How Sugar Makes You Fat

Look at how many grams of sugar are in what you’re eating (on the nutritional label). Now divide that number by 4. That’s how many teaspoons of pure sugar you’re consuming. Kinda scary, huh? Sugar makes you fat and fatfree food isn’t really free of fat. I’ve said it before in multiple articles, but occasionally, I’ve had someone lean over my desk and say “How in the heck does sugar make you fat if there’s no fat in it?”. This article will answer that puzzler, and provide you with some helpful suggestions to achieve not only weight loss success, but improved body health.

First, let’s make some qualifications. Sugar isn’t inherently evil. Your body uses sugar to survive, and burns sugar to provide you with the energy necessary for life. Many truly healthy foods are actually broken down to sugar in the body – through the conversion of long and complex sugars called polysaccharides into short and simple sugars called monosaccharides, such as glucose. In additions to the breakdown products of fat and protein, glucose is a great energy source for your body.

However, there are two ways that sugar can sabotage your body and cause fat storage. Excess glucose is the first problem, and it involves a very simple concept. Anytime you have filled your body with more fuel than it actually needs (and this is very easy to do when eating foods with high sugar content), your liver’s sugar storage capacity is exceeded. When the liver is maximally full, the excess sugar is converted by the liver into fatty acids (that’s right – fat!) and returned to the bloodstream, where is taken throughout your body and stored (that’s right – as fat!) wherever you tend to store adipose fat cells, including, but not limited to, the popular regions of the stomach, hips, butt, and breasts.

As an unfortunate bonus, once these regions are full of adipose tissue, the fatty acids begin to spill over into your organs, like the heart, liver, and kidneys. This reduces organ ability, raises blood pressure, decreases metabolism, and weakens the immune system.

Not good!

Excess insulin is the second problem. Insulin is a major hormone in the body, and is released in high levels anytime you ingest what would be considered a “simple” carbohydrate, which would include, but not be limited to: fruit juice, white bread, most “wheat” bread (basically white bread with a little extra fiber), white rice, baked white potato, bagels, croissants, pretzels, graham crackers, vanilla wafers, waffles, corn chips, cornflakes, cake, jelly beans, sugary drinks, Gatorade, beer, and anything that has high fructose corn syrup on the nutritional label. Two actions occur when the insulin levels are spiked. First, the body’s fat burning process is shut down so that the sugar that has just been ingested can be immediately used for energy. Then, insulin takes all that sugar and puts it into your muscles. Well, not quite! Actually, most of us, except those random Ironman triathletes and 8000- calories-per-day exercisers, walk around with fairly full energy stores in the muscles. As soon as the muscles energy stores are full, the excess sugars are converted to fat and, just like the fatty acids released from the liver, stored as adipose tissue on our waistline.

But that’s not all. After the blood sugar has been reduced by going into the muscles or being converted to fat in the liver, the feedback mechanism that tells the body to stop producing insulin is slightly delayed, so blood sugar levels fall even lower, below normal measurements. This causes 1) an immediate increase in appetite, which is usually remedied by eating more food; 2) the production of a stress hormone called cortisol. Cortisol triggers the release of stored sugar from the liver to bring blood sugar levels back up, which, combined with the meal you eat from your appetite increase, begins the entire “fat storage, metabolic decrease” process over again.

This process of destabilizing blood sugar levels and sending your body on a roller coaster ride can occur throughout an entire day, week, or month. The excessive cortisol that accumulates in the body eventually distresses your hormonal system and results in other problems, including a further decrease in metabolism, obesity, depression, allergies, immune weakness, chronic fatigue syndrome and other serious side effects.

So what kind of carbohydrates can you eat to avoid de-stabilizing blood sugar levels, constantly sabotaging your weight loss, and spending hundreds of thousands of dollars in health care as you get older? Here is a list of carbohydrates do not trigger such a strong insulin response and instead provide long-term, stabilized energy: apples, oranges, pears, plums, grapes, bananas (not overly ripened), grapefruit, oatmeal, brown rice, whole wheat spaghetti and egg fettuccine, whole-wheat pasta, bran cereal, barley, bulgur, basmati, Kashi and other whole grains, beans, peas (especially chick and black-eyed), lentils, whole corn, sweet potatoes, yams, milk, yogurt (preferably low-fat or fat-free) and soy. Stay away from processed and packaged foods as much as possible, because they are highly likely to include artificial sweeteners (which basically have a similar effect as sugar), as well as simple and refined sugars. Keep your eye out for ingredients that include sucrose, maltose, dextrose, fructose, galactose, glucose, arabinose, ribose, xylose, deoxyribose, lactose, and other fake names for sugars. Even “healthy” juice and many health food products will need to be avoided if they contain high levels of sugar.

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If you need more help with your diet, just let me know. Feel free to e-mail [email protected], and I’ll give you some suggestions on how a personal trainer can help you with your nutrition. My book, Shape21, includes 21 days of nutritional intake that completely stabilizes blood sugar levels, which, when combined with the perfect exercise program that I’ve detailed in the book, leaves you with a lean, athletic body. You can check it out at my website,, or at a gym near you.

If you’d like my FREE newsletter and weekly audio podcast, simply visit For a more personalized online fitness coaching, fat loss, human performance or nutrition consulting, you can also visit

Until then, train smart!

Ben Greenfield

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54 Responses to “How Sugar Makes You Fat”

  1. Susan McIntyre February 20, 2018 at 9:48 am #


    This often-overlooked, unsuspected common airborne pathogen thrives on sugar, even releasing enzymes (like lactase) to get it, and is known to cause malignancies, mental illness, and idiopathic diseases. (Can it cause Diabetes type 1 from an autoimmune destruction of pancreatic cells?)

    I’d like to share information I learned during my Dallas area workplace’s outbreak of an airborne infectious disease that can cause malignancies, precancerous conditions, rheumatological diseases, connective tissue diseases, autoimmune symptoms, inflammation in any organ/tissue, seizures, migraines, mood swings, hallucinations, etc. and is often undiagnosed/misdiagnosed in immunocompetent people. Of course, some of it you may already know.

    My coworkers and I, all immunocompetent, got Disseminated Histoplasmosis in Dallas-Fort Worth from roosting bats, the most numerous non-human mammal in the U.S., that shed the fungus in their feces. The doctors said we couldn’t possibly have it, since we all had intact immune systems. The doctors were wrong. Healthy people can get it, too, with widely varying symptoms. And we did not develop immunity over time, we’d get better and then progressively worse, appearing to relapse periodically and concurrently every year.

    More than 100 outbreaks have occurred in the U.S. since 1938, and those are just the ones that were figured out, since people go to different doctors. One outbreak was over 100,000 victims in Indianapolis. 80-90+% of people in some areas have been infected. It can lay dormant for up to 40 years in the lungs and/or adrenals.

    It’s known to cause hematological malignancies, and some doctors claim their leukemia patients go into remission when given antifungal. My friend in another state who died from lupus lived across the street from a bat colony. An acquaintance with alopecia universalis and whose mother had degenerative brain disorder has bat houses on their property.

    This pathogen parasitizes the reticuloendothelial system/invades macrophages, can infect and affect the lymphatic system and all tissues/organs, causes inflammation and granulomas, etc. It causes idiopathic (unknown cause) diseases and conditions, including hematological malignancies, autoimmune symptoms, myelitis, myositis, vasculitis, panniculitis, dysplasia, hyperplasia, etc. It causes hypervascularization, calcifications, sclerosis, fibrosis, necrosis, eosinophilia, leukopenia, anemia, neutrophilia, pancytopenia, thrombocytopenia, hypoglycemia, cysts, abscesses, polyps, stenosis, perforations, GI problems, hepatitis, focal neurologic deficits, etc. Many diseases it might cause are comorbid with other diseases it might cause, for example depression/anxiety/MS linked to Crohn’s.

    Researchers claim the subacute type is more common than believed. It is known to at least “mimic” autoimmune diseases and cancer and known to give false-positives in PET scans. But no one diagnosed with an autoimmune disease or cancer is screened for it. In fact, at least one NIH paper states explicitly that all patients diagnosed with sarcoidosis be tested for it, but most, if not all, are not. Other doctors are claiming sarcoidosis IS disseminated histoplasmosis.

    The fungus is an Oxygenale and therefore consumes collagen. It’s known to cause connective tissue diseases, rheumatological conditions, seizures, and mental illness. Fungal hyphae carry an electrical charge and align under a current. It causes RNA/DNA damage. It’s known to cause delusions, wild mood swings (pseudobulbar affect?), and hallucinations. It’s most potent in female lactating bats, because the fungus likes sugar (lactose) and nitrogen (amino acids, protein, neurotransmitters?). What about female lactating humans…postpartum psychosis (and don’t some of these poor women also have trouble swallowing)? The bats give birth late spring/summer, and I noticed suicide rates spike in late spring/early summer. It’s known to cause retinal detachment, and retinal detachments are known to peak around June-July/in hot weather. A map of mental distress and some diseases appear to almost perfectly overlay a map of Histoplasmosis. Johns Hopkins linked autism to an immune response in the womb. Alzheimer’s was linked to hypoglycemia, which can be caused by chronic CNS histoplasmosis. The bats eat moths, which are attracted to blue and white city lights that simulate the moon the moths use to navigate. Bats feed up to 500 feet in the air and six miles away in any direction from their roost, but not when it’s raining or when the temperature is less than approximately 56° F.

    I believe the “side effects” of Haldol (leukopenia and MS symptoms) might not always be side effects but just more symptoms of Disseminated Histoplasmosis, since it causes leukopenia and MS symptoms. What about the unknown reason why beta receptor blockers cause tardive dyskinesia? The tinnitus, photophobia, psychosis “caused” by Cipro? Hypersexuality and leukemia “caused” by Abilify? Humira linked to lymphoma, leukemia and melanoma in children? Disseminated Histoplasmosis is known to cause enteropathy, so could some people thought to have nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug enteropathy have it and taking NSAIDs for the pain/inflammation it causes, and the NSAIDs aren’t the actual culprit?

    From my experience, I learned that NO doctor, at least in DFW, will suspect subacute and/or progressive disseminated histoplasmosis in immunocompetent people. Some doctors, at least the ones I went to, will actually REFUSE to test for it, even when told someone and their coworkers have all the symptoms and spend a lot of time in a building with bats in the ceiling. Victims will be accused of hypochondriasis. In fact, the first doctor to diagnose me was a pulmonologist, and the only reason he examined me was to try to prove that I didn’t have it, when I really did. No doctor I went to realized bats carry the fungus. And NO doctor I went to in DFW, even infectious disease “experts,” understand the DISSEMINATED form, just the pulmonary form, and the only test that will be done by many doctors before they diagnose people as NOT having it is an X-ray, even though at least 40-70% of victims will have NO sign of it on a lung X-ray. It OFTEN gives false-negatives in lab tests (some people are correctly diagnosed only during an autopsy after obtaining negative test results) and cultures may not show growth until after 12 weeks of incubation (but some labs report results after 2 weeks).

    One disease of unknown cause that could be caused by Disseminated Histoplasmosis: I suspect, based on my and my coworker’s symptoms (during our “rare” infectious disease outbreak) and my research, that interstitial cystitis and its comorbid conditions can be caused by disseminated histoplasmosis, which causes inflammation throughout the body, causes “autoimmune” symptoms, and is not as rare as believed. I read that “interstitial cystitis (IC) is a chronic inflammatory condition of the submucosal and muscular layers of the bladder, and the cause is currently unknown. Some people with IC have been diagnosed with other conditions such as irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, allergies, and Sjogren’s syndrome, which raises the possibility that interstitial cystitis may be caused by mechanisms that cause these other conditions. In addition, men with IC are frequently diagnosed as having chronic nonbacterial prostatitis, and there is an extensive overlap of symptoms and treatment between the two conditions, leading researchers to posit that the conditions may share the same etiology and pathology.” Sounds like Disseminated Histoplasmosis, doesn’t it?

    My coworkers and I were always most ill around April/May/June, presumably since the Mexican Free-tail bats gave birth in Texas during May, and fall/Thanksgiving to December, for some unknown reason (maybe migrating bats from the north?). We had GI problems, liver problems, weird rashes (erythema nodosum, erythema multiforme, erythema annulare, etc.), plantar fasciitis, etc., and I had swollen lymph nodes, hives, lesions, abdominal aura, and started getting migraines and plantar fasciitis in the building, and I haven’t had them since I left. It gave me temporary fecal incontinence, seizures, dark blood from my intestines, tinnitus, nystagmus, benign paroxysmal positional vertigo, what felt like burning skin, various aches and pains (some felt like pin pricks and pinches), tingling, tremors, “explosions” like fireworks in my head while sleeping, temporary blindness, and chronic spontaneous “orgasms”/convulsions. Suddenly I was allergic to pears (latex fruit allergy?). I had insomnia (presumably from the fungus acidifying the blood, releasing adrenaline) and parasomnias. I suddenly had symptoms of several inflammatory/autoimmune diseases, including Fibromyalgia, Sarcoidosis, ALS, MS, Sjogren’s syndrome, etc. that have disappeared since leaving the area and taking nothing but Itraconazole antifungal.

    No one, including doctors (we all went to different ones), could figure out what was wrong with us, and I was being killed by my doctor, who mistakenly refused to believe I had it and gave me progressively higher and higher doses of Prednisone (at least 2 years after I already had Disseminated Histoplasmosis) after a positive ANA titer, until I miraculously remembered that a visiting man once told my elementary school class that bats CARRY histoplasmosis….so much of it that they evolved to deal with the photophobia and tinnitus it causes by hunting at night by echolocation. There’s a lot more. I wrote a book about my experience with Disseminated Histoplasmosis called “Batsh#t Crazy,” because bats shed the fungus in their feces and it causes delusions and hallucinations, I suspect by the sclerotia it can form emitting hallucinogens (like psilocybin and dimethyltryptamine) along with inflammation in the CNS. (Schizophrenics have 2X of a chemical associated with yeast, part of the fungal life cycle.)

    Thank you for your time,

    Susan McIntyre

  2. Lia November 18, 2017 at 10:58 am #

    I’ve been put on the FODMAP eating plan by my dietician at the kidney drs office. I lost 18 pounds in 10 days because it sped up my metabolism. The following week it was awful to see my skin shriveled and disgusting. So after speeding up the metabolism for thirty days my skin was disgusting. I purposefully put those pounds back on to fill out my skin. Then I went on a two week binge and am now 260!

    I know I have to go back on the FODMAP plan to get this mess off but I I’m so afraid of the excess skin hanging. Anyone have any ideas?

    • Ben Greenfield November 19, 2017 at 12:17 pm #

      Lia, check out this article……

      Also, this is exactly the type of question myself, my team of coaches and the community in my Inner Circle can help to answer for you. The Inner Circle is a collective of people who are pursuing the same goals you are – trying to live a healthy, happy, adventurous, fulfilling and limitless life in a modern world. In the Inner Circle, we all help each other with questions, ideas, motivation, suggestions and much more!
      Here is where you access that community:

      You can also seek advice in the Kion community. Because I get so many questions like this and it's impossible for me to respond to everyone individually, I built this community of like-minded people who both have advice and are seeking advice!

      If you prefer a more direct, customized approach, I'd be happy to help you via a personal one-on-one consult. Just go to… and then choose a 20 or 60-minute consult, whichever you'd prefer. I can schedule ASAP after you get that.

      Additionally, if I'm "out of your price range" (yes, yes, I know I can be a spendy guy to access) I have a team of coaches I've personally trained who can help you here:…

      Hope this helps!

      • Alexis J. January 30, 2018 at 3:06 pm #

        hello! I am working on a Statistics project for a college assignment and would greatly appreciate if you could email me the details to a few questions. As in, Where did you get the data from, who was tested, how were the individuals selected, was there a variety of individuals varying in gender, weight, etc., and what were some determining factors to get to this conclusion. Any of these questions you are willing to answer will be of a great help! Thank you so much.

    • Gale Futch December 18, 2017 at 7:25 am #

      I’m no doctor but I want to say give it time your skin will start to shrink back. I would think give it at least a year. After that you would probably have to have surgery to tighten up the access. It’s kinda like a woman who has a baby. Took 9 mos to get that way give it 9 to get back. Some are blessed and it doesn’t take that long. We all are different.

  3. andrea hansen July 27, 2016 at 8:28 pm #

    ok, so i am onboard with sugar makes you fat… i try to eat for fat loss, meaning good proteins and fats and veggies (non starchy) for most of the day, if not all… if I’m going to have carbs i have them at night… the

    other night i had some full fat yogurt from grass fed cows, that had 11 grams of sugar, none added, and also had some nuts and cinnamonon top and my BF said i shouldn’t eat that sugar before bed and that it would turn to fat. i was like, umm, no it won’t. but then didn’t have the best way to explain myself … also i do cross fit and interval 20 min runs….. also i was surprise in the above article that u suggested low or non fat yogurt…

    so i guess the big question is where does the sugar go if having it at night for an active woman, thanks ben 🙂

    • Cat August 11, 2017 at 1:36 pm #

      I eat sugar in moderation, but no matter what I do I don’t gain weight. I have to eat bowls of buttery sour cream filled mashed potatoes may, may possibly gain 1/2 pound, maybe. My doctor said if you want to gain weight you have to eat protein. Eating pies and cakes aren’t going to work. So I started eating steaks and huge baked potatoes (butter, sour cream), it still didn’t work. Got rid of the boyfriend,, then I started gaining small amounts of weight. It’s really kind of indiivdual, don’t you think?

    • Guest123 April 26, 2018 at 7:30 pm #

      Well you wouldn’t turn fat right away you will just get addicted to eating sugary foods, which will lead to you being fat but just avoid those foods (and sugars) as much as possible but also make sure to get your body’s amount of sugar needs.

  4. Patrick Mullin April 21, 2016 at 8:20 pm #

    Great article! I used this to further explain the effects of sugar to a client and I feel it went hand in hand with my lectures for my Pn1 certification! Thanks for sharing it!

  5. Sheila April 10, 2016 at 7:35 am #

    This article explains my problem. I watch my calories and do full body workouts. But my hips, arms etc.. are holding onto fat. I eat sugar. Too much of it. I try to eat nutrient dense food but I also like sugar and wine. I have been very frustrated with an extra 7lbs I have gained this year. I have been blaming my age but am now quite convinced it’s sugar. The hard part is giving it up…… Thank you(I think ):) for the informative, straight forward and easy to understand article.

    • Fras April 22, 2016 at 7:47 am #

      sugar is not the problem. I would encourage anyone to read this newsletter by Dr John McDougall.…
      He lays out the truth behind sugar and the, not so great western diet filled with high levels of fat! Here is his website.

      • Bryan August 1, 2017 at 3:59 pm #

        I’ve been following a Vegan cyclist called Durianrider who follows Dr. McDougall. Durian eats mostly fruit but also refined sugar. He is skinny as hell and extremely fit.

  6. Tom March 25, 2016 at 6:16 am #

    Hi Ben,

    Great article but i would just like to add that; sucrose, maltose, dextrose, fructose, galactose, glucose, arabinose, ribose, xylose, deoxyribose and lactose are not fake names for sugars. Sucrose being a disacceride, composed of 2 glucose and fructose being similar to glucose but less calorific. Deoxyribose is dna (deoxyribose nucleic acid) and lactose and galactose are not very calorific sugars either and are only found in dairy products.

    • Michiel March 9, 2017 at 8:10 am #

      I guess he meant dextrose, not deoxyribose.

  7. J February 20, 2016 at 5:14 am #

    There is so much bro science in this article it’s disgusting. Anything to sell a product.

  8. Julie devyea February 8, 2016 at 11:31 am #

    I understand what you are telling me however, I thought low fat or fat free yogurt is full of sugar substitutes because it needs flavour after the fat has been removed.

  9. Lauren November 23, 2015 at 2:05 am #

    Do you recommend I eat sugar free food instead of fat free or both? I'm trying to lose weight, and it sounds like it says in your article that sugar is technically fattening. Would it be better to eat sugar free or fat free?

    Do you have any other tips for losing weight? I'm 15 years old and am 135 pounds. I'm trying to get down to 130 pounds, but the scale won't budge if you know what I mean 🙂



    • Ben Greenfield December 21, 2015 at 8:44 pm #

      I have a tonne of stuff on weight loss. If you google Ben Greenfield + Fat Loss you'll get a bunch of stuff I've written

    • Guest123 April 26, 2018 at 7:33 pm #

      I know what you mean. Try to not eat fat-free foods because without fat, foods are tasteless so then the products are added more sugar. I recommend you avoid processed foods, eat healthy foods, and exercise.

  10. wakeupnaija November 18, 2015 at 4:48 pm #

    Tnkz. Really helpful

  11. Ahmed November 18, 2015 at 6:20 am #

    Hello dear

    Thanks for the great article I really had no idea how sugar makes you get fat

    And btw am 185cm tall my weight is 129kg ive lost about 4-5 kgs in 3 weeks but i didn't make my tea sugar free… anyway I wanted to ask , I have been drinking orange juice that says *sugar-free* on the bottle its even have a *diet* motto on it

    And it is kinda sweet i was wondering if that is bad or not…

    Resopnd please I've ordered a set of bottles not long ago and there's 5 bottles left waiting your response XD

  12. Cara November 13, 2015 at 8:07 am #

    Yes! You turned on another light bulb in my head…lol! I finally get this! Another issue I'd like to bring up is the high protein,low carb diet and why it's advocated. Well, first of all carb and fats are the body's primary fuel source. When you eat low carb and low sugar you deplete what the body needs to burn and it starts to use the stored carbs and fat!! Thats why the Atkins got popular which I don't advocate (carbs are good to). The whole idea really is moderation and very rarey cookies, heavy breads,sauces, processed food. Most processed food is similar to drugs, ya just have to stay away from it,at least for me!!!

  13. Dan October 6, 2015 at 4:14 am #

    I was told by my doctor that I have cirrhosis of the liver but I do not drink he said it is the fatty acids that has bill up around my liver how I get rid this fatty acid and if I get rid of this fatty acid will it help my liver.

    • Ben Greenfield January 15, 2016 at 1:37 am #

      I'm not a doctor and anything I say should not be taken as medical advice, but if you wanted to talk through this it would be better over a consult. If you want to book one go to and choose 20 or 60 mins and we'll get you scheduled.

  14. Blythe September 5, 2015 at 9:07 am #

    Thank you so much this post! Glad I found it. Another question: In the body do sugar-free choices breakdown in the same way. Can the body differentiate between the refined and sugar free?

    • Ben Greenfield January 15, 2016 at 5:24 pm #

      The body can indeed tell the difference. However, many sugar-free sources that are artificial, which include most everything other than Stevia, can cause some other issues such as killing good bacteria as well as Neural toxicity.

      • John Luc Seligman December 8, 2016 at 2:44 am #

        Just keep it simple. NO refined sugar. NO meat dairy egg fish process liquid oils! ONLY ‘WHOLE FOOD PLANT BASED LIFE STYLE’. FRUIT VEG ROOTS GRAINS NUTS. LOTS OT WATER. SUPPLENT B12 + D3. DO THE

    • Martin July 20, 2017 at 3:06 pm #

      According to Dr. Oz, he says that you can’t fool the body. He says that sugar free products trigger the body into releasing insulin. Since there is no sugar, the insulin ends up in the cells. Over time it can result in insulin resistant cells. This results in cells that do not process sugar when it enters the blood stream. Over time this can result in diabetes.

      • george November 4, 2017 at 4:39 am #

        Incorrect explanation (find a better doctor).

        Insulin is a hormonal response to the influx of sugar in the blood (like when you eat). Insulin is needed to allow the cells in your body to take in the sugar for its own energy use. The problem starts when there is a high level of sugar constantly circulating in the body (even after the cells requirements for sugar have been met and the liver has processed the excess sugar into fat for storage in the liver itself and/or fat cells). Faced of this constant barrage of high level of sugar circulating, the body becomes insensitive to the sugar presence (either not enough insulin being produced or the cells stopped taking up the sugar or not quickly enough). You are now diabetic type II.

        Note sugar is not the only culprit in making you fat, dairy products, pasta, potatoes, white bread and most refined products will cause a sugar spike in your blood stream until dealt with by insulin and your liver.

  15. David Smith August 11, 2015 at 5:04 pm #

    So if sugar makes one fat, what does MEAT, SALT, DAIRY and the so called VEGETABLE OIL does to your body? What i think I take from this article is, if I go to a restaurant and order a burger with the french fries and a pop. You are saying that it is the pop that makes me fat?

    • jo February 11, 2016 at 2:41 am #


    • Chris Love July 10, 2016 at 5:38 am #

      The bun, sugar in the condiments, simple carbs in the fries and yes the massive amounts of sugar in the soda make you fatter.

    • abubakr ahmad October 28, 2016 at 5:13 am #

      meat is protein and makes muscles strong and healthy, salt keeps insulin levels stable (if you eat the right amount), dairy makes bones strong and healthy and vegetable oil, fats, oils have lipids in them and help with major brain development until the age of 25.

  16. Adi August 1, 2015 at 2:01 pm #

    Hey! Excellent article. I just had some questions that I've always been wondering.

    How do cheat days fit into this? Are we putting on fat when we eat a cheat meal or have a cheat day?

    When people overeat and become fat, where is the line drawn? For instance, how many days can one go before that excess sugar becomes visible fat? And lastly, when we do exercise, do those fat cells decrease in size?


      This would be a really great question for us to cover in the podcast – can you call it in at


  17. Charlotte Hawk May 5, 2015 at 4:32 pm #

    It all makes sense now. Thanks to this post! I was really contemplating why sugar has a great impact to gaining weight and increasing health risk. I have watched the episode of Dr. Oz's show and he compared two different sizes/structures of fat, the ideal size and overexpanded fat size. You will notice there that there is a big difference of two. And too much intake of sugar is one of the greatest culprit why our body fat expanded. No wonder that I have this bulge waistline, I love sweets and I do not find time to exercise. Another episode I have shown, when he mentioned that taking forskolin supplement (read futher:… able to realease fatty acids from adipose tissue which is very essential in our body which increase the thermogenesis and resulting to losing body fat.

    • Apk June 14, 2016 at 1:04 am #

      Avoid Dextrose and Glucose ? Fake names for sugar ? Dextrose/Glucose are the same thing ! And are not fake names at all, Glucose is highly metabolic and not like Fructose ! It is used by diabetics as it doesnt get stored in the liver, it goes straight to the muscles ! You put all sugar in the bad box but you negate to mention the difference.


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  7. Does sugar make you gain weight? | Why Sugar? - March 1, 2014

    […] harmful effect of sugar is weight gain?  When you consume large amounts of sugar your body simply cannot burn it off. As a result, that […]

  8. Ready. Set. Health. » Blog Archive Why Fruit is Deceiving. Cutting Fruit to Lose Weight. - February 14, 2013

    […] For this section, I will have to quote a few different articles I found in my research, as I am not a nutrition or dietary expert. The following is an paraphrased excerpt of an article I found during my research. You can find the entire article written by Ben Greenfield, M.S. PE, NSCA-CPT, CSCS here. […]

  9. Infographic of the week: New Years Stay Fit starting with eliminating sugar! « The Digital Diva - February 9, 2013

    […] The New Year is for new beginnings and a fresh start. The most popular New Year’s resolution is getting into shape, or changing eating habits. Whatever way you want to put it, it’s about getting fit. I often tweet great info on staying in shape and eating right to stay fit. Since many people I know seem to have jumped on the wagon I came across this awesome infographic about sugar consumption that is a great visual wake up call on how easy it is to consume way too much sugar. Why is it not good to consume sugar? Because that is what is making us fat! Well I’m eating fat free food how am I getting fat, you ask. That is a whole other story but, check out Pacific Fitness for their great write up on, how sugar makes you fat. […]

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