Did you know…
Repeated and continued blood sugar spikes and crashes can have many detrimental impacts on your health and weight.
- Pre-diabetes (Insulin Resistance)
- Diabetes
- Harder and slower fat burning
- Weight gain, particularly around mid section
- Excessive hunger
- Cravings – particularly for high carbohydrate foods
- Low energy swings
- Fatty liver
- Slowed metabolism
- Just to name a few
—
This 4 part series will give you the WHAT, WHY and HOW of blood sugar management.
—
When I talk about managing your Blood Sugar Levels (BSL), what I really mean is avoiding repeated blood sugar spikes and crashes over your day. What you want instead is a moderate rise and fall. By choosing foods that keep you full you are inadvertently managing your BSL.
—
There are many factors in blood sugar management, however I believe one of the most important things we can do is manage the amount of carbohydrates we consume over the day.
When you eat a food containing carbohydrates, that food is broken down into glucose. The glucose enters your bloodstream and your blood sugar rises.
- A small serve of carbohydrate = a small blood sugar rise
- A large serving of carbohydrate = a large blood sugar rise
- Caveat – Consuming a carbohydrate with fibre can slow down this spike. Eg. Apple = slow blood sugar rise. Apple juice (fibre removed) = fast blood sugar rise
Example
- You eat 2 pieces of white bread with honey. (Large intake of carbohydrates with very little fibre)
- Your blood sugar spikes
- The body releases insulin from your pancreas, in order to get the glucose from the bloodstream into the cells.
- Your blood sugar falls
- This results in you being hungry soon after eating
- More carbohydrate consumed = more insulin released
Compared to
- You eat 2 pieces of grainy bread (more fibre) with tuna and salad (protein and fibre)
- Your blood sugar has a moderate high – meaning you stay fuller for longer
- The body releases a moderate amount of insulin
- Your blood sugar has a moderate fall
- You stay fuller for longer
–
As you can see, this does NOT mean you need to avoid carbohydrates altogether, rather to consume smaller portions of them paired with protein and fibre from vegetables / salad.
–
A rise in our blood sugar feels nice. We all know that feeling when we are eating a chocolate or packet of chips. We feel all warm and fuzzy. BUT, once the insulin is released and the blood sugar comes crashing back down….. Well, that crash is not a very nice feeling at all. We get hungry and low in energy and some of us may even experience a shaky feeling.
It is at this point that we start to crave another HIT or another HIGH.
What do we crave?
You guessed it, we crave more foods that will give us that blood sugar high all over again.
This is known as riding the blood sugar roller-coaster.
When we choose foods that control and manage our blood sugar levels, we also in turn manage our
- Hunger
- Cravings
- Energy levels
- Mood
Please view video below for a full explanation
————–
——————
–
Please don’t think that because you are not diabetic, this is a topic that doesn’t concern you.
Failure to manage your BSL over an extended period of time (decades in some cases) may result in the health and weight problems listed at top of article.
Prevention is always better than cure.
–
Continued and repeated blood sugar spikes and crashes may result in you becoming more Insulin Resistant (hence less Insulin Sensitive)
More on that in Part 2 of this series – Part 2 = Insulin resistance and your weight
—
- Part 3 = Simple tips to naturally manage your blood sugar levels
- Part 4 = How Rosie lost weight by balancing her blood sugar levels and hormones