad for you, but good. It helps in aiding your body in performing some of the most essential functions such as digestion. 

A healthy amount of these microbes in the body, we’re talking trillions as mentioned in the book is a sign of good health and a great way to aid the body in optimizing it’s inside functions and thus giving you a healthier you.

A lack of it however, which Dr. Stork has cited several studies on which involved obese individuals pointed to a lower amount of healthy microbes. 

So there’s living bacteria inside the body? Isn’t that dangerous? 

No, it is a fact that there are microscopic organisms in our body besides cells that work with our body and against it. Microbes (called gut bacteria), the healthy kind are passed onto us apparently through birth from our mothers and then it is based on how we lead our lives, especially in how we eat and even exercise that determines if we will have a healthy amount of them or not and the amount we has is apparently directly proportional to how healthy we are.

Dr. Stork makes an interesting analogy in the book about how for example, a yard has much more living things within the it the closer we look and that is how we should look at our bodies. 

There are also a number of different species of microbes inside the body all of which are important to keep alive and in healthy numbers. 

So having healthy numbers of bacteria in the body means we can lose weight and fat correct?

Yes, as they help the body perform better, a healthier amount of these things help you burn fat more faster and maintain other healthy functions.

If that is the case, what is the diet plan laid out in the book that helps you have a healthy amount of bacteria?

Well what surprised me was that a diet that is high in fiber is the healthiest and best way to have a supportive and healthy microbe count. Dr. Stork points to several foods that while high in fiber should be eaten to help you maintain that count. 

Foods such as legumes, nuts, seeds, whole grains and certain vegetables. 

Dr. Stork mentions that people who do not get a healthy amount of daily fiber in their daily life, can have unhealthy amounts of microbe counts which can affect many things in your body negatively. He suggest that men for example, eat anywhere from 30-40 grams daily, but it also age dependent, whereas women should eat 20 to under 30 grams a day.

There is also a chart provided in the book which lists the highest fiber foods available in the meal plan of this book. Flaxseeds for example, are something that I eat regularly had about 8-10 grams per serving! 

Is there an actual meal plan to Dr.Stork’s diet?

Yes, there are essentially 5 points to The Lose Your Belly Diet and they are all meant to target and fuel the growth of the gut bacteria because as you know, doing so aids in weight loss. 

1) You basically are told to eat the 2 most powerful dairy products…

That actually have what are known as probiotics (living organisms in the food that directly add to the growth of them inside the body).

These 2 things are Yogurt and Kefir. 

Now not all of them are the same and to differentiate which ones have the healthy kind of probiotics you need, there are directions in the book for how to read the labels and make the right pick.

2) Eat high fiber fruits and vegetables. 

Lima beans, blueberries for example provide good sources of fiber, among other foods listed in the book. When it comes to cooking, Dr. Stork suggests eating your vegetables raw. Out of the list provided, certain ones can be eaten in limitless amounts, while others, such as corn, beans, things with high starch for example, are recommended in limited amounts daily.

3) Proteins. Not the type you’d expect…

Although Dr. Stork does say it’s ok to eat meats in certain amounts, the biggest endorsements for protein in this book come in the form of fish (ex: Salmon, trout, herring, tuna), shellfish, legumes, nuts, eggs and basically vegetables and grains and seeds that are high in proteins. Things that are high in omega 3 content.

Veggie burgers are also recommended.

4) Grains. Yes grains.

One of the other surprising things I found is that Dr. Stork is not a hardcore opponent of eating grains. Recent weight loss books I’ve read have basically all but made me quit them entirely in saying anything with grain, even healthy types in even limited amount may be bad for your insulin and other things. 

However, Dr. Stork I believe disagrees because he says healthy types of grains can be beneficial. Things like Quinoa, which I agree are grains that have high fiber and protein content.

Other foods like whole pasta, whole pasta, whole bread are allowed in small portions and there’s an abundance of choices here to mix in with the other foods from the other 4 guidelines. 

5) Fats, healthy fats. 

This was the only part of the 5 part plan which didn’t have in my opinion enough food choices other than olive oil, avocado, guacamole and a few other things. 

As someone who has recently been on board with being on a high fat eating plan, I am a bit disappointed that Dr. Stork didn’t add more content in this area, because as I have tested it personally, a high fat diet can be very powerful when you eat it correctly. 

Although you can count eggs, fish with oils, and nuts as healthy fats too.

This piece should have in my opinion been more developed and I do recommend 2 things (1 of them on it’s own is also good):

A) Read Eat Fat, Get Thin. It is one of the most comprehensive guides to healthy high fat eating that I have personally taken tips from to lose several pounds. 

B) 10 fat loss cheats. It’s a free eBook I wrote from seeing the best ways to drop weight (via healthy methods).

The 5 guidelines put together make up a daily, weekly and long term plan for fat loss:

Each guideline above has it’s own list of foods. Your goal is to implement every guideline’s foods, at least some, every day for maximum probiotic gains and weight loss effects. 

The book itself has a nice 4 week sample meal plan where everyday there is a chart provided with different foods that are friendly for this plan and will help you get used to eating the way you should to accommodate your gut bacteria and in turn accommodate your weight and fat loss, around the belly.

The Lose Your Belly Diet Score:

4 out of 5 stars. This score actually matches the average Amazon score this book got from people. My reasoning for this rating however is different and here is how I broke down the plan’s value:

Conclusions:

Dr. Stork has from what I’ve read always had a very rounded opinion of weight loss issues meaning he was never hardcore to one type of eating style vs another, but more about changing and eating from a broad spectrum of foods that are good for you to maintain an overall healthy life.

The tips themselves aren’t in my opinion directly weight loss oriented, but you will lose weight by following The Lose Your Belly Diet Plan. One thing that is also mentioned is the importance of exercise, and there are exercise plans provided to perform in accordance with this eating plan.

If this is your first time hearing about healthy bacteria or gut bacteria, don’t let the word “bacteria” frighten you. This is a well known concept and part of the human anatomy that has been accepted.

Read the labels on things like acidophilus, a popular probiotic supplement (also recommended) or consider that many good doctors who prescribe antibiotics (notice the term is ANTI-BIOTICS) to people also recommend probiotics to be eaten while you’re on the antibiotic to help maintain a healthy number of gut bacteria. 

These things are truly important for our health and things that aid our health naturally aid our body, hence the fat loss.

Why this plan is not so special. 

While I did enjoy the book and learned about foods that are good for our “gut bacteria”, a normal, healthy diet will also have these types of foods in it, so even if you know nothing about gut bacteria or even try to focus on it, just eating in healthy ways that is common sense is enough to lose weight and maintain a healthy number of them. 

Basically The Lose Your Belly Diet comes to the same conclusion about eating healthy, but it’s thesis is on the gut bacteria, that’s all.

Recommended eating plans if your focus is more on weight loss results…

As I said, there’s 2 supplemental books/plans you may want to take a look at the Eat Fat, Get Thin book if you wish to get a higher understanding of high fat eating plans so you get more out of guideline 5 above and the more powerful, 10 fat loss cheats which also has many probiotic food recommendations, but is the type of plan that I’d recommend for people interested more in weight loss.

I think it’s more flexible and powerful than The Lose Your Belly Diet. 

For a very long period of time, my weight hovered between 181-184 pounds and for a guy who is 5’11 and works out quite intensely weekly, that’s not really a bad thing, far from what someone can call overweight or obese, BUT a big issue for me was that I always had problems with my sides and belly fat. 

And while my training regiment would burn up to 10,000 calories a week (yes it is very intense), unfortunately, I would supplement most of losses (caloric losses) with foods high in carbohydrates. We’re talking McDonalds, chicken and rice platters (A New York dish), Dunkin Donuts muffins, and all of these things were timed to be eaten post workout so any type of fat loss gains I’d make would be completely broken by the food eaten up and while my fitness level increased, my less than pretty side areas (love handles) did not make any improvements. 

Enter the idea of trying a high fat diet…

After reading about the concept through the 3 week diet and then further getting into the specific science of it from the Eat Fat, Get Thin book, I finally decided to change up my eating patterns and run an experiment. It wasn’t hard to implement, but as I will reveal, after 2 weeks, I had some major changes to my body…

I would eat anywhere from 3-5 meals a day. 

On mornings, my initial “meal” was a can of cod liver, a cucumber, and sometimes a bowl of flaxseeds mixed with boiling water which made it feel like oatmeal. I would also eat greens such as spinach, arugula and more.

Now the caloric combination of these foods didn’t really amount to much, but a great deal of those foods were very high in fat, especially the cod liver and it’s oil, which I admit to forcing myself to drink. We’re talking 5-6 teaspoons and while the taste isn’t quite “exquisite”, I will explain the benefits of it later.

Now usually my second meal would be dinner in which I’d have something like sushi, chicken soup or another flaxseed meal. 

And finally for supper (3rd meal), I may have had sushi (if I didn’t have it for dinner) and sometimes a scrambled egg meal consisting of 3-4, another great one for this diet. On some other nights, I’d eat fresh shrimp, maybe a pound of it.

Now this regiment was for none training days. For training days, my first meal would remain the same, but sometimes I’d eat a little bit more and even eat a sandwich to load up on carbs. 

Then during my training sessions, which can last anywhere up to 5-7 hours with 2, 1 hour breaks in between, during those breaks, I’d take a small meal with me which included scrambled eggs, quinoa and maybe the same flaxseed meal and time to eat half for the first hour break, then the other half for the other break.

Then when I would get home, I’d finish the day with sushi usually because I was too tired to make anything. Thus, on training days, I would eat 4 or more meals.

Doing this for 2 weeks resulted in me jumping from 180-184 DOWN to…

174-176 pounds. At best, a 10 pound weight difference. And considering how I did not limit how much I ate, eating this way got me to lose weight and I saw it on my sides, I really did. 

Now as an extra thing, I forgot to mention that I added 2-3 very fatty, but healthy oils:

Coconut, hemp and flaxseed, all of which I took sips of multiple times a day and/or used the coconut one whenever I would fry eggs. 

So with about 50-60% of my diet consisting of fat, I lost weight. Thus the 3 week diet and Eat Fat Get Thin’s science was right. 

The health benefits of a high fat diet:

While most of the benefits are explained in this book detailing this way of eating, the main benefits besides faster metabolism is that they help reduce inflammation and as someone who is very physically active, I put a lot of stress on my knees and as such, reducing inflammation there helped my mobility. 

In fact, I had very little to complain about in terms of soreness and injuries while being on this type of eating regiment for 2 weeks.

My mind also felt better and clearer and overall my energy levels were pretty high. 

Back to weight gain:

So I weight myself this morning to discover I jumped back up to 179 pounds and the reason for it is simple:

After the 2 week experiment finished and I was thrilled at my results, I let myself go in that I started to eat more of the carb heavy foods I talked about before. 

Over a 3 day period after my initial diet was all it took for my weight to jump back up which shows how fast acting carbs can be on your body if you’re not careful. 

Is there anyway to eat carbs without gaining weight?

Only if the timing is correct and by that I mean 2 things:

Eating a high carb meal before a workout will help you burn of the calories from that meal and prevent it from turning into fat. So in my cases, before I’d go training, I’d eat something more carb heavy, but usually, most of my carbs came from drinking tea with honey, otherwise, most of the foods were low carb.

Now after the workout, if I was tired and had sushi, one big problem there is the white rice which is loaded with carbs, but on the opposing end, there was fresh salmon and avocado to kind of balance it.

Never the less, my object there was to eat and then go to sleep when I’d feel hungry because it would take longer to burn off calories while I slept vs if I waited to burn them off before sleep.

As a result, by timing my carb intake in this manner, I was able to at least limit the “damage” they would do to my body and at least use it wisely for energy.

But if you can, maintain a high fat, low carb diet as long as you can, you will totally lose weight as a result like I did.

If you’re going to try and redo my type of eating plan, here is a short list of foods that I added. I didn’t count calories, it was just a manner of changing the foods of my diet to see the changes:

• Eggs (boiled, scrambled is fine).
• Avacado.
• Shrimp.
• Chicken.
• Beef.
• Herring, tuna, cod liver (and the oil from all of them).
• The oils from coconut, olive, hemp and flaxseeds.
• Green vegetables that are low in starch.
• Salmon.
• Quinoa.
• Flaxseed meal (not the oil).

That is a regular list of things you can mix up anyway, but that should make up over half of what you eat weekly. Should you desire higher effects or more weight loss, do the 3 week diet as it takes this dieting idea much farther.

I just finished reading Eat Fat, Get Thin by Mark Hyman and I will say that any skepticism I originally had about this dieting subject is at rest, this book completely put me over the fence onto it.

Originally the very first diet I ever heard of that had the “audacity” to suggest eating fat as a means of losing weight was the 3 week diet and because that was the first time I ever heard it, I was on board with the idea, but not completely into it, not until I finished reading this one.

Anyway, I will explain to you the basic idea of the Eat Fat, Get Thin book, personally review the dieting style itself and let you judge whether or not you should do it.

What is this dieting book about?

Well in terms of the basic idea, the title says it, but the depth to which Mark Hyman goes into it is by far the deepest inside look into a subject I’ve ever read on dieting.

There is actually a plan within it where you eat for 21 days, one way that is outlined and then you’ll have 2-3 options of how to “exit” out of the plan into a long term lifestyle.

In terms of weight loss, there is a page inside the book which says that most people lose about 7 pounds in the 21 days with exceptions going farther.

The biggest thing to take from this diet:

If nothing else, then the “fear” you have about fat should be put to rest. Mark devotes nearly half the book into explaining why we fear this word and the food that causes it and why it’s a misleading term.

In short, there are many different types of fats, and as it turns out, most of them are actually good for you as Mark explains. There just needs to be a distinguishing factor to understand it and well…

It’s very complicated. There’s different types of fat: saturated. monounsaturated, poly saturated and trans and the last one is the one which without any doubt is the worst, so there’s 1 distinction there.

As for the others, Mark explains when and how they are good for you by explaining which foods to eat and things such as:

Not looking at the single nutritional aspects of the food you’re eating, but the overall food itself because in many cases, what you eat may provide both healthy and unhealthy fats, but as long as there’s more good ones than bad ones, you get the benefits from it.

Ah the benefits, what can they actually be from eating like this?

Well again, this is something I already knew thanks to the 3 week diet, but this book went much deeper into the specific health benefits:

For one, healthy fats can actually reduce the risk of particularly 2 diseases: Cancer and diabetes. How? Well to understand that, we need to understand Mark’s position on where those diseases arise from:

Eating unhealthy amounts of carbs is what may cause these epidemics:

Mark cites a bunch of studies (really, there’s A LOT of studies) that prove how consuming too many carbs which is what many people in the western world do directly leads to higher insulin levels being produced as well as not enough nutrients being fed to the body and obesity arising because carbs when overeaten actually get turned into BAD fat.

Considering how this over consumption is done in the western world by many and the fact (And Mark explains this) that the food pyramid in at least the United States points to eating more carbs as being healthy and adding to that the overwhelmingly high statistics of cancer/diabetes and other conditions rising in the country, one of the culprits may indeed be carbs.

So that being said, where does fat segway back into this?

Well by eating the right kinds, Mark says it will help you burn off the BAD fat inside your body, feed the brain (lots of the foods inside this diet plan have healthy cholesterol that is said to provide benefits to muscles and the brain), lower insulin levels and basically steer an unhealthy person who has overeaten carbs and is suffering from their effects to backtrack and improve their health. The detailed story and science is inside the Eat Fat, Get Thin book.

This is where we get into the weight loss:

As I said earlier, this plan is 21 days long and as you may have guessed, you’re eating a mainly high fat diet. Now what goes into this?

Well the plan works like this:

For 21 days, you eat 3 main meals a day with 2 optional snacks provided. Water is allowed and barely a little bit of fruit such as berries are allowed. 

Now in terms of sample foods, there’s ones with high fat and low carbs that are allowed but basically, there’s about 50 main foods for the 3 meals you’re eating and a little over 50 for the snacks. 

One thing about this plan is that there is no calorie counting from what I saw because Mark points out that calories are not all the same and considering what types of foods you eat, they burn away differently. 

So back to the sample foods:

For the main meals: Anything typically with protein and fat is allowed such as chicken, elk, beef, bison, eggs, herring and other types of fish. 

For the sample snacks, you’re looking at various nuts, chia seeds, ginger, and just small things that are meant to help you get to the next main meal.

Now vegetables are interesting in this diet because as I personally learned, many of them actually have starches and those get turned into…carbs. 

Mark provides a list of vegetables with…healthy carbs, basically those that don’t raise insulin from my understanding and provide you nutritional benefit, things like avocados, broccoli, asparagus and even sweet potato was something I saw in one of the meal plans.

But while the examples here are few, in the book, you will get an index of all the foods that are available to you as well as a WHOLE bunch of meal plans you can create to diversify your diet. 

Post diet choices…

I think I saw in the beginning of the book that there were 3 choices or paths you can take post diet, but I only read about 2 of them:

The first choice is to continue the same meal plan PAST the 21 day period and that is recommended if you have more weight to lose or haven’t reached the target goal you set. 

The second is what Mark calls the “Pegan diet” which is a combination of eating in a vegan/paleo style for the long term for which there is a part of this book that devotes several sections and stages to explain how it works. 

Mark says he is a big fan of the Pegan diet because it can offer long term benefits.

Eat Fat, Get Thin Diet Score:

3.5 out of 5 stars. With all the evidence provided for it, there is little doubt this diet works and/or is healthy for you. It is a strongly recommended try because it basically goes in the opposite diet suggestions that have been around for years, but have still seemingly not provided a decrease in obesity and other conditions.

Conclusions:

Is this diet recommended? And if so, for who? 

I would say that anyone who has excessive weight issues, obesity, diabetes, the likelihood of heart disease and other conditions at least look over this plan and consider following it, especially if the current things you’ve been doing have not worked.

Is there anyone for whom this diet will not be suited for? Better solutions?

Well I believe everyone who does it will lose weight and if that is the priority and the goal is ONLY that, and a lot of it, then you may want to try a diet plan that has 10 options (I briefly talked about this above), all of which are great for fat burning.

One of the methods also uses the same style of eating fat, but in addition has 9 other methods I’ve personally used to increase results a lot more. So you basically get the benefits of the Eat Fat, Get Thin diet plan + more proven options added to the mix for a much more powerful overall plan:

I absolutely love both plans and strongly recommend either of them. You will lose weight by eating fat from both plans, but one will provide faster results.

Both plans function on a similar, none orthodox understanding of why people can’t lose weight easily and how to solve it and that makes them both special plans worth checking out.

After reading both of these plans, I have completely rethought what I think and know about the subject of fat and recently repurchased myself a bottle flaxseed oil and the seeds themselves so I can eat them, among other food choices that people would think would add weight to me, but I have full confidence in that it won’t and will only improve my health thanks to the knowledge from this plan (and the other too).

Ever tried to lose weight by doing something like cutting sugar out of your diet? How did that go? Chances are you probably quit very quickly because without that rush and satisfaction of eating something sweet, you felt like you would lose your mind!

Nevertheless, if you want to reduce the health risks associated with eating too much sugar and also lose weight, there’s no “cutting” out the facts: You need to lessen your intake of it or stop eating it completely, but that’s something that I think is too radical to do, the options I’ll show you are a lot easier.

This is something I personally decided to do when I felt that each day I was eating too much of it. Honestly though, my biggest intake of it involved me putting it in my tea very often.

1 of the cups I would use to drink the tea from would be about 3/4 of a liter and I would drink multiple cups everyday with each having around 3-4 teaspoons of sugar.

Because I was much younger at the time, it was much easier to ignore this health problem but as I entered my mid and now late 20’s, and the stubborn belly fat started to pile on, as well as the reality that if I didn’t change things, I would be at a greater risk for health problems, I have tried various different ways to cut it out and have found a 5 methods that even the most addicted people can use to lessen it.

5 ways to cut out the sugar/carbs!

By the way…

Do you know the difference between carbs and sugar?

It’s easy, all that sugar is, is the most simple version of a carb. Everything we eat that has carbs, breaks down and then gets turned into glucose for energy so it’s the same thing, just one is a more complex version of the other. 

1) Switch any refined white sugar with the organic brown version.

It’s not a permanent way to fix the problem, you are basically shifting the addiction from something that’s bad for you to something that’s a little bit less bad, but it is a transition you can start to make and then get into the more truly helpful tips moving forward. Generally this “substitute” doesn’t taste that much different than the most basic white version so you won’t have problems transitioning your taste to it.

This is something I used to do when drinking tea. When it came to buying ingredients and other foods, I would try to buy more organic based carbs.

2) Raw honey (not the regular one) makes for an even better substitute.

At least for most things you’d normally use sugar for (tea, cakes, oatmeal) anywhere where you would put it, now just substitute it with raw honey. 

3) Use Stevia.

Stevia is a natural herb that basically replaces sugar without harming you. It is basically a safe way to add things to your food and drinks without risking the extra dosage of the regular stuff. While it doesn’t taste the same (it basically tastes like vanilla), it’s something you can experiment eating and drinking with for at least a week while feeling pretty satisfied as though you’re still eating something sweet. It takes time to get used to Stevia, but it’s a great product.

4) Eat less things with complex carbs by just lessening your intake of it daily and weekly.

That same big cup I said I used to drink from, I have lessened it to a cup half that size and about (from 3-4 teaspoons to now 1-2 teaspoons). While I have not completely stopped eating sugar from doing this, at least I’m eating a lot less of it now: 

Also, by doing this, not just when I drink but also when I eat, I have noticed that at first the cravings will hit when you first lower the intake in that my brain will start to make me think it needs me to eat more of something sweet and since I only rely on drinking from that smaller cup, I found that just by waiting about 10-15 minutes after finishing the cup, that usually the craving go away after that. 

If I can’t take the stress, I just force myself to drink an extra cup of regular water to make up for that craving my brain is trying to make me satisfy.

When my body is full of water and food, and a little bit of time goes by, it doesn’t crave anything anymore and I am satisfied that I didn’t give into it. These cravings hit me only when I’m hungry/thirsty and once I fill myself up with something other than carb related foods/drinks and start to feel full, the craving cease.

In addition this tip has helped me consume overall less carbs in general and more healthy proteins because I know it’ll only take a little bit of time before I stop craving the bad carbs. In the worst cases, I’ll eat a fruit. 

5) If you need to consume carbs, at least do it before this…

Any consumption of carbs is much better prior to something like a physical workout. It helps your use what would be the extra glucose going into your body instead for energy so that won’t be added into your body and then become fat.

I have found that prior to any workout, eating something with some carbs and mainly protein is the perfect mix for me to get through a difficult physical experience while maintaining my energy for a long time. 

Have you ever eaten something with a lot of carbs such as cereal, but felt full for only a short period? Well that’s how it works with carbs, so if you do eat a lot of them, make sure to use the energy rush you get from it for something physical right away.

So don’t eat or drink something with a lot of sugar/carb and then do something inactive right after like go to bed or sit in a chair for hours without doing any physical activity. For cases when you work, something like chocolate or again the stevia option would make for great substitutes, but in small amounts, just enough to give you the energy to finish the work and leave. Try to balance out the intake with the calories you need to burn to finish a job.

A warning: You will want to abuse these tips.

I’ve personally seen that once I’ve started doing these 5 things, that I actually wanted to increase the amount of the other, less harmful products I’ve taken because I let the addiction kick in and I also though that I was doing it in a safe way so I would have no problems eating more raw honey or stevia or the other tips.

But be careful not to let yourself get this far. Regulate how much you’re eating, get into a flow that you’re comfortable with, but know that like gambling, letting your sugar cravings get out of control is easy. So always monitor yourself and maintain a system so you don’t overdo the intake. 

You will definitely be able to lower your intake of sugars with these tips but…

This is a something you have to personally discipline and get into a rhythm with. The hardest thing for me to do personally was stop eating it completely and it’s like that for most people. And I still find myself drinking from the larger cup every now and then, especially when I get home and am too exhausted to think about the intake or wonder about what to cook. 

If you completely stop eating it and force yourself not to consume it, there are those who say that it takes a few weeks before your addictions to it will stop and you’ll start enjoying foods that don’t have much carbs, but to reach that point is something most people will never be able to do. 

I salute anyone who has the will power to maintain that mental fortitude needed to not eat carbs for a long time, but I personally think there should be a slow change unless you have health risks that require radical changes. 

If you substitute your sugars/carbs with things that are less harmful and even healthy (fruits/raw honey) while also timing that you eat them such that you burn them away through exercise, you may start to see weight slipping away!