Building the Best You

Breaking Free From Sugar Addiction with Mike Collins

• Jeanne Collins • Season 2 • Episode 102

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0:00 | 48:39

Sugar is everywhere—but what if it’s influencing far more than your waistline? 

In this eye-opening conversation, Jeanne Collins sits down with Mike Collins, founder of SugarAddiction.com and known online as the Sugar Free Man, to explore the powerful connection between sugar, emotional health, addiction, and long-term wellness. 

Mike shares his personal journey, the science behind sugar cravings, why traditional diet advice often fails, and how a structured sugar detox can help people reclaim their health, mental clarity, and emotional resilience. 

Whether you're curious about reducing sugar, overcoming cravings, or creating lasting lifestyle change, this episode offers practical insights and a fresh perspective on what true wellness really means.

Mike's Book Recommendations:

What Happened to You, The Myth of Normal, The Body Keeps the Score

More About Mike:

]Mike Collins believes sugar addiction is very real and not to be taken lightly. As a person in long-term recovery from substance use disorder for over forty years, he took a keen interest in what sugar was doing to him and his friends in early recovery. After much research and experimentation, he quit sugar with the help of amazing mentors. He then raised two children sugar-free from the womb to six years old, and as they grew, he rewrote the rules for sugar and kids in childhood. He takes his stewardship of SugarAddiction.com, SugarDetox.com, and QuitSugarSummit.com very seriously and aims to provide information and community for anyone wanting to curb or quit sugar.

Hundreds of thousands have read his book The Last Resort Sugar Detox, and tens of thousands have completed his online 30-Day Sugar Freedom Challenge.

https://sugardetox.com/ https://quitsugarsummit.com/

https://www.facebook.com/QuitSugarNow/ https://www.youtube.com/@SugarAddiction 
https://www.facebook.com/groups/sugardetox.sugaraddiction.supportgoup 
https://x.com/SugarDetox 
https://www.instagram.com/realsugarfreeman/ 
https://www.tiktok.com/@sugardetox 
https://www.pinterest.com/sugaraddictionsupport/ 
https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-mike-collins-57a5628a/


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Introducing Mike Collins

SPEAKER_01

Welcome to Building the Best You, a destination for you to reimagine what is possible in your life and then create it. Welcome to the show, everybody. I'm your host, Gene Collins, and today we're talking to another Collins. We're talking to Mike Collins, and we are going to talk about sugar. I've been telling people that this podcast was coming up, and I cannot tell you how many people were so interested in this subject. So Mike is an expert at helping people detox and remove sugar from their lives. And I personally love sugar. I know it's not great for me. I don't use it a lot, but I love even natural sugar. I really love it. So I am fascinated to learn all about how Mike became the expert in helping people detox. He's got a book, he's got a program. We'll talk all about it. So, Mike, welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_00

Thank you, Jeannie. I really appreciate it. I always like talking about it. I don't know why where this got to me, but uh years ago it became part of my life and it just keeps getting bigger.

SPEAKER_01

Well, especially now, I think people are learning more and more how much sugar is really not good for your health, especially in a country that has a lot of processed and not even good for you sugars if we are going to have good and bad sugars. So I think your expertise and your life's work is really super timely because everybody's really interested in this.

SPEAKER_00

The difficulty is that it's so enculturated that a lot of people know and they're not able to do. And one of my favorite sayings in the world is to know and not do is to still not know. And this is a problem, seriously, because of the enculturation, because you can give this to a baby and 90% of parents would thank you. It's become a problem. And the science has outstripped the cultural norms. In other words, like cigarettes, like drinking and driving. The science is very, very clear now about what we're going to talk about for the next few minutes, but the culture has not changed around it yet. And that takes time. And so that's kind of what we do and you know who we are.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, it takes a lot of time, especially because everyone's addicted to it. That's the reality. Sugar is addictive. So, all right, before we dig into what you do, and I definitely want to cover off on how people can accomplish it. Because, like you said, knowing that you should remove sugar from your life and actually being able to go through a process to do that in a healthy way, those are two different things. So, but before we get into that, I would love if you would share a little bit about your background, about how you became someone who doesn't have sugar

Growing Up With Sugar and the Path to Recovery

SPEAKER_01

in your own life.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, I have the podcast version, and uh it probably brings up more questions than it answers. But the short version is that probably started a generation back with my mother, my favorite sugar junkie. My grandmother, her mother died when she was only eight years old. And my grandfather and her had to, she was the last child and had to move in with uh the spinster, really not nice aunt, and he had to work. And so they owned the country store across the way, right across the street, and they made a deal. My grandfather made a deal with his cousin Jim that anytime my mother walked into that store, she could have all anything she wanted, the candy, just put it on his tab. And that was a wonderful thing to do for an eight-year-old who had just lost her mom. But she grew up and she died, and we grew up believing that sugar was love. And this is replete in the entire society, everything from birth to death, baking and celebrations, and now right after school, after the soccer game, you know, there's treats and sweets, and and and really, again, the science didn't denote that this was an issue. It was something that tasted good. You know, I raised a couple of sugar-free kids, and people would literally tell me that I was depriving them of a child. And that, you know, I didn't believe that. And if I could ever tell you about that experiment, you'd think I was lying to you or bragging that their brain development was so much different than an average child. But anyway, fast forward, I grow up covered up in sugar, everything you can imagine. That's how we bonded. You know, that was the if there was a theme in our child that it was what was the sugar thing going on, you know, I would help grow the grocery store and we'd pick it out and bake on Saturdays. It was, and then I had the candy when I got outside the house. But fast forward again, and and I run into beer at 14 or 15, right? So now here's the most important linchpin of the entire discussion is that I knew that beer changed how I felt. It changed my state. I was kind of shy, and I could go behind the high school and drink the beer and be able to talk to the girls, right, at the dance. And that party lasted until I was 28 years old. Basically, I got sober at 28 years old, right? So I gave up the uh the alcohol and the drugs and everything. But I wanted to get healthy. I I just wanted to get healthy. I found that sugar and caffeine were treating me like drugs. I couldn't live without it. I get irritable, I gain weight, you know, I'd have rhosacea and uh, you know, acne, and uh, I was just, it was just, and I had to have it. Like it literally, if I didn't, I couldn't work or do whatever. So I read a book called Sugar Blues back in the day, and uh they the guy, the author, was at a party one time and he was putting two lumps of sugar in his coffee, and and the voice from behind him says, I wouldn't have that in my house, let alone my body. And it was Gloria Swanson, the famous movie star, right? Well, he ends up marrying Gloria Swanson, and they promoted that all over television and books and signings and everything in the late 70s and early 80s. So again, another quick fast forward. I'm a regular guy. I raised the two kids sugar-free, but I had a regular business life. And I didn't, you know, obviously their childhood is a little different than the average childhood. And they said, Dad, you should write a book. You should write a book. So I did. I was semi-retired. I wrote a book in 2018. And in 2018, I started coaching people online and helping them. I had opened sugaraddiction.com in 2009, but I didn't get really any traction because people would take the information. They didn't have any assistance in doing it, right? And there were some people that had success, but it wasn't until I started coaching, and I knew that I always tell people I built my company backwards. What that means simply is that I knew I had to have a support system of meetings or support where they would support one another from my recovery background, right? And so when I was, you know, coaching persons, you know, an hour a week or whatever, I would have everybody meet on a Tuesday evening. And that meeting still exists six or eight years later on our platform where I, you know, help a lot more people now. But so then another fast forward to the pandemic, and all hell broke loose. I mean, it just you saw the newscast where all the sugars bought, all the flour's bought, all the cookies and ice cream and sodas, and you know, everything's gone in the grocery store because people were hoarding it and eating it and you know having problems. They were, you know, anxiety and worrying and whatever. And uh, we went from the one meeting a week to three to five meetings a day in like an 18 to 24 month period. And that's where we are today. We're approaching five or six meetings every day of the week on our platform, and all staffed by you know, trained coaches that we've trained. We also train sugar addiction and sugar detox coaches. We were approved by the National Board of Health and Wellness coaches, the first group to ever be uh first sugar group for sure, but definitely the first addiction group. Uh, and they they didn't know what to do with us, to be honest with you. So, but they, you know, they probably know my grandchildren's names, but they vetted us pretty heavily because that it made sense. The funniest story is that the woman who was vetting us was literally getting the seminar. She was trying to figure out her own issues. And I'll tell you, Jeannie, you're not alone. I would guess that at least 50% of the podcasts that I go on, the host says something very similar. I invited you on because. So, anyway, that's the short version. Like I said, it's a quick synopsis of how I oh, and then the sugar-free man came in in the pandemic and it kind of stuck. So that's what I am on social.

What a Sugar-Free Lifestyle Really Means

SPEAKER_01

Right. Yes, which is so cool. Okay, before I even dig in deeper, I have a question about the concept of sugar-free. Because there are lots of foods, fruits, for example, that do have sugar naturally. So when you are coaching someone to live a sugar-free life, how is that defined?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, no, great question. So here's the difficult part. A lot of what I've done over the years has really literally become a messaging problem, a messaging issue, trying to figure out what people really need, right? And I've settled on this idea that, well, actually, I've kind of gone beyond that now, is that this is an addiction recovery program. I'm the last house on the block, okay? Strangely enough, my clients are women between 40 and 80, okay. I I think women are smarter than men, but I also think they accept help more. And they've they've suffered and struggled with diet and weight their whole lives and helping others. So the answer to your question is you have to eliminate sweetness for a time. And I want I want to stress that part of it. There needs to be a reset where you go back to the factory settings, whatever your beliefs are, God, evolution, whatever, you have to go back to what you were born with, right? And most people were likely born as sugar babies, and that has nothing to do with sex. It's a sugar baby who, like a crack baby, they passed the placenta, they passed the barrier, and they they the mother was ingesting sugar, right? Definitely it started as early as two and three, but we created this need for sugar and sweetness, not for the taste on your tongue, but for a emotional lift, okay? And so we have to reset the uh the the taste buds, and so that includes fake sugars and high glycemic fruits and a lot of other stuff. You know, in 11 days, 10 or 11 days, the taste buds will readjust. And the normal stuff that you would eat tastes looky sweet, syrupy, like the it's like you know, macadamia nuts will taste like candy, you know, pepper, you know, carrots will be sweet, right? And so we get to a place where the brain says, if it gets the fake sugars and it gets the uh whatever, stevias and all that kind of monk fruits and whatever, the brain says, Where's the calories? The the gut says, Where's the calories? And here's something you're gonna hear me say a lot is that it keeps the cravings alive if you're continuously ingesting sweet. On my program, there is nothing to sweeten, okay? Nothing to sweeten. And it's like so you have to eliminate the sweet for a time. And I can break those numbers down in society that a third of people biochemically cannot ingest sugar without setting up cravings for more sugar, okay? That's just a fact. You have blue eyes, I have green eyes. It's just a fact, okay? You can't argue with it, right? It's like your friend who can't drink. You know they can't drink. Maybe they don't know they can't drink yet, but that's, you know. And then there's about a third of people that are what we call harmful users. And these track very well with the obesity numbers in the world, like a third overweight, a third obese, a third overweight. Now, caveat, you can be a very thin sugar addict, okay? That's not even an issue. But 72%, by their own admission, surveyed of obese people qualify as they tell them the the interviewer that they are a sugar addict, right? So the addressable market, how many people are struggling with this is very real. And you know, it's hard to like understand that we as an evolutionary species smacked into 300 years ago, where we got less fruit, less fructose, less sugar than we eat in a day, in a year, right? And now we're in a bucket, you know, we're in a problem that we have to turn this big giant battleship around. So yeah, sweetness, no place in it, at least for a time. My only job in life is to get someone to see 90 days of 100% abstinence. And 100% abstinence is much easier than 90%, okay? Just for that time period. Then you get to make the decision. The number is 90 days for the healing to happen, for the regeneration of new neural pathways. If that can happen, then you can, you know, you can move forward. You can make your own decisions, whether or not you're a sugar act.

SPEAKER_01

Well, and it makes a lot of sense. I've had people come on and I can't remember what the numbers are, but they were talking about how many of

The Emotional Connection Between Sugar and Reward

SPEAKER_01

your taste buds are, you know, regenerating all the time. And that if you learn, I can't remember how long this woman said, but I want to say she said like 14 days. If you stop eating a food for 14 days and then you start eating it again, the food will taste completely different to you. You know, if you she's a vegan and she was like, you know, if you just eat fruits and vegetables, you know, just stick to natural plant-based products for 14 days, and you will your taste buds will change and how you're tasting the foods that you used to eat will change. So I can see the science behind it. But what I also think is so interesting about what you talked about is the sugar is love connection because it's it is a hundred percent our mindset and our behavior. I played well. Yay, I get a cookie. I sold a big deal. Yay, I get a glass of wine. I worked out really well this week. Yay, I can have a cupcake on Friday night. Like it's a direct correlation to how we celebrate and reward ourselves. Birthdays, you have a cake. It's like every holiday, what are you having for dessert? Pies, all those things. And so not only do you have to change how your body responds to sugar, I think you also have to have a massive mindset shift and change your lifestyle as well.

SPEAKER_00

No, it's it's it's absolutely a lifestyle change. Moreover, that it it really is an emotional management change. We have literally, and this is where it gets the rubber meets the road kind of thing. We have literally outsourced our emotional life to substances because nobody's fault, nobody's fault, because of the ubiquitous nature of the product in the food system, in the cultural system. We have, you know, people, I mean, everybody knows about comfort food. Everybody knows about emotional eating. They've, you know, these terms have been bantered around incorrectly, by the way, I might add, but they've been bantered around for decades now, and people understand what it is. You know, the one for a phrase I hate the most is empty calories. Empty calories implies no harm, no foul, a little bit of energy, maybe, but it's not gonna hurt you, right? It's just an empty calorie. Maybe you'll get a little energy from it. Pick up at three o'clock or four o'clock at the office when you have a little candy bar or something. But it's just not true. The science is very clear now that these are toxic calories, these are neurotoxins, you know, brain neurotoxins, right? And giving them to a child should be criminal. It really should. Definitely, even I believe personally, eating sugar while you're pregnant should be illegal because it really does affect the baby. It does affect the brain, the brain development from conception to the first, they call it the first thousand days, is so incredible that you just can't ignore it. And they have giant nonprofits now about this, about the baby's nutrition. Even the American Pediatric Association finally comes out with you know, no sh added sugar for the first three years. But no one even knows that rule. Like no one pays any attention to it. They always got this hee hee ha ha that they have this ice, you know, hot fudge Sunday because I'm pregnant and with pickles, you know, or whatever. You know, it's like, and it's uh it's a joke, you know, and it's really sad because it really is it's dangerous, I believe, for it's dangerous for the

Sugar, Brain Health, and Metabolic Psychiatry

SPEAKER_00

and now they have science pro to prove that even if you how much you ate as a young person, the diseases that you carry or or get later in life. So it's a complicated intersection that we find ourselves at now in society because every single day now, a new study comes out about sugar, the damage that it causes mentally and physically. Now, here's an important distinction. For a hundred years, we have been studying sugar and what it does to the body. And we know about weight gain and diabetes, too, and fatty liver and heart disease, all of these things. And I call these guys, I've interviewed 400 of the world's leading experts, and I'm I may be jaded, but these folks have been studying a lot for many years, boots on the ground. And then on the other side of it, the most exciting part of my work and my life literally has been what's called the uh ascension or the advent of metabolic psychiatry. Metabolic psychiatry is how are these products affecting the brain, right? How are they affecting how we think, how we act, what our behavior is, right? And they've got lots of examples now of people getting off bipolar meds, curing depression, or putting depression in remission is the probably proper phrase. But it's intersecting with my work of addiction and addiction recovery that people do need to understand that this is much more than the $78 billion diet industry is saying eat less and exercise more. That has never worked. Everybody knows the statistics. 95% of all people who lose any amount of weight gain it all back in the first year, and then they had some. There's more, right? Well, that there's a new book that just came out that has effectively raised that to 0%. 99.9 something percent of people fail in the eat less and exercise more process. Okay. So no one is losing weight in that way. And then, you know, we can kind of go on to how by accident, by every mistake in the book over the last decade, we have discovered what really works in this process.

SPEAKER_01

So, all right, so I'm so curious. Let's say for someone who's listening, yeah, they're like, okay, this sounds super interesting. I know that there's no way I could just do a sugar detox myself. And so I would need some help. Can you give us some specifics about the process that you walk people through to help them and give a glimpse into what that process looks for people that either read your book or get involved in your programs? What does that process look like?

SPEAKER_00

The big mind shift, which doesn't happen till in the middle of the process or kind of halfway

The 90-Day Sugar Detox Process

SPEAKER_00

through the first month or whatever, or at the first month in that process, is that you start to realize that there's no, you don't have to worry about the food. You know, I could do a little coaching here, is that people that come to me will drag me around for months if I let them focus on the what they eat. They all want to know what do I eat? What do you eat? Well, how can I live without sugar? How can I live without flour? Alto ultra processed carbohydrates, what else would I eat, kind of thing. And if they if you do that, they'll they'll never get there. Okay, first of all. So the answer to your question is that they need a support system of people who have already done it. And the support system revolves around just what I said, support. It's like it is literally three to five Zoom meetings a day of support of people who have been through the process. Because what happens is about day 10 or 15, it feels like the world is caving in on you. The common refrain is, Mike, I'm losing my mind. And I'm like, I know you are. And that's, but they have to fight alternative soothing methods. And this is an important word, an important construct. Like I have a 30-day detox that literally goes through every single day for 30 days. If I've done a proper intake, if we've done a proper intake, I can tell you, you know, from your background and the information that you share with me where you're going to be at day 10, 20, 30, you know what I mean, and beyond, and how much emotional upset you're going to go through. And people are, you know, irritable and hungry and starving and sleepy and you know, they don't even like themselves. Like everybody's like they're just angry at the world, or they'll get grieving, you know, processes that were tamped down. Everybody knows this about emotional eating, but they're not really putting the two and two together, right? And so their emotions that, God forbid, it was sexual or physical trauma, or so, you know, a rough childhood or something, but just the everyday stresses and strains of life have been unconsciously soothed by sugar. And it wasn't like I need a beer on a Friday. I had a rough week and I'm gonna go numb out. It's just like it just, I I wouldn't a soda be nice. Uh, let me, I think I need a chocolate, right? That's how it, I mean, just as an example, so because of my openness about my drug and alcohol recovery, I've attracted over a thousand recovering people, people that sober five, 10, 15 years from drugs and alcohol. But to a man, to a woman, every single one of them said it was harder to get off sugar. Yeah. Because there weren't, they never put the two and two together. There wasn't like a thing that they they thought about, right? Because they didn't have to think about it. To get alcohol, you've got to buy alcohol. You've got to be in a bar, and and to get drugs, it's even worse. It's even more of a barrier. But sugar is so ubiquitous, so easy to even a child can score it. You just ingest it, and the little stresses, the little strains, the old trauma, it just is soothed for a time. But like any drug, 20 minutes later, you gotta reingest it. Right. And then you wake up 30 years later, 30 or 40 or 50 or more pounds overweight, and you know, fatty liver and a prediabetes diagnose, and you're like, this thing that served you as a child no longer serves you, right? And you have to re-unwind it. But you can't unwind it because you don't have practices, you don't have meditation or yoga or get a hug, call a friend, get a massage. Other practices, right? Now, some people seem to do well with the exercise component, right? I had a one of my coaches, an ultra marathoner running 100 miles a week, but she still carried 30 extra pounds during that time period, right? In her 50s, now that 30 pounds is gone, her times are way up because she, I mean, they literally feed you goo, they call it on the roof, like eat this goo, which is straight sugar. And then her rest of her life is a okay, I'm finally done. I can eat, you know, I can whatever. And the most ridiculous fallacy ever created in in sports is car bloating. And so they were carbloating. So anyway, it's uh it's not complex really after what I've done accidentally again is pattern recognition at scale. 61,000 people at one form or fashion have passed through this process, and I've been able to watch it all and you know, one-on-one with you know, six or seven hundred of them. So I've I've walked through what's gonna happen to them when they take it away. Right. Which everyone, you know, every diet on the book on the planet says don't you know quit the white stuff. That's just like the first rule of every diet, every diet, not just some, every diet book. And so, you know, this re-education process, this me going on all these podcasts is just that. It's just if if this is resonating with you as an audience listener, you know, just let the information light on you. You don't have to make a decision right this minute, but let it light on you as an alternative to eat less and exercise.

SPEAKER_01

Well, and I think what is so interesting about what you talk about is like this concept of does the information like rest and sit well with you? I think I know for myself personally, every time I have someone come on the show that's living what I'm gonna call a very clean life. And most of them are doctors, most of them are in the medical profession, most of them are aware of how bad things like alcohol and sugar are for your diet and and bad for your brain as well. And I will say it's sort of you listen to these people and you think, you know, somehow they're doing it. Like they're doing it, and they are healthier. And I think for a lot of people, if you really asked them if if there weren't any barriers, would you want to be healthier? And I think almost everyone would say, yes, they want to be healthier. It's just for a lot of people, that mountain feels just too big and they don't even know where to start. So it's why I love to have guests on like you that provides a path for them. Because a lot of this, I would think part of your program is also educational, because I think a lot of people have absolutely no idea how much sugar is hidden in the things that you buy at the grocery store.

SPEAKER_00

Oh, that's absolutely true. I mean, 84% of the food products in the grocery store have sugar in

Hidden Sugars and Why Most Diets Fail

SPEAKER_00

it. And and people don't get the flour connection either. You know, people say that uh, Mike, why do I have to quit flour? So, well, flour turns to sugar in your stomach. And while we could get off on a whole new tangent about the other half of the sugar molecule, which is fructose, and the alcohol, you know, if you were wearing, and we, you know, suggest this that wear a continuous glucose monitor, you would see the spikes that any kind of ultraprocessed carbohydrates cause. And really it's those spikes in the brain that are shrinking your brain, putting holes in your brain, grooving new neuropathways to, you know, try and get more dopamine. It's a very common, you know, understood scientific norm that eating ultraprocessed carbohydrates and sugar grooves new neuropathways. And down, the scientific term is down regulates your dopamine receptors, thins them out, you have less of them. And so again, you need more to achieve the same soothing, the same process, right? And that's a that's a huge problem. People don't really understand it, that you have to have another way to self-soothe. And the self-soothing education, look, I you know, I stopped long ago after this marketing problem of not, you know, telling people that addiction is a very difficult word, and it's a very difficult stigmatized word. And the government websites have all scrubbed the term, it no longer exists in government websites and major treatment centers. It's use disorder, substance use disorder. And uh likely in the DSM it will be ultra-processed food use disorder, up FUD. It's gonna be a different name than sugar addiction or carb addiction, whatever you want to call it. And it's likely at least one more round, it might get in this time in the next DSM, but it's gonna probably be another round before it because the science keeps compiling every day, and there's work groups working on that. But at the end of the day, if I can move people and even this podcast, towards the idea that this may be something that you used unconsciously to self-soothe, maybe your parents even were complicit in that, you know, you were busy, they were busy, you had they had other children and a job and stuff, and when you were upset, instead of getting down on your level and giving you a hug, they gave you a cookie, sent you to the TV, and and you our little brain registers this. I'm like, you know, wow, I I feel a little better. And then it keeps doing it and keeps doing it and keeps doing it. And again, you wake up 30 years later, and this thing that helped you back then, from whatever, if it was a terrible childhood, even a good childhood, you you start to realize that or you hopefully realize with you know our program and the introduction to thousands, literally thousands of people who thought as you thought that if they exercised enough and they restricted, you know, some I don't like the term, but uh calorie deficit. Calorie deficit, that's the word. You know, like if they did that, then they would succeed. And it does succeed for a time because the exercise itself substitutes for the soothing, right? That that is actually creating the soothing. And it so it will work for a little bit, but no one can, very few people, even as I mentioned, long distance runners, can make that they can't make it all of their soothing methods, right? And so if people can just let that information set for them for a minute, because most of them have read a little bit about, I mean, some of our best candidates are people who know a little bit about emotional eating and they've studied a little bit about it because they say, I am an emotional eater, you know, I eat when I'm upset or bored or whatever.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Um, but they don't put the rest of the puzzle together. They're not really understanding that it requires a healing. And I like that term of 90 days at least, so that your body can have zero carbohydrates, ultra-processed carbohydrates, and sugar. And when that happens, then there's so many changes in the body and the brain mostly. Here's an interesting statistic. So we have hundreds of people that have lost 100 pounds and hundreds of people that put type 2 and diabetes in remission and fatty liver in remission. But when we do surveys for testimonials and you know, just garnering information, they just blew us away and shocked us because the number one thing that they're really excited about is that their brain came back online. They focus better, they remember better, they sleep better, their anxiety is lessened, right? And this is the, like I said, the beautiful intersection now of metabolic psychiatry and addiction recovery, where addiction recovery is called behavioral change, right? That's the name of the industry, the name of the process. It's behavioral change. And so it's like this intersection is happening whether people know it or want to accept it or not. And I'm my job in life is to get them to slowly through exposure to people who used to think the way that they did, and then if that if that happens, then to buy into Mikey's little fantasy and try the uh abstinence for a time and see what happens. Like if it happens, then more power to them and to us for easing them through it, right? But honestly, the one of the most important metrics I watch on the platform is engagement, like a social media person, right? But it's on a closed office social media platform, and engagement is right now under 30%. That means of 10 people to sign up, only three really kind of get it or are willing to accept the change and move forward, but it's resulted in tens of thousands of testimonials and success stories. So it's the other, and here's another part. You ever been to a gym in January? Yes, right? Our thing is a lifetime access, right? So they come in and like whatever they do, they do. But then in January, they all come flooding back in, and all the meetings are full, and you know, we're running around like crazy. And so it's uh again, I always say it takes about the arc of a podcast to kind of get it all out and to put it all together. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I think it's fascinating. So you do have an event coming up in June, and this is going to come out in the beginning of June. Can you talk to us about that June event and what's unique about that versus your ongoing programs?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, no, that's super exciting. Thank you. So in June, we uh we have paired with the

The Quit Sugar Summit and Building Community Support

SPEAKER_00

American Diabetes Society, which is different gang than the American Diabetes Association, and they are we are helping them raise funds for the nonprofit, and we have literally, I mean, the combined social media presence of the speakers that we have exceeds 40 or 50 million people. Okay, it's a it's a star-studded lineup. I'm sure there'll be links or whatever, but you can go just go to the Quitsugar Summit for now and that'll put you on the list so that you can uh we'll send you emails when it opens up. It's June 26th, 7th, and 8th. And uh, you know, we've already interviewed 400 of the world's leading experts, but literally I think this is and our main summit is, and this is over a decade, our main summit is in January because of that phenomenon I just told you about. Yeah. And uh, but this thing is it just turned out this way because the board members at the American Diabetes Society are so excited about it. They've just literally opened their well, people that probably don't even know what this is, but their role of decks is to get all of the other influencers in and all the other educators. I mean, of the the lineup, I would say 80% of them are MDs or PhDs. Okay. So it's a really quality group of people who've done lots of research and they'll enjoy it.

SPEAKER_01

That's great. And is it in person, online, both?

SPEAKER_00

Oh, it's all online. Good, thank you. It's all online and it's all free. Okay. Wow. It's all free. Holy cow.

SPEAKER_01

All right.

SPEAKER_00

For three days, it's free. Now you can buy the package because it's like a full-time job because it's eight or ten hours of programming a day, but you know, it's free if you want. And then there'll be an encore, and that's free too.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Okay, that's great. We will put links to all of that in the show notes. That's fantastic. Thank you. All right, before we run out of time, is there anything that I didn't ask you that you think is super important? We will put links to you, your book, your website so people can go get more, how they can follow you. I think everyone's going to think this is a fascinating subject. I know I personally think it's fascinating. I'm going to buy your book. But is there anything that we didn't cover that you think is so important that we don't want to miss it?

SPEAKER_00

Well, I mean, you can find me anywhere on social media, Sugar Free Man, or just Mike Collins Sugar. It'll come up, everything will come up. And SugarDetox.com, sugaraddiction.com. And these things are, you know, obviously, I didn't start this yesterday because you're not going to be able to buy those domain names, you know what I mean? But the one thing I did want to emphasize, and we did we did talk a little bit about it, and I kind of skirted around a little bit, but one of the most important parts that people have to understand is this tie-in between that is completely absent or absent, you know, completely separate from eat less and exercise more, calories in, calories out, deficit. This is a brainwashing. And I want to make that very clear. This is a diet industry, $78 billion a year diet industry brainwashing that most everybody is under the assumption. But the real solution, if they find they struggle with sugar or ultra-processed carbohydrates, is more of an emotional. I'm not going to pull any punches because I don't have time anymore, to be honest. This is a codependency recovery program. This is a eat less, this is not an eat less or exercise more. This is a sticking up for yourself program, a saying no program, a setting boundaries program. This is a program where you have to change your behavior because the social 85% of our clients do not have their own spouse's support. This is a lonely process if you don't have a support system, a different support system. You don't have to leave your family of origin. You don't have to join a cult, but you have to have other people who believe as you do that possibly we have come to a place in scientific history that the understanding of something like cigarettes and drinking and driving has changed and and that this might be the difference in their lives, the the you know, the emotional component of why they ingest sugar. You know.

SPEAKER_01

Well, and I think you bring up such an important point. Anything when you're trying to do any sort of detox, having a support group of people that you can bounce challenges off of, especially because the beginning is really hard, and learn from and get ideas from and feel like you're not alone is so incredibly important. I can't imagine being the only one in a household trying to do this. That is really, really hard. It's really hard. But honestly, many people who go on the diet and exercise thing try to do it like that too. And that is also, I feel like you're just making it harder than you need to. But having access to a support group, I think is so important in addition to the education and the understanding of what to do. And I love that you suggest doing it for 90 days because it does take time to change and to go through a process like this, any sort of recovery. Everyone wants a quick fix now. And we live in a society of wanting a quick fix. But the reality is if you really truly want to be healthy and return to more of a natural state, there is not a quick fix. You have to go through the process because there is a mind-body connection component to it also, and recognizing this isn't just about stop eating sugar. There's a whole lot more going on that you talked about than than most people think at the onset.

SPEAKER_00

It's so true. Yeah. So true.

SPEAKER_01

Thank you. Okay, so I have two quick questions.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Second one will be about a book. But the first one is what does your daily life look like? How are you living a life like this? What does it look like? Just to give people a glimpse of what life looked like for you. You look super healthy, first of all, but what does your life look like?

SPEAKER_00

I'm a little older than most people think, first of all.

SPEAKER_01

I would think so. Yes. Congratulations on that.

SPEAKER_00

I'm going to be 70 this summer, so.

SPEAKER_01

You don't look 70.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, I'm still pretty active. I have a full-size trampoline in my backyard. I have a uh a smaller rebounder. This is one of my favorite. I walk about 12 miles a week. I go to the gym a couple times a week. I go to yoga a couple times a week. And my most favorite self-care is a sauna practice where I discovered this group of people. And so you go into a sauna for 15 minutes with a uh at a above 200 degrees, and you do, you know, kind of gratitude, deep breathing and stuff. Then for three minutes, you go into the cold plunge and you repeat this for three times in an hour, right? And you walk out of that thing like uh you're high as a kite, you know, and it's just baseline dopamine. So that's one of my favorite things. Uh, I eat really, really healthy. And uh, you know, um I got twin boys, and they're, you know, one of them has two kids, and I'm pretty close with both of them, you know, everybody, but they do live a little far away, so we have to be traveling. But yeah, yeah. I mean, that's the short version of my life, and I plan to live to be a hundred, so good for you.

SPEAKER_01

You're on the right path if that's the goal. So, congratulations. Thank you for sharing that because I think it's important for people to see. You can't just talk. It is a lifestyle, and uh, wellness is a lifestyle, and it isn't just one form of exercise every once in a while. It's a daily commitment to what are you going to do to take care of your health and your mind and your body and your spirit. Also, you mentioned breathing and meditating. All of those things are really important, and I find the healthiest people I meet.

SPEAKER_00

Oh, one of the things that that that little it's a group that they have uh yoga and everything is the breath work. And I wasn't a big breath work, but now I'm like addicted. I gotta go every week. It's like amazing. And I got an amazing teacher. She's just wow. He's really good.

SPEAKER_01

Breath work is life altering. Life altering. I did a an intensive breath work, 12-week breath work session, and life changing. I had no idea that I didn't know how to breathe. I had no idea.

SPEAKER_00

And oh, and I keep my mouth closed at night. So you want to look that up, be my guest. That's wild. There's been a lot of great changes there.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, there's a lot of research about that. So, oh, that's great. All right. Before we round, I'd love to ask every guest if there's a book.

Favorite Books and Inspirations Featuring What Happened to You?, The Myth of Normal, and The Body Keeps the Score

SPEAKER_01

Obviously, we're going to put all your stuff in the show notes. But if there's a book that you'd like to recommend that has impacted you personally or professionally that you think people should read.

SPEAKER_00

Okay, so this is it, this is a three-book triad that I think is very important and the order is important as well. Most of them stem from a book called The Body Keeps the Score. Okay, The Body Keeps the Score is a little textbooky and a little deep, but there's also 70,000 reviews. That's unheard of. It's like a minor cult, right? Yeah. But that said, that that that's not, you shouldn't start with that book. Unless you're really uh, you know, like uh into this stuff that I'm describing here. You should start with Oprah Winfrey's book with Dr. Bruce Perry, the audio version, because it's like an eight-hour Oprah show called What Happened to You. Okay. That should be your first book. Okay. And then you should go to Gabor Mate's The Myth of Normal. Okay. And if you put those two together and this podcast together, and then, you know, eventually, if you're really or a practitioner or a therapist or something, then read the body keeps the score. I mean, anyone can read it, but it is dense material. But those first two will ease you into it. The audio is really good. You can read it, but if the audio is good, and then the myth of normal. If you go through that arc, you this podcast will make a lot more sense. Great.

SPEAKER_01

Uh, love that. Thank you. All of them I've heard of. I have not, I think I've listened to the Oprah one, but I'm gonna go back and listen to that again. I'm gonna start off.

SPEAKER_00

You'd enjoy it. I do.

SPEAKER_01

I love to read the books that my guests recommend or reread them.

SPEAKER_00

The audio production is mind-boggling how they got it so clean, and uh it's just beautiful, really. It is the best audiobook I've ever, you know, produced audiobook I've ever ever listened to.

SPEAKER_01

I love that. All right, I'm that I'm adding that to my audible list because I do like to listen to books when I walk outside sometimes. If I'm not just absorbing nature, sometimes I try to activity stack and get the books in with the walk. So you gotta do what you gotta do. Mike, thank you so much. This has been really fascinating, and I love that you are living what you live. And I hadn't even thought about the emotional connection between the sugar and your brain at all. I was thinking more about how your body is craving that. I hadn't even thought about the emotional part and the soothing. So you've really opened my eyes to this. I'm super interested. I'm definitely gonna read up on it. I'm gonna grab your book and I thank you because I think a lot of the listeners will be really intrigued by this. I think it's really great. So thank you so much. And maybe I'll get super brave and I'll give your 90 days a try. I'm gonna put it out there. Maybe I will get really brave and give your 90 days a try, because that would be a real stretch, but something I think I might be kind of into. So thank you.

SPEAKER_00

I'd love to have you. That'd be great.

SPEAKER_01

Thank you so much, and we'll definitely stay in touch. Thank

Closing Thoughts on Health, Healing, and Lasting Change

SPEAKER_01

you for joining us for this week's episode of Building the Best You. If you are ready to take a deeper dive into transforming your life, check out my Empowerment Fundamentals course on my website, houseofgermar.com. Thank you, and I will see you next week with another inspiring guest.