According to the American Heart Association, women should consume no more than 6 teaspoons of sugar, while men should limit their intake to a mere 9. Eating more than this comes with risks outside of diabetes, such as fat livers, rusty muscles, faster aging, and addiction.
First of all, sugar tricks your brain into thinking you’re hungry after eating, which means you’ll to more than necessary. Second, it makes you age faster. Fructose, the sweet molecules in sugar, creates a lot of free radicals, which can mess up chemical process that occur in the body. This leads to more cell deaths and ultimately faster aging.
If that’s not enough to weaken your cravings, sugar also causes muscles to “rust” faster. As we age, our body tissue turns brown because of chemical reactions that occur naturally. Sugar seems to accelerate this process, leading to extra rusty muscles. Also, energy-making structures inside our liver have no choice but to take the excess sugar and form fat. This can damage the organ and lead to a number of diseases.
Worst of all, high amounts of sugar can turn a person into an addict. Over time, sugar loses its “feel good” effect, so a person needs to eat more and more in order to have their sweet tooth satisfied.
