​15 Painless Ways to Reduce Sugar Cravings

Americans have a love affair with sugar, which is a major culprit contributing to our obesity epidemic. While the recommended daily allowance for sugar set forth by the American Heart Association is 6 teaspoons for women and 9 teaspoons for men, the average person consumes 22 teaspoons of sugar a day, most of it is added sugar in processed foods. According to the National Institute of Health, sugar addiction is real and meets all the criteria for physically and psychologically addictive substances. Ask yourself, “Do I need an intervention”?

Cutting sugar out of your diet isn't easy, but research shows that it only takes five days of being sugar free to vastly reduce cravings. The first three days are the hardest (and believed to be the most dangerous if you are around other people). Here are 15 ways you can reduce cravings to get over the hump.

1. Keep your blood sugar under control to prevent spikes, which can make cravings unbearable. Picture Gollum with his “Precious”, that’s what you might look like during low blood sugar once you get ahold of food. Eat six small meals a day, each of which contains a protein, healthy fat, and complex carbohydrate.
2. Reduce stress, which often results in emotional eating. Lower your stress on the spot with deep breathing, and reduce it over time with exercise, healthy habits, and meditation. Try waiting 5-10 minutes before turning to food during a stressful moment. If the urge goes away, you have successfully executed self-control. Yay!
3. Exercise. Moving your body has a similar effect on the brain as sugar, and it can give you the motivation and stamina you need to make good food choices. Seriously, once you’ve gone the extra mile to do something healthy for your body, why take two steps backwards by consuming something with sugar?
4. Get plenty of sleep. A lack of sleep affects appetite hormones to make you feel hungrier. Note your hunger level in the morning the next time you stay up too late.
5. Eat healthy fats. Healthy fats will not make you fat! But they will help keep your blood sugar balanced and make you feel fuller longer, which helps to stave off cravings.
6. Take a daily multivitamin. A healthy body with optimally functioning systems will crave sugar less than a body with vitamin or mineral deficiencies. Many cravings you experience may be the result of a vitamin deficiency.
7. Take chromium picolinate, a trace mineral that stabilizes blood sugar, fights body fat, and reduces carb cravings. The recommended dose is 600 micrograms a day.
8. Take L glutamine, a nonessential amino acid that blocks sugar cravings. Take 500 grams three times a day.
9. Visualize how you'll handle temptation. Every day when you wake up, visualize how you will walk away from the donuts at the office, decline dessert at the restaurant, or avoid the vending machine down the hall. Visualizing can help you say no more easily when the time comes. When all else fails, look to the old rubber band snap on the wrist trick!
10. Be mindful. Mindless indulgence leads to overeating, followed by self-loathing and guilt. Make careful, mindful decisions about what you put in your body.
11. Meditate. Meditation can lead to better self-control, a more intimate knowledge of how your mind works, and a higher level of natural mindfulness.
12. Chew sugarless gum. Research shows that a stick of (sugarless!) gum can help reduce cravings of all types. Just try not to chew yourself into a headache from overuse of your jaw muscles or overload your body with too many fake sweeteners.
13. Replace sugar with healthier, sweet options. Fruit is sweet, and it's full of fiber and antioxidants. Peanut butter is sweet and full of protein. Dark chocolate is somewhat sweet and is packed full of nutrients that can help stave off signs of aging and disease. Once you get passed the fake sugars you crave, you’ll find these options to be much more delectable than how you once thought of them.
14. Distance yourself. When you're feeling overwhelmed by the cookies calling to you from the cupboard, go outside for a walk, make a phone call to an old friend, or take a bath. Do whatever you can to distract yourself until the craving eases up, which it will. Repeat to yourself, “Sugar doesn’t feed my body. I do not need that sugar. I am stronger than the cookie!”
15. Eat breakfast! Going without sustenance in the morning is the best way to ensure massive sugar cravings later, when your blood sugar drops. Have a couple of pieces of toast or an egg every morning to help control your blood sugar until lunch time. You’ll thank yourself later when you don’t resort to looking through co-worker’s desk drawers for something to eat on the fly!

What do you do to avoid the sugar cravings?