Article re sugar

Lily, making it clickable. Important info.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC387121...

Thanks for posting it.

This study is a bit hard to follow for us non-scientific types, but I think I got the gist of it. Thanks for posting it, Lily.

Since there's no concise conclusion, I would welcome a layman's interpretation, if Leggo or anyone else can help.

Also, while I avoid most refined sugar, I do use honey (about 2 tsp./day in my green tea) and real maple syrup (as an occasional sweetener), and I've always wondered if there's a significant difference between these natural sweeteners -- as I believe there is -- and what is referred to as glucose in this study. Does anyone know for sure? And what about fruit sugar for those of us who eat a lot of fruit? Deanna

What is the difference between glucose and natural sugars found in whole foods? I'm sure that fructose, corn syrup etc. is bad for us generally, but don't we burn off sugar when we exercise?

And...I know that too much sugar can cause inflammation of tissues, which does seem to relate to increased cancer risk.

I agree--I scrolled through much of it because it was too unlayman-speak for me to get the jist of.

Here's a short general audience language article from Dana Farber about sugar and cancer. I think that sugar can screw up insulin levels, which can drive some kinds of cancer. Metformin, a diabetes drug, is being used with some success to treat some metastasized cancers because of that insulin link.

http://www.dana-farber.org/Health-Library/Sugar-an...

Just to add, like I mentioned above, I'm not 100% clear on which sugars, but if I had to make an educated guess, I'd say avoid artificial sweeteners at all cost and strictly limit refined sugar of any kind. That just makes sense to me. I suspect that's what's screwing up those modulators during glycolysation. JMHO.

Just got some questions asking how much is too much. 25g is the recommended daily amount for women. Anything above that will have to be burned off by activity to keep your blood sugar relatively steady. If you read your labels, you'll see how easy it is to triple that amount on the average (even healthy) diet. That's A LOT of exercise (or a lot of yummy stuff you have to do without).

Yeah, it's pretty easy to get too much sugar. It's in a lot of tomato products like spaghetti sauce and catsup, to cut the acidity, and in bread and crackers and cereal, and well, everything processed. Sugar is definitely a huge weakness for me (I'm definitely a dessert person). Wish I could quit it. I wonder how stevia stacks up. I've been using it a lot lately in tea.

Oh, and I learned something new yesterday! Just an interesting factoid that has nothing to do with anything really....just found it fascinating. The only tv I watch is My 600lb Life and Hoarders. They're good incentive to eat healthy and keep your house clean, LOL. Anyhoo, this was mentioned on My 600lb Life. Did you know if you have that particular gastric bypass surgery, you can never drink carbonation again, ever? That would suuuuccckkk. I would absolutely die of dehydration, seriously.

Very sound advice Lily.

Definitely a good idea, cancer or not, to avoid hidden sugar, like added sugar in commercial breads, tomato suaces, salad dressings etc. It really is not hard to dress salads with lemon and olive oil, or if you want creamy, greek yogurt blended with herbs and lemon. Tomato sauce can be made in 15 minutes

"I just find after this length of time I can't be hyper-focused on everything that's supposed to be bad for us. It's exhausting, debilitating, and depressing after a while."


Thanks, claireninaz. For a short period of time after my stage IV dx, I was hyper focused on every bite that went in to my mouth. I juiced daily and refined sugar became the enemy. My dd's and I got in to arguments if they thought I was eating "bad" things. While not "perfect", my diet is relatively clean (and had been for years before bc). The stress caused by rigid dietary rules and the need to be hyper-focused on every bite, sucked a great deal of joy out of my life. So, that period of time was very short lived.
If I want a sweet or a glass of wine, I have one and thoroughly enjoy it. For me, the joy is worth far more than the stress.

I know that anecdotal info isn't always meaningful. But with over 10 years of seeing myself and many of you struggling with this, the reality hasn't been even come close to matching the standard diet-and-exercise recommendations. What worked for me pre-treatment to stay a size 10 has not worked since then, and even worse, it slowly resulted in weight gain no matter what. That's depressing.

In frustration, I approached it by seeking professional help from the cancer center dietitian. He used a breath-measuring device to determine how many calories per day I should be eating - to me a puzzling 1440 for my 5' 7" average frame. I was exercising daily -- something I'd never had to do before because I had always been able to maintain a normal weight with just exercising 3 times a week for maybe half an hour. And following a healthy 1440 calorie diet along with the now-daily exercise, I continued to gain weight.

I went thru my NP and got a referral to an endocrinologist, who thoroughly analyzed my lab results from blood testing and said I was eating the ideal diet, but that in order not to gain weight, I would have to exercise 2 full hours per day, 7 days a week. That was now my reality. But for me that would mean my life would becoming nothing more than diet and exercise with no time to enjoy much of anything else.

I'd heard about the Canadian female physician who had noticed that of her patients with breast cancer, those who seemed to do better were on metformin. I'd heard about the start of trials to see if there was merit to this. I asked the endocrinologist for an Rx for metformin and he gave it to me. It does help, even though I am not diabetic and even though I only take a low dose of it. I'm thankful for it, even though I still have to exercise and be careful with diet, and even though a little part of me cries at the loss of a nice figure.

Part of the treatment for bc results in an extreme drop in our natural testosterone level. Testosterone is what helps to build muscle and without being able to do that as well as we could in the past, we are not as able to use exercise effectively.

I want to share what I learned because conventional medicine has not come close to helping us with all of this. I want to share this because of the frustration of being told by premenopausal nurses with cute figures that I just needed to "exercise" more", and eat better. (WHY can't oncologists and MDs hire older nurses with some actual knowledge to speak to us humanely?)

A very big question in my mind remains unanswered: To what degree are bc patients being treated with therapies that then end up putting them at high risk for recurrence due to slowing of the metabolism that occurs due to the treatments? It makes no sense.

Exbrnxgrl: I agree 100% with what you said. I was so stressed by what to eat, what not to eat, what to drink, how much to exercise, etc, that I drove myself into a depression that required treatment. I was trying to control something that is not controllable. Now I focus on stress reduction and happiness and finding my old self again. My oncologist psychiatrist put things in perspective for me and I had to stay off of these boards for awhile. Information overload and fear tactics by many interest groups eventually drove me crazy. The only good thing about this is that while depressed, I no longer even thought about bc! My weight went so low as I was living on greens and grains that I had to start drinking boost, only to find it is loaded with sugar. So quickly dropped that. Wine tastes so good now, as does a cookie. And my slightly chubby psychiatrist told me that he can find a study to support anything he wants to, even excessive weight. Its great to be informed, but please be careful not to get caught into extremes like I did. Good luck to everyone trying to deal with this damn disease.

AlaskaAngel you raise some interesting points. I feel like many oncologists really don't have a very good handle on endocrinology. Case in point: I asked my MO what effect alcohol drinking has on hormone levels and he said, "I don't know, you'd have to ask an endocrinologist." Considering hormones play a big part in 70% of breast cancers I think all MO's should know A LOT about endocrinology.

I wonder too about the negative effects of a lot of cancer treatments on metabolism. I just read a study showing that glucocorticoids, which are commonly used with chemo, caused hyperglycemia in 20-50% of the patients who took them (in another study it was 58%)! And there is also the increased risk of diabetes among tamoxifen users. It's like two steps forward, one step back.

rje brain runs on sugar. perhaps can get enough for t from properky cooked vegetables. wou;d be the best way of coursee