SUGAR!

Well, I have been addicted to sugar as long as I can remember. It is truly scary how addictive it is and how it is in everything.  From the full blown candy bar and ice cream to ketchup, meats, and  milk.  Several months ago, before I learned of CDH1I embarked on my first Whole 30.  If you’re unfamiliar, Whole 30 is basically a reset to help you determine what foods you do and don’t do well with.  For 30 days you eliminate all added sugars, dairy, alcohol, grains/gluten, and legumes to reset your body and bowels. Then after the 30 days you can slowly reintroduce these things back into your diet to help you determine if any of those food groups are causing you problems (i.e. bloating, gas, etc). Okay, So I started this January 1st of this year with a group of friends at work.  So I really learned how to read labels and if he different sources of sugar.  Well,  I was loving it and going strong. I Felt so good about it and was totally planning on doing the legit reintroduction after the 30 days were over.

Well, January 8th, I learned I had his genetic mutation of my CDH1 gene.  If you’ve read my earlier blogs you’d know my gynecologist nor myself had any idea what this meant.  Even after googling for a couple of hours at work the next day I decided not to let this affect my Whole 30 journey. I was going to wait until I saw the genetic counselor to really figure out what this meant. That was the longest 2 weeks of my life thus far.  After the genetic counseling appointment, which was January 23rd, it took me a few days to realize I wanted to eat whatever the hell I wanted to eat and didn’t care about this Whole 30 bullshit. I mean, who knows if I’ll ever be able to tolerate added sugar again (which is my pitfall and I’m totally addicted). So I had a cookie a couple of days before Whole 30 was over. And instantly regretted it.  I was doing Whole 30 for a reason and still wasn’t sure where this CDH1 journey was going to take me.  So I finished Whole 30 at that point but then did not do a proper reintroduction. Which I’m totally fine with.  So, as you’ve learned I’ve been over indulging a bit and not having much will power when it comes to sweets.  Which I was totally fine with. Other than the fact that it’s very emotional difficult for me to gain weight. I’ve been up and down with my weight my entire adult life and was finally getting into a good groove and balance of eating healthy and staying active and feeling good about myself...and now I’m just going to gain a bunch of weight?  So I’ve waffled back and forth with mixed feeling of ‘I’m going to enjoy eating’ and ‘there’s no reason to overindulge’. Until recently (about a week ago actually), I had yet another epiphany.

Let me back track a bit.  So I had my upper GI with biopsies at the NIH in June.  I’m thinking my TG will be in March. That’s 9 months.  I’ve learned that 9 months in the CDH1 world can be absolutely devastating.  I’ve read and heard countless stories of people having negative biopsies on EGD and then several months later finding late stage HDGC.  In my personal family the only person we know of that had HDGC is my dad. And he was 46 years old.  I’m 34 years old.  So logically it makes sense that I should be able to wait a measly 9 months and be fine. But I’ve also learned that this CDH1 mutation is not logical. There is so much they still don’t understand and I would hate to regret waiting 9 months. However, I’m not ready. There are still things I’d like to do before surgery and am trying to make peace with that decision.

Okay, now to back to the sugar epiphany.  If I’m afriad I already have cancer and that it’s going to advance so rapidly in 9 months, why would I provide it’s favorite source of fuel...SUGAR!?!  We all know cancer loves sugar so what am I doing eating so much of it!?  So for the last week or so I have looked at all my favorite sugary treats in a very different way.  I’m not cutting it out cold turkey at this point. Just drastically decreasing my intake just by being aware of what I’m putting in my mouth.

I’d love to hear your thoughts about sugar so feel free to leave a comment.

Until next time.