is sugar toxic?

Raili

After reading Anti-Cancer, I went cold turkey with sugar and didn't have any refined sugar for 7 months.  After that, I loosened up a bit and started having a little sugar here and there, on special occasions.  I agree with what Fearless said - I'm now much more concerned about environmental pollution and chemicals in products, than I am about sugar.  I spent several months post-treatment trying very hard to follow all of the health rules as best I could, in terms of diet, exercise, sleep, stress-relieving methods, supplements, etc., but it was exhausting and STRESSFUL!  I still take good care of myself, but I've shifted my focus more towards activism instead, e.g. writing to my Senators to ask them to sponsor the Safe Chemicals Act of 2011 to reduce the carcinogenic chemicals we're all exposed to against our will.  To me, this feels more productive and reasonable than obsessing over my diet and berating myself for accidentally buying the kind of spaghetti sauce that has sugar in it.

In terms of sugar substitutes, I love maple syrup and honey, but I don't think they're much healthier than sugar, so I've been trying to use more stevia, molasses, and xylitol.  I like stevia in coffee if my coffee also includes cocoa powder and lots of cream.  Molasses is good in plain yogurt, with cinnamon and walnuts.  And xylitol, a natural sweetener actually recommended by my dentist because it remineralizes the teeth, looks like sugar but the crystals are bigger and sparkly and pretty.

TonLee

I can use fruit to wean off processed sugar.

Watermelon is a wonderful, filling fruit...and at roughly 9 calories an ounce...I can get plenty of it!

Heidihill

Sugar feeds cancer, but so do lactate, ketones, fatty acids. Maybe more. Our cancers are what we eat, it seems. Just burn it all off with exercise. Barring that, eat apples to lower blood sugar levels.

Ted_Hutchinson

There is an interesting paper by a chap called Thomas Seyfried called "Cancer as a metabolic Disease". It available for free download from NutritionandMetabolism.com and although a bit technical there is plenty there to educate the novice.

There is some research showing that diets with a high glycemic load or high glycemic index result in increased risk of developing BC.