Now that masses of children are awash in Halloween treats – mine included – let’s talk about sugar, what it does to us and how you can sell it to your dentist.
Just five days before kids hit the streets begging for sweets, a new study in the journal Obesity shed light on just how bad sugar is for us. It found that when obese kids cut back on added sugars, health markers such as cholesterol and blood pressure dramatically improved in 10 days. For the 43 kids in the study, the average LDL cholesterol count decreased 10 points, diastolic blood pressure dropped 5 points and triglycerides 33 points.
I doubt this is the only evidence against sugar. In February, the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee warned that Americans should limit added sugars to no more than 10 percent of our daily calories, roughly 12 teaspoons or 48 grams a day for many adults. Internationally, the recommendations are much lower. In 2014, the World Health Organization recommended sugar make up no more than 5 percent of daily calories.
But how do you break the habit?
My husband and I have always tried to limit our kids’ sugar intake. Their grandfather was diabetic and they have other, more distant relatives who are borderline. When they were little and I’d say no, they’d sometimes follow up with “because I could get the diabetes?”
I could tell when my kids ate sugar. They didn’t listen as well and they were hyper. When my son was in elementary school, he displayed symptoms that made us think he had ADD, and we realized that the symptoms were always worse after a sugar-laden holiday.
Now that my kids are older and they get sugar from relatives, from school, from us when we’re weak and glorious holidays like Halloween, Christmas and Easter, they act like addicts looking for their next score. “Mom, can I have a piece of candy?” You just had dessert. “Mom, can I have some cookies?” What did I just say?
And I get it. Not to make light of drug and alcohol addiction, but I find it really difficult to say no to sugar.
I did a quick Google search for advice. Choose low-sugar cereals, the health experts say. Check. Stop keeping juices, soft drinks and candy in the house. Check. (Except we don’t throw it out when it does get in the house.) Save party foods for special occasions. Check. (Though special occasions seem to happen every other week.) Despite our efforts, sugar is everywhere. It calls to us.
And now we have loads of Halloween candy.
One thing we can do with all that gooey goodness is sell it. A few dentists and orthodontists are paying kids $1 to $2 a pound for their candy: Gulf Coast Orthodontics, Pediatric Dentistry of Fort Myers, Children’s Dentistry of Naples and Barkley Circle Dentistry for Children.
I mentioned this to my kids last year, and they replied, “Great! I always get a lot of candy I don’t like anyway.”
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