I have gained ten pounds in the last couple of months. I know where they came from, they came from fructose. I know where they are, these extra pounds are in and around my liver. I weighed in at 147.5 the other morning. I had my clothes on, but thats only worth about two pounds, so I have put on almost ten pounds by eating and drinking sugar.

For a while there I couldn’t quit eating the sweet stuff. This happens to me when I quit drinking liquor again. In my mind somehow they are linked and when I have been drinking and then quit I crave sugar to a great extent. We have sweet sodas in a little refrigerator and I will drink one with dinner. We have ice cream in the freezer, I will have one before bed. We have candy I will have candy. Christmas-time is Topsy’s Popcorn season at my house.

Go ahead and click. It’s Safe.

The reason these things are in my home is that I do not have a moat, drawbridge and customs office to limit the free flow of contraband into my home. I have an adult son that thinks it is funny to buy gigantic candy bars and economy sized ice cream boxes to give to me. He brings in cases of soda, knowing that I will not throw it away, I will use it little by little until it is all gone. He brought us the largest tub of Topsy’s that they sell. I don’t discourage him, as I think that I should be able to decline any momentary craving.

I suppose that we all have that voice in us that says, “you can have it around, you are tougher than that.” I do know that I am tougher than that, as I can easily stay away nine times out of ten. The problem is that a person has about 50,000 thoughts a day. A large percentage of those thoughts are about getting something sweet into the mouth, so there are a lot of opportunities to say ‘yes’… about one percent. If saying yes means going to the store or to an ice cream shop to get it, then there are a lot more chances to turn a ‘yes’ into a ‘later’, which makes eating sweets less likely. My theory is that the voice telling me I can have it around is the same side of my mind that is telling me to have a Coke. I know that having it around makes having it infinitely easier to go ahead and have it the instant I want.

Living a busy life means eating out a few times per week. Eating out is another chance to eat carbs and drink sugars. I could order tea. I could stick with water. Lately (last week) I did do that, stick to water, I mean. It’s harder to not eat the chips they bring out before the entree shows up. Ordering is a snap decision, and saying I will just have water is a conscious deviation from the lifetime normal of “Coke”. Years past it would be “beer”, which is really just as fattening as Coke. Now when the question is asked, I must consciously say “water”. Doing it makes me feel powerful. Taking the old road makes me feel a touch of shame. My wife looks at me and she knows I just lost a little fight, but of course she doesn’t say anything. She fights these same battles each day, as we all do. I feel like I gave up, and I did. I know that it doesn’t mean the war is over, that now I am doomed, but I also know that it means that the war is not over, and that there will be another little battle the next time I have a choice to make.

I am going to make the right choices the rest of December more times than not. If I can keep my sugar consumption to the absolute minimum then my weight will trend down again. I can get back to 137.5 with my clothes on by next year. All I have to do is win more than I lose. If I am not hard on myself, if I trust myself going forward and love that I am even willing to fight “normal” at all, then doing the right thing is not hard. Doing the wrong thing will not leave me with self inflicted extra damage which might make me want to self medicate with liquor or sugar.

We live in a sweet world, don’t we?