As I sit here writing this, I'm munching on a pink Himalayan–salted dark chocolate caramel bar. I don't even like dark chocolate, but this particular offering is gooey, salty, and sweet, and, well, it was there—taunting me and begging me to eat it. This sort of mindless snacking on sweets is what can easily serve as a gateway to sugar-related health issues and weight gain: A whopping one out of every eight Americans is diagnosed with diabetes.﻿﻿ We get it; trust us. Many of us were born with a giant, throbbing sweet tooth that can only be pacified with candy, cookies, etc., but it's time to extract that tooth and curb sugar cravings for good.

To find out how to stop yearning for the sweet stuff, we spoke with nutritionists Elissa Goodman and Dana James, who gave us their most foolproof tips. James says the first step to stopping sugar cravings is understanding what's triggering them.﻿﻿ It could be anything from physical pain to not getting enough sleep. "Think about how often you want comfort food when you don’t feel well," she says. "Sugar disguises pain momentarily; however, it’s an illusion. It’s simply a distraction."

Meet the Expert Elissa Goodman is a certified holistic nutritionist who works with a number of celebrity clients with a focus on clean eating.

Dana James is a triple-certified nutritionist and founder of Food Coach NYC based in New York City and Los Angeles

Read on for these nutritionists' best tricks for beating those sugar cravings once and for all.