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I know from personal experience that eating sugar does induce more anxiety in me. This might sound weird but I can "physically feel" in my head a certain anxiet

by Tarsul 1y ago

I know from personal experience that eating sugar does induce more anxiety in me. This might sound weird but I can "physically feel" in my head a certain anxiety when e.g. I think about something awkward. This "physical feel" stopped being there when I stopped eating sweets for a few weeks. One reason why I try to keep my sugar intake down (the other being in danger of getting diabetes...). Thus, I wholly believe this study.

veunes 1y ago
It's wild how much your gut can mess with your brain chemistry
frankish 1y ago
Can you explain your jump from gut microbiota to sugar? Aside from sugar being one food that passes through our digestion, I'm not certain why you have singled it out.
- kelipso 1y ago
  Just from basic principles, what you eat affects your gut microbiome because different bacteria reproduce more or less from you eating different foods.
cjbgkagh 1y ago
I believe most people are not notability adversely affected by sugar and a small subset of the population, like myself, are acutely affected. The former does not invalidate the latter. Sarah Wilson of “I quit sugar” fame started off with a zero sugar crusade then later ameliorated her advice in an apparent effort to generalize her advice for a wider audience. I think advice should be tailored by conditioning on what category a person fits into. I would go further and suggest that a zero sugar diet should also have zero fruit. As a ADHD sugar addict I would generally substitute sugar with fruit and that prevented me from finding out that even my ostensibly healthy diet had too much sugar in it.
- itsallboutsugar 1y ago
  Thank you, I initially came here to post a comment disencouraging sugar based on my anecdotal experience. It's indeed weird that people I know don't report the same immediate, acute, negative effects that I experience upon sugar consumption. Until now it never occurred to me my experience might not be universal. Curiously I have ADHD too. Maybe there is a link? In my experience an apple = a bar of chocolate, has the exact same effect, no difference except maybe a bar of chocolate is slightly faster acting. Immediate brain fog, almost like being psuedo-drunk. I too gave up on fruits after deluding myself for a long time that an apple a day is somehow healthy for me. In hindsight it's crystal clear addiction. I was looking forward the entire day to that moment where I'd 'allow' myself the fruit. I was frequently unable to stop eating after the determined portion.
  - cjbgkagh 1y ago
    Sure, I absolutely think there is a ADHD link and I think there is a likely (which is not the same as definitely) common cause of hypermobile Ehlers Danlos Syndrome (hEDS), understand that this is not the medical establishment view but I think my models are more accurate and more predictive. If you scroll through my previous message history I cover this topic quite a bit, you can also email me. In general terms, I think hEDS is far more common than doctors do, and is likely caused by TNXB SNPs. TNXB SPNs are overlooked because these are too common to cause the 'rare' condition - but if you drop the prior assumption of rarity then a very different picture is painted. It appears to me that the only difference between hEDS and far more common Generalized Joint Hypermobility (GJH) is severity and the stochastic diagnosis that this difference causes. The prior assumption of rarity has informed the diagnostic test so the diagnostic tests reproduce this assumption and in my view have an extremely high false negative rate. If using other proxy stats like the rate of hypermobility in Long Covid from the work of Dr Jessica Eccles it's pretty clear that that prior assumption of rarity is wildly inaccurate. I was able to figure this out because I have experience as an applied researcher and machine learning, having spent half a lifetime reading papers I've developed a bit of a nose for the sorts of mistakes that academic researchers tend to make.
- Tarsul 1y ago
reliablereason 1y ago
You say sugar, but are you referring to glucose or fructose? There is a meaningful amount of scientific literature connecting fructose and inflammation. The AVERAGE human can only digest about 30g of fructose a day. Some substantially more, some substantially less. A can of soda or three apples is about 30g of fructose. Inflammation (high- and low grade)then being a second step linking to anxiety.
- Tarsul 1y ago
  I am talking about the sugar in sweets. My daily apple does not appear to heighten my anxiety.
  - reliablereason 1y ago
    I have heard people say that eating fibers together with fructose(like when eating a apple) reduces the impact of fructose, as fibers create a lining on the gut wall reducing the absorption rate. Sounds reasonable. But i have had a hard time finding evidence verifying that hypotesis.
    - xdavidliu 1y ago
      i'm pretty sure this saying is well agreed upon by the mainstream medical community. (not a medical pro myself, but follow a lot of articles and podcasts from mainstream sources)
    - NoPicklez 1y ago
      Its in most nutrition textbooks, it's partly why fiber is so important. Eating fiber with any carbohydrates reduces the absorption rate. It's partly why eating an Apple is better for you than eating a lolly despite both being high in sugar.
    - vanderZwan 1y ago
      I think you have to look for "glycemic index" and learn about its mechanisms, which in your defense is not an obvious term to search for.
iknowstuff 1y ago
Heads up, I don’t think there’s a link between eating sugar and risk of developing diabetes. Obesity is a risk factor but not sugar itself.
- Tarsul 1y ago
  Maybe. But eating sweets makes me eat more anyway. Which leads to me gaining weight. So it's the same anyhow.
- strken 1y ago
  https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2161831325000493 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S216183132... There's a complicated relationship, according to this meta-analysis. Eating sugar in isolation from other sources of nutrition is a risk factor. Eating fruit, or eating sweetened foods with redeeming qualities like yoghurt and wholegrain cereal, is probably inversely correlated (with lower confidence). These seem to be true even when controlling for BMI. Looking at the meta-analysis, it's hard to say there's no link. The authors suggest that fibre might mitigate the impact, and that adding sugar to otherwise healthy foods might encourage higher consumption of them.
iaaan 1y ago
I recently started consuming relatively large amounts of fiber (standard daily dose of whole psyllium husks mixed with water) and I feel noticeably less anxious than on days when I don't take it. Fiber has been shown to interact somehow (I'm not super familiar) with the body's insulin levels. I wonder if it is related to what TFA is saying.
amelius 1y ago
I get a similar feeling when drinking milk. Maybe I'm becoming intolerant.
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
xattt 1y ago
Sugar? Why not caffeine? I swear that a 4+ week coffee and caffeinated holiday improved emotional regulation and turns down OCD behaviours and anxiety. Not sure if this is microbiota-related or related to down-regulation of neuroreceptors activated by coffee compounds. I’ve heard arguments such as “well… caffeine is cleared within hours so a weeks-long effect is placebo”. Say what you want.
- NoPicklez 1y ago
  Well I don't think they're saying that wouldn't happen with caffeine, just that this is their experience with sugar.
mountainriver 1y ago
Yes same, my anxiety is completely gone on keto. It’s just really hard to constantly be in keto, so I limit my carbs which helps but isn’t quite the same
McAlpine5892 1y ago
Most of my adult life I've suffered from DPDR. In recent years I've been able to get somewhat of a handle on it. While I never pinned down the cause exactly, my talk therapist and I came to the realization that some meals would trigger it. Usually those meals were obviously bad for my health, so I started avoiding them. > This might sound weird but I can "physically feel" in my head a certain anxiety Why I commented. DPDR is in the same box as anxiety and, yeah, I could literally feel this weird pressure in my head. An actual physical sensation. Seems like we had different cause and side effects but it's so good to read there's someone else out there. Glad you found something that worked for you. There's so much we don't know about our bodies. --- [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depersonalization-derealization_disorder https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depersonalization-derealizatio...
- Tarsul 1y ago
  Thank you for posting. You made my day as well :)

by Tarsul 1y ago

veunes 1y ago

It's wild how much your gut can mess with your brain chemistry

frankish 1y ago

Can you explain your jump from gut microbiota to sugar? Aside from sugar being one food that passes through our digestion, I'm not certain why you have singled it out.

kelipso 1y ago
Just from basic principles, what you eat affects your gut microbiome because different bacteria reproduce more or less from you eating different foods.

cjbgkagh 1y ago

I believe most people are not notability adversely affected by sugar and a small subset of the population, like myself, are acutely affected. The former does not invalidate the latter. Sarah Wilson of “I quit sugar” fame started off with a zero sugar crusade then later ameliorated her advice in an apparent effort to generalize her advice for a wider audience. I think advice should be tailored by conditioning on what category a person fits into. I would go further and suggest that a zero sugar diet should also have zero fruit. As a ADHD sugar addict I would generally substitute sugar with fruit and that prevented me from finding out that even my ostensibly healthy diet had too much sugar in it.

itsallboutsugar 1y ago
Thank you, I initially came here to post a comment disencouraging sugar based on my anecdotal experience. It's indeed weird that people I know don't report the same immediate, acute, negative effects that I experience upon sugar consumption. Until now it never occurred to me my experience might not be universal. Curiously I have ADHD too. Maybe there is a link? In my experience an apple = a bar of chocolate, has the exact same effect, no difference except maybe a bar of chocolate is slightly faster acting. Immediate brain fog, almost like being psuedo-drunk. I too gave up on fruits after deluding myself for a long time that an apple a day is somehow healthy for me. In hindsight it's crystal clear addiction. I was looking forward the entire day to that moment where I'd 'allow' myself the fruit. I was frequently unable to stop eating after the determined portion.
- cjbgkagh 1y ago
  Sure, I absolutely think there is a ADHD link and I think there is a likely (which is not the same as definitely) common cause of hypermobile Ehlers Danlos Syndrome (hEDS), understand that this is not the medical establishment view but I think my models are more accurate and more predictive. If you scroll through my previous message history I cover this topic quite a bit, you can also email me. In general terms, I think hEDS is far more common than doctors do, and is likely caused by TNXB SNPs. TNXB SPNs are overlooked because these are too common to cause the 'rare' condition - but if you drop the prior assumption of rarity then a very different picture is painted. It appears to me that the only difference between hEDS and far more common Generalized Joint Hypermobility (GJH) is severity and the stochastic diagnosis that this difference causes. The prior assumption of rarity has informed the diagnostic test so the diagnostic tests reproduce this assumption and in my view have an extremely high false negative rate. If using other proxy stats like the rate of hypermobility in Long Covid from the work of Dr Jessica Eccles it's pretty clear that that prior assumption of rarity is wildly inaccurate. I was able to figure this out because I have experience as an applied researcher and machine learning, having spent half a lifetime reading papers I've developed a bit of a nose for the sorts of mistakes that academic researchers tend to make.
Tarsul 1y ago

reliablereason 1y ago

You say sugar, but are you referring to glucose or fructose? There is a meaningful amount of scientific literature connecting fructose and inflammation. The AVERAGE human can only digest about 30g of fructose a day. Some substantially more, some substantially less. A can of soda or three apples is about 30g of fructose. Inflammation (high- and low grade)then being a second step linking to anxiety.

Tarsul 1y ago
I am talking about the sugar in sweets. My daily apple does not appear to heighten my anxiety.
- reliablereason 1y ago
  I have heard people say that eating fibers together with fructose(like when eating a apple) reduces the impact of fructose, as fibers create a lining on the gut wall reducing the absorption rate. Sounds reasonable. But i have had a hard time finding evidence verifying that hypotesis.
  - xdavidliu 1y ago
    i'm pretty sure this saying is well agreed upon by the mainstream medical community. (not a medical pro myself, but follow a lot of articles and podcasts from mainstream sources)
  - NoPicklez 1y ago
    Its in most nutrition textbooks, it's partly why fiber is so important. Eating fiber with any carbohydrates reduces the absorption rate. It's partly why eating an Apple is better for you than eating a lolly despite both being high in sugar.
  - vanderZwan 1y ago
    I think you have to look for "glycemic index" and learn about its mechanisms, which in your defense is not an obvious term to search for.

iknowstuff 1y ago

Heads up, I don’t think there’s a link between eating sugar and risk of developing diabetes. Obesity is a risk factor but not sugar itself.

Tarsul 1y ago
Maybe. But eating sweets makes me eat more anyway. Which leads to me gaining weight. So it's the same anyhow.
strken 1y ago
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2161831325000493 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S216183132... There's a complicated relationship, according to this meta-analysis. Eating sugar in isolation from other sources of nutrition is a risk factor. Eating fruit, or eating sweetened foods with redeeming qualities like yoghurt and wholegrain cereal, is probably inversely correlated (with lower confidence). These seem to be true even when controlling for BMI. Looking at the meta-analysis, it's hard to say there's no link. The authors suggest that fibre might mitigate the impact, and that adding sugar to otherwise healthy foods might encourage higher consumption of them.

iaaan 1y ago

I recently started consuming relatively large amounts of fiber (standard daily dose of whole psyllium husks mixed with water) and I feel noticeably less anxious than on days when I don't take it. Fiber has been shown to interact somehow (I'm not super familiar) with the body's insulin levels. I wonder if it is related to what TFA is saying.

amelius 1y ago

I get a similar feeling when drinking milk. Maybe I'm becoming intolerant.

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]

xattt 1y ago

Sugar? Why not caffeine? I swear that a 4+ week coffee and caffeinated holiday improved emotional regulation and turns down OCD behaviours and anxiety. Not sure if this is microbiota-related or related to down-regulation of neuroreceptors activated by coffee compounds. I’ve heard arguments such as “well… caffeine is cleared within hours so a weeks-long effect is placebo”. Say what you want.

NoPicklez 1y ago
Well I don't think they're saying that wouldn't happen with caffeine, just that this is their experience with sugar.

mountainriver 1y ago

Yes same, my anxiety is completely gone on keto. It’s just really hard to constantly be in keto, so I limit my carbs which helps but isn’t quite the same

McAlpine5892 1y ago

Most of my adult life I've suffered from DPDR. In recent years I've been able to get somewhat of a handle on it. While I never pinned down the cause exactly, my talk therapist and I came to the realization that some meals would trigger it. Usually those meals were obviously bad for my health, so I started avoiding them. > This might sound weird but I can "physically feel" in my head a certain anxiety Why I commented. DPDR is in the same box as anxiety and, yeah, I could literally feel this weird pressure in my head. An actual physical sensation. Seems like we had different cause and side effects but it's so good to read there's someone else out there. Glad you found something that worked for you. There's so much we don't know about our bodies. --- [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depersonalization-derealization_disorder https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depersonalization-derealizatio...

Tarsul 1y ago
Thank you for posting. You made my day as well :)