Uneasy Sweetness

When Sweetness Was Still Innocent

On Wednesday evenings, as a teenager, I used to eat pizza, pancakes, and popcorn as a weekly ritual with my best friend.
Two teenagers on the floor, watching a movie.
No sense of excess. No guilt.

Later, the sweetness of that joy in time began to shift.
Not because sugar changed, but because comparison arrived.
Old photos next to new ones. Images of beautiful women online, as Instagram grew.

What once passed through unnoticed began to stay longer.

Sweetness gained meaning.
And that meaning became weight.

When Measure Was Lost to Comparison

Today, the cultural response feels decisive.
Zero-sugar shelves. Artificial sweetness framed as control.
Bananas questioned, while diet sodas signal self-control.

In many spaces, especially where bodies already carry more, sweetness is no longer adjusted.
It is removed.

Still, the tension remains.

There is something real in sweetness.
A lift the body recognises. A moment where the world feels lighter.
Dopamine rises. The effect is generous, and brief.

But what rises, returns.
Sugar doesn’t vanish. When there is more than can be used, the body stores it.
Repeated often, that pattern asks something of the system.

What follows is more than guilt alone.
It is information. A signal that the exchange no longer feels even.

The trouble begins when listening is replaced by control.
When understanding gives way to rules.

Erasing sugar entirely often creates its own strain.
The system tightens. Stress hormones rise. The mind narrows.
What began as discipline turns into effort. The body rarely responds well to absolutes.

Choosing Sweetness Without Losing Ourselves

A lived relationship with sweetness looks different across lives.
For some, it belongs to weekends. For others, to small daily moments.
Bodies differ. Lives differ.

What matters is not strict control, but proportion.
Sweetness can belong to life.
When agency, instead of excessive control, returns, clarity in mind follows.
The body carries less.

I don’t think sweetness was ever the issue.
Losing measure was.

Because health is not found in removing what tastes good,
but in recognising when sweetness still serves joy in time lived.

Years later, I still enjoy popcorn.
This time, with agency.