Careful! Added sugar increases kidney stone risk!

This week, Jill talks about sugar and how it affects kidney stone formers.

Jeff Sarris
Welcome back to the Kidney Stone Diet podcast the show about reducing your kidney stone risk and living your best life. I’m your host and fellow student Jeff Sarris.

Jill Harris
Oh, we’re taping and I’m your kidney stone prevention nurse.

Jeff Sarris
So this week, I know last week, we didn’t do a listener voicemail, but we were going to do more of an FAQ sort of approach this week because we’re going to talk about sugar. And sugar is such a sort of Hot Topic across wellness and nutrition in general. Yeah, it’s important that we touch on a few things here regarding sugar, kidney stones, and overall well being.

Jill Harris
Sugar. Oh my gosh, it’s such a you know, I mean, everybody vilifies sugar, right. And everybody knows we should not be eating like teenagers eating Baby Ruth bars all day long. We over consume sugar, we over consume it. So I’m not a I’m not a fan of keto. Because I don’t think we should ever take away a whole food group. I just don’t believe in that. Okay, if you’d like you know, God bless and you can still prevent kidney stones with the keto diet. I get a lot of people talking to they come to me because they got kidney stones from keto, but I always push back keto didn’t give you stones the way you did, keto did though. So I have plenty of stone formers that have had consults with me and they’re on keto, as long as you fit into the kidney stone diet goals founder kidney stone diet.com. I don’t care what lifestyle you leave whatever you want, but sugar.

The one thing I do love about keto is it really did start making people turn it around Buster Brown and look at sugar on labels. And enough people did that, that food manufacturers really lowered the sugar in products, of course, they put more salts in there and sugar alternatives but whatever, people are eating less sugar. Okay, now so for kidney stone prevention, we want less added sugar. Okay, added sugar, think of molasses so so when you’re looking at a food label, you’re going to turn it around and you’re going to look at the label. If you’re in the States, it will say sugar and then below that it’s going to parse out added sugar. So from that total amount of sugar this much is added so if you have 10 grams of sugar and then it’s parsed out it says four grams of added sugar it means four grams of sugar added sugar are in the total sugar that’s what you read on the label. I don’t know about your. In other countries it can be different. They may not even have a parse down in the kidney stone diet we talked about added sugar because it can also increase urine calcium.

So we do not want you eating a lot of added sugar think junk food that’s added sugar and we’ll talk specifically about what equals added sugar what words to look for 25 grams of added sugar and the American Heart Association gives you the same you a USDA gives you the same goals as the kidney stone guide 25 grams of added sugar for women and 37.5 I just rounded up to 38 grams of added sugar for men added sugar. If you turn a label if you look at your nutritional label like I said it will be parsed out but if you if it isn’t parsed out for you look at your ingredient list. Does it say things like molasses coconut sugar, invert sugar turbinado sugar, raw sugar, agave nectar, evaporated cane juice Crystaline fructose maltose anything ending in ose you know Bobby Flay? That’s his name. I don’t know he’s always talking about oh, I love coconut sugar. Sugar is sugar don’t matter what kind coconut doesn’t matter. sugar is sugar. If that’s added sugar, Bobby Hill always say Bobby approved coconut sugar or whatever he said. It’s sugar. It’s sugar. It’s added sugar. So you’re going to know if something’s added by looking at the ingredient list. Here’s another Yeah. corn sweetener corn syrup, fruit juice concentrates.

These are all added sugars to your food. High fructose corn syrup. Malt sugar. Okay syrup of any kind dextrose fructose glucose lactose. Remember all the oats maltose sucrose, brown sugar don’t matter if it’s brown, white, purple and polka dot people sugar. Honey, Jo honey is natural. Now when they put it in something, it then becomes an added sugar is sugar. I don’t care if it comes from the bees if it’s sugar or wherever it comes from. I don’t know where it comes from the bees something. I don’t know. I live in a city I don’t know birds and bees and I don’t know any of that stuff. All I know is honey is added sugar. Added sugar. Okay, so, added sugar can also lower urine volume. We all know that with salt. It’ll make you pee less when you eat more salt, right people like oh my god, I’m so bloated, my dungarees don’t fit because they more salt. Same thing happens with sugar. You can sometimes if you eat more sugar, I know for me because I barely eat any sugar. So when I do, I feel really thirsty. I don’t know if anybody else feels that first you gotta get a perspective of eating less sugar, and then you’ll know but it can pull urine calcium out of your bone and put it into the into the urine and that can increase your stone risk. And my mentor Fred Coe. C-O-E and kidney stone.uchicago.edu. He has I have an article on there. And he has a few articles on sugar. I think one of his articles and you should link it Jeff, if you get a chance, sugar, our love affair and have a love affair. That’s a great article and he talks about the science behind it. And then I have an article on that website too called something was sugar in the cookie monster whatever you don’t have to link mine just link is because it’s a great article, sugar. The end of a love affair, Fred Coe.

And so we don’t first of all, we don’t want you eating too much sugar. Forget about kidney stones. We don’t want to throw obesity. We don’t want it for diabetes. The American Heart Association doesn’t want to for heart disease. These are very serious diseases as you all well know. So we we want to lower added sugar. That doesn’t mean that you can’t have ice cream. People say oh my god, I can never have this I can never guess you can. It just means you can’t have it all the time. So if you want I spend here, let me show you how I’m gonna get up and show you. So you think people are like, Oh, she must be a nun the way she eats. Let me show you. Let me show you added sugar.

I went in my fridge and I got a carton. Here’s my creamer. It’s called the oatmeal cookie from silk dairy free oat creamer. Okay, I start my day with four grams of added sugar every day. Why? Because I love it. I love it. It makes me happy. It brings me joy. I like my coffee with a little bit of sweetness. I don’t eat any sugar anywhere else in my day. This ain’t given up so pay attention to me kidney stone formers. This doesn’t mean if this makes you happy. You’ll see on the Facebook page. Oh my god, it hasn’t had a trigger the four grams, I get 25 I ain’t nowhere near 25 grams. Use your sugar allotment where it brings you the most joy. I do eat like none. So if somebody came and said to me, you’re going to have to give this up. I’ll be like, Well, too bad. So sad. That ain’t happening. Because I would feel deprived that morning coffee with this creamer. I get the I there’s four Lucy’s in there for curtains because it was on sale. I stocked up like a juvenile and to Oh, oatmeal once. It makes me happy. If I’m happy. I can be real compliant the rest of the day. So what I’m suggesting for you guys, yes, added sugar. We want to curtail it for all kinds of medical conditions. I want people to eat responsibly. My coffee tastes like candy. But that’s it for my diet. So four grams. But again, if I wanted to go have ice cream, I’d have some ice cream. I get right back on track. That’s how we do it. You all have allotments and sometimes you’re gonna go over 30 grams, 40 grams, 50 grams of sugar. Some days you’re going to do that. Nobody cares. It’s when you do that. Get mad at yourself and say screw it, I’m just gonna keep eating like that. Please don’t do that. Don’t abuse your body that way, just get right back on track.

Jill Harris
So people will say, well, we can’t have too much added sugar. What about regular sugar? What about naturally occurring sugar? Like, maybe you’re gonna go to the grocery store, you’re going to turn it around, you’re gonna look at some cranberry juice, or apple juice, or prune juice or all those juices. And you’re gonna say, oh, oh, zero, added sugar. But, you know, there’s a bunch of, I’m certainly not going to be adding, I’m not going to be drinking cranberry juice every day, or prune juice every day, or apple juice every day, when each eight ounce glass has over 30 grams of natural sugar, it’s still going to it’s still going to be a lot of sugar, it’s not added. But that doesn’t mean you now can have 15 glasses of juice, it might as well be soda. Okay, so let’s just say diabetics are not going to drink apple juice all day. So that’s an unhealthy either a piece of fruit, because it’s going to have fiber and stuff, of course, healthy. But just straight sugar from normal juice, just regular juice, even if it’s not added. Of course, you can have some but don’t think it’s a free thing. Don’t think that that’s not going to add a shitload of calories, and it’s also not going to be healthy for diabetics, it will increase your insulin, of course, your blood sugar. So you don’t want to be doing that either. Can you have four ounces of an apple juice? Of course you can. I’m just saying. Just because something doesn’t have added sugar. It’s all natural sugar. Does that mean you can have as much as you’d want of it? It’s not a free food. I hope that makes sense. Do you think that makes sense, Jeff?

Jeff Sarris
Yeah, it absolutely does. Yeah. Because I mean, we’re back like, just one of the key things is the portion that perfection idea. Yeah, well, in like the quantity. It’s almost like the quantity of the poison. How does it go?

Jill Harris
Makes the poison. Go? Yeah. Yeah.

Jeff Sarris
Just a little Finn walk through the through the frame. I don’t know if it’ll be on the video but he’s like, Alright, it’s time

Jill Harris
He’s bored. He’s like, Jesus, I can’t even have apple juice. Now. I wouldn’t get stuck with this one.

Jeff Sarris
Yeah, but I mean, that is that is important to, to note, as well. Because also like if we’re having an Apple versus drinking apple juice, it’s very different. Like Apple is concentrated sugar you’re consuming many more apples equivalent of many more apples without the fiber without the all the other things that go together with that enclosed food that nature created.

Jill Harris
Well, and listen to this. I mean, it’s real easy to chug down four glasses of apple juice and get like 500 600 700 calories. Nobody’s eaten 22 apples, and it still wouldn’t be all those calories. Okay, so I’m just saying, right? It makes a big difference juice to me, to me, personally. And because I have my bowel issues. I can’t tolerate all that sugar at once added or regular. It to me is the equivalent to soda juice is not healthy, folks. We all know that. But of course if you if you’re like I need some hot hot apple cider, because it’s fall right now while we’re recording this oh my god have some enjoy it, of course. But don’t think it’s a free food and you can have that don’t think it’s like, you know, it’s still affecting blood sugar is still affecting calories, obesity. So again, these things should be in normal portion sizes too, despite the fact or and also limited despite the fact that it’s not added sugar. So I think that that differentiation is really important, because I’ll have patients that say, Well, I’m doing the kidney stone diet, look at my added sugars like a baby doll, but I’m gaining all this weight. He’s drinking six glasses of juice. Nobody has room for an extra 678 100 calories in their diet. And that’s a crapload of sugar, whether it’s natural or added, it’s still a lot of sugar. Right? So we’ve got to we’ve got to just pay attention to that. You know, you want to limit your naturally occurring sugar too. So meaning just don’t drink all this juice and think it’s fine. Just because it’s not add. That’s the message here.

Jeff Sarris
Yeah, absolutely. So with that, I think we will wrap for this week. The phone number once again. If you have a question you’d like to have featured on a future episode is 773-789-8763. Or you can email a voice memo. Just record a voice memo on your phone. You can email that to podcast at kidneystonediet.com And, of course kidney stone. diet.com is where you can find everything Then the the meal plans, the the ebooks, there’s snack ebooks, there’s everything that you would need to actually follow the kidney stone diet and realize that you have so many more options than you might otherwise assume. When it comes to just the thought of what a diet in quotes means. So, definitely, if you haven’t been there yet, go to kidney stone diet.com. And you can sign up for the weekly, weekly email newsletter as well. Yes, Jill will keep you on track every week with a little nugget or story or whatever it is.

Jill Harris
recipes, I get a lot of free recipes in that newsletter, I just did it. And also, for people who need to gain weight. We just added a new recipe on the website, it’s free, and their kidney stone diet replacement bars, you’re gonna really like them because I have been ill lately, I’ve needed a higher calorie bar. So if you’re on and also even though I don’t like using bars as a meal replacement, but sometimes we just have to so this is a nice higher calorie bar, high protein. It’s a great bar that’s free at kidney stone diet.com The recipe section go there. It’s a wonderful one.

Jeff Sarris
Yeah, for sure. So yeah, thank you again, everyone for tuning in for liking, subscribing, and just just for being you. So thanks for being here. Yes, we will see you next time.

Jill Harris
Bye guys.