Why is it that we can drink sugary drinks all day long, but feel sick after eating too much sugar at once?

Question

Why is it that we can drink sugary drinks all day long, but feel sick after eating too much sugar at once?

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Answer 1

There are different kinds of sugar which your body processes differently. Plain old “sugar” is sucrose, which your body reacts to pretty quickly. If you overindulge, your body will dump a bunch of insulin into your bloodstream pretty quickly, which gives you a sort of “sugar crash”. Meanwhile, most sugary drinks these days have very roughly a mix of 50% glucose and 50% fructose. The glucose is processed about as quickly as sucrose, but the fructose is processed slower, leading to an overall slower reaction.