Over the course of the Challenge, you’ll also follow the Sugar Smart Express program to wean yourself off sugar and artificial sweeteners in only 21 days.

That’s what these four women did, and not only did they live to tell about it, they will happily talk, over a delicious low-sugar lunch of feta-mushroom crab cakes, tuna tacos, and vanilla pudding, about how much smoother it went than they’d imagined.

We get it: You think it would be easier to give up sex for 6 months than sweets. Heck, giving up cigarettes might be easier. The truth is, no matter how many health problems researchers link to sugar—chronic inflammation! heart disease! diabetes!—most of us truly are addicted and overeating the sweet stuff.

“My taste buds have completely changed. Foods that I had craved didn’t live up to the expectations when I had them again.”—Joelle Junior, 45, lost 5 pounds

It’s not our fault. An inborn attraction to sweets is part of our biological hardware. It doesn’t help that sugar is in nearly every packaged and prepared food, including stuff never meant to be sweet. Completely give up sugar and chemical sweeteners, and most of us will crawl back to the cookie jar within days.

You can eat dessert on the Challenge, like this orange-spice-vanilla pudding that’s big on taste but low in sugar.

But going cold turkey or going it alone doesn’t beat this addiction. This year’s Challenge will give you freedom from sugar, thanks to the only things that work: good food, a proven program, and the help of others.

“We were basically the guinea pigs,” says Michelle Davies, whose petite frame expanded quickly when she moved back to the United States after spending 8 years in Prague. Suddenly, foods like Oreos and Frosted Mini Wheats were readily available again—and her weight was on a steady upswing. “I could feel my belly hanging over my pants, and I was exhausted by the afternoon,” she recalls. “I knew I needed to get serious about losing weight.”

“I knew I needed to get serious about losing weight, but I didn’t think I ate that much sugar. I was shocked when I realized that just about everything I was eating—PB&J sandwiches, granola bars, iced coffee—was full of it.”—Michelle Davies, 45, lost 11 pounds

For 21 days, Davies joined a group of women to do the Sugar Smart Express plan, which guides how you’ll eat during the Challenge. They temporarily gave up all sources of added sugar and starchy carbs—no breakfast cereal, no bread, no pasta, and no artificial sweeteners. Once their bodies and taste buds adjusted to low-sugar eating, the women slowly added reasonable amounts of starch and sugar back into their diets. And they did it all together and lost weight.

Learn to cook easy meals like these feta-mushroom crab cakes over buckwheat, which fill you up with flavor, not calories.

“I was addicted,” says Linda Kempf, 47, a busy working mom who dreaded her first time eating out—restaurants are where nutrition labels go to die. She decided to share the menu with the online community, asking, “What should I order?” Advice and go, girl!s poured in, and Kempf went on to enjoy every bite of her quinoa burger, minus the bun and the guilt.

“It seemed intimidating in the beginning; the recipes sort of scared me. But the few extra minutes I spend in the kitchen are totally worth it. Home cooking tastes so much better than anything out of a box or packet.”—Linda Kempf, 47, lost 15 pounds (eventually 45)

Ready? Starting May 1, Here’s How You’ll Ditch Sugar
REDUCE, THEN RECLAIM.
You’ll start your escape from Sugar-ville by learning to read labels for added sugar and chemical sweeteners, and then swap out foods for healthier alternatives (say, changing your cereal brand to one that’s whole grain with less sugar or swapping your honey mustard for vinaigrette). After a bit, when your taste buds have adapted to detect natural sweetness again, you’ll learn the right way to reintroduce sugar.

CRUSH CRAVINGS.
Protein slows digestion, is more filling than carbs or fat, and makes it difficult for sugar cravings to take hold later on. So by getting more protein in the AM, you can look at that ice cream later and say no.

NEVER SKIP A MEAL.

If you’re hoping to flatten your belly, the starvation response is the last thing you need. Skipping meals fires up sugar cravings, lowers blood sugar levels, and can cause you to overeat to make up for missed calories. You’ll find out how many hours you should go between meals.

TRICK YOUR BRAIN.
You’ll discover that when you crave sugar, you can do something pleasurable instead to curb the craving—like watch junky TV, do a little yoga, or peruse a pretty catalog.

FLAVOR-BOMB YOUR TASTE BUDS.

As delightful as it is, sugar tastes basically the same, with variations on yum, that’s sweet and yikes, that’s sweet! But flavor? That’s a different thing. If you’ve ever dropped fresh rosemary into a bottle of extra virgin olive oil, you know how much flavor fresh herbs and spices can add to everyday fare.

“My headaches are gone, I feel 10 years younger—and I can fit my butt into skinny jeans. Nothing tastes better than that.”—Alison Ackerman, 44, lost 10 pounds (eventually 35)

FEEL BEFORE YOU EAT.
Get a split second of clarity as you close in on your coworker’s candy dish and ask yourself, Why am I reaching for this? If the answer is anything other than I’m starving, you’ll find another way to give yourself what you need and eat less.

By the end of the program, Kempf had lost 15 pounds. Everything became smaller: her face, her belly, her thighs. What really surprised her was how little she missed the white stuff.

Her Sugar Smart friends have transformed, too. “People keep asking me what I’m doing,” says Alison Acker-man, a nurse and mom of four who’s dropped 35 pounds total. “Now I can honestly say, ‘Nothing.’ It’s become a lifestyle I can happily live with.”

Go to prevention.com/21daychallenge to join them in saying the sweetest words ever spoken, overheard from Davies: “I stopped wanting it.”