Yup, that’s right. Many people can become addicted to sugar, and it can happen AFTER you’ve stopped drinking or using drugs. Yes, sugar can be addictive, and if you already have a predilection to using drugs or alcohol, it can turn into a substitute for what you really want to use. Since sugar spikes the dopamine in the brain, the “feel-good” chemical, it carries the same (though much smaller) effect of a drug.
Sugar goes by many names, and it’s not exactly crystal clear when there’s added sugar to a food or beverage. Sugar is not always labeled “sugar.” It’s also agave nectar, fruit juice, brown sugar, lactose, high fructose corn syrup, maltodextrin, honey, and many other names. At times, it feels like the sugar industry is looking for some new, covert way of “labeling” sugar. And that’s really what’s happening, as we uncover more and more about nutrition and what’s actually good for us to eat, and avoid sugar.
It’s recommended by the American Heart Association that when eating sugar, you should consume “no more than 100 calories a day for most women and no more than 150 calories a day for most men. That’s about 6 teaspoons of sugar for women and 9 for men. One teaspoon of sugar has about 16 calories.”
Sugar can create various health problems. Over time, excess sugar will deplete dopamine levels in the brain, meaning that you need to eat more and more of it to feel the effects you desire, much like a drug. Apart from that, weight gain is an obvious side effect, as is intensified cravings, and later on, binging and a lessened effect of the “reward.”
When you’re drinking, you’re often consuming huge quantities of sugar without even realizing it. While a “low calorie” alcoholic beverage like a vodka soda contain about 75 calories, a more sugary drink like a daiquri or whiskey sour might have as much as 400 calories. And that’s not even bringing into question the number of these drinks that one person can consume. If they drink 3-4 100 calorie drinks, that’s basically an extra meal of empty calories. Consume 3-4 400 calorie beverages, and you’re looking at a day’s worth of empty calories. Empty calories refer to the type of food or drink that needs to be immediately digested, so alcohol slows down the digestion of other foods, since it must go through your system first, before other foods. This can lead to weight gain.
