Q: I have a really sweet tooth and find myself craving candy bars and other sugary foods. I know I should be snacking on carrot sticks and celery, but sometimes I just go to town on whatever sweets we happen to have in the house. What should I do?

A: There's nothing wrong with having a sweet tooth. In fact, it's one of the reasons we're still around - nature makes the food that's good for us taste good. Lots of bitter leaves are poisonous, and so we're repelled by the taste.
The problem with the sweet tooth is the modern economy, which creates ever more dastardly concoctions designed to appeal to our natural love of sweets.

Let's face it - carrot sticks and celery simply can't compete with M&Ms and Kit Kats. To expect yourself to prefer the raw veggies is setting yourself up for guilt and disappointment.

So instead of trying to fight your sweet tooth, honor it! The key phrase in your question is, "whatever sweet things we happen to have in the house."

Not to be too blunt, but you don't "happen to have" anything in your house. You have things in your house because you bring them to your house. The M&Ms and Kit Kats don't have legs. They are in your house because you invite them, because you buy them, and because you put them in your cupboards and drawers.

Here's my advice: get rid of the candy. If you don't have it around, you won't eat it.

But keep the habit of feeding your sweet tooth. I eat sweets all the time. Currently I go through half a seedless watermelon a day. I grabbed a banana on my way to the post office, and I had a smoothie with frozen fruit, rice milk, and 3 pitted dates for breakfast.

Heck, while I'm confessing, I even make my salads sweet: half a cup of Craisins or raisins, and an awesome blueberry dressing:

1 cup frozen blueberries
1 T. vinegar (fancy fruit flavored if you like, I can't tell the difference between that and the gallon jugs of white vinegar that cost a buck and a half)
1 T. lemon juice (fresh or bottled)
2 pitted medjool dates

Sometimes my greens look like capsized rafts floating in a purple sea, I pour it on so thick!

There are a number of "health bars" that actually are healthy (most are just expensive candy bars). Try Lara Bars or Think! Organic Bars - raw fruit and nuts only, and easy to keep and carry.

And I do eat baby carrots with pleasure now - because my taste in "sweet" has modulated. Now a ripe plum is about as sweet as I can handle. A candy bar or piece of chocolate cake is now unpleasurable for me. It's not longer about willpower, it's about desire. But that's not a quick road. In the meantime, focus on giving your sweet tooth what it wants without compromising your health.