I am now a savory person living in a sweet world. Do I feel deprived? Well- I cannot tell a lie. A bit. Yes. Definitely.

Now, don’t get me wrong; I’m speaking relatively here. Are there lots of topics probably way more important than whether or not Eve Schaub got to put honey in her coffee this morning? Yes.

That being said, I wouldn’t be bothering with our family “experiment” if I didn’t think it had value. In fact, if you listen to the lecture which inspired the idea of attempting our family year without sugar, you might just wonder why more people aren’t talking about sugar and it’s omnipresence in the contemporary western diet- quickly becoming the contemporary diet of all industrialized nations. In this talk posted on YouTube, “Sugar: the Bitter Truth,” pediatric endocrinologist Dr. Robert Lustig makes the case for sugar being the root of every evil from obesity and Type 2 diabetes to hypertension, cardiovascular disease and stroke. If we could find a way to reduce the incidences of all of these maladies, wouldn’t it be worth talking about? If there’s another way to look at- or perhaps even opt out of- the treadmill of diet and disease in our culture, shouldn’t we be talking about it?

So when I say deprived, I mean relatively so. I know- there’s a tiny little violin playing somewhere just for me. And yet, it’s funny the things over which one feels more mournful than others. Last night at dinner at our favorite local restaurant, I managed not only to forgo the Oh-My-God Bread Pudding, (gasp!) but when our dear friend Carol enjoyed it, amazingly enough, it really didn’t phase me. Really! However, it was another matter entirely this morning as I stared longingly at the Crispy Hexagons cereal box on the shelf… (forgot to toss those out- darn!)

Another phenomenon I’ve noticed is the “waiting for the other shoe to drop” feeling I’ve been getting at recent meals: it’s as if I’ve just seen three quarters of a play when suddenly- the curtain goes down and everyone goes home. It is so thoroughly ingrained in me to expect a little- or a big- sweet finale at the end of a meal, but especially at the end of a labor-intensive home-cooked meal or a rare evening-out meal, that I find myself experiencing a sort of phantom dessert syndrome. “What, no fireworks? No crème brulee or tiramisu? Not so much as a mint?” my brain chemistry complains.

Yep, one week and my brain is already talking to itself. Well, this should be an interesting year.

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Information About The No Sugar Project