Does eating too many sweets cause diabetes?
Don't be worried. Sugary treats don’t boost the risk of developing Type 1. So if your child has just been diagnosed, rest assured that it wasn’t because you let them gobble down too many goodies. But this doesn’t mean that sugar gets the thumbs-up. Eating too many sweets can make you fat and obesity is linked to Type 2 diabetes, a similar condition that often strikes later in life. Life can be sweet, but you can also have too much of a good thing. Teach your children to strike the right balance.
Eating sweets will not influence your risk of getting Type 1 diabetes in adolescence or childhood. If you are the parent of a young child, remember to tell this to your child’s friends as younger children in particular often wonder whether sweet-eating will give them diabetes too.
Parents can fall into the trap of thinking: “If we only had done this or that differently, perhaps our child wouldn’t have diabetes". But they shouldn’t blame themselves like this. Generally speaking, there is nothing a parent could have done differently to prevent his or her child from developing Type 1 diabetes.
Type 2 diabetes is rather different however. While sweets do not in themselves cause Type 2 diabetes, excess calories of any kind (sweets, cake, potatoes, sugary drinks), or just insufficient physical exercise coupled with eating too much, is clearly related to obesity. And if you have a genetic susceptibility to Type 2 diabetes, obesity will greatly increase your likelihood of developing it.
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