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Just some related things I've been discussing on other diet boards I want to throw out there.
Insulin is a hormone. I think of it as a shuttling hormone. It moves glucose into the body's cells. Insulin resistance is a relative condition in my opinion. I don't believe it's an all or nothing thing. IR is when the body does not respond quite as efficiently as it should to the secretion of insulin so the pancreas pumps out more.
We are all a bit IR when we are sedentary and a bit more IS (insulin sensitive) when we have very recently engaged in vigorous, extended exercise. The liver and the skeletal muscles can only store so much glucose at at time, so if you've not recently exercised fairly long and hard, (and drained those stores) it's easy to eat too many carbs and get the excess stored into adipose tissue. (Read: your ass and hips)
Which is the basis of carb cycling. Basically, a higher percentage of your total daily calories can come from low GI carbs on workout days, but a higher percentage of your total calories must come from healthy fats on rest days.
So, yeah IR. Couple of symptoms of it are when you feel sleepy and/or foggy 30-45 minutes after eating a low fat low GI carb meal. Ideally that shouldn't happen. (Notice I bolded "low". A crap carb meal will make anyone sleepy. That's normal. Also a symptoms of a crappy diet, but I digress)
The Glycemic Index is a measure of how quickly a carb raises blood sugar, so a low GI carb should raise the blood sugar s-l-o-w-l-y, and trigger a long steady energy boost. If you get sleepy and/or dopey feeling 30 minutes after a low carb breakfast, you could be feeling the effects of IR.
What to do?
Avoid caffeine. It temporarily increases IR. Yeah I like my caffeine too. I dearly feel your pain.
Do not treat the sleepyness and/or foggyness with carby craptastic snacks or more caffeine. Only going to keep you on the blood sugar rollercoaster sister. Hey I'm awake! Hey I'm sleepy again.
Fat, eat it. Fiber, eat it.
Dietary fat slows gastric emptying. That can be a good thing. Fat is a critical nutrient. Cold pressed extra virgin olive oil is like liquid gold for the liver. Flax seed oil even better. Almonds, awesome. Fat can be very nutritious and can slow carb metabolization thereby avoiding insulin spikes and sugar crashes.
Fiber comes in two flavors, and they do very different things to your food. One speeds up digestion, and one slows it down. Did you know that?
Soluble fiber slows gastric emptying a whole lot. Look it up and I guarantee you'll see the word "gel" used to describe what it does to the meal in your stomach. Basically it mixes into your food, maybe a bit like a soft paste. It slows everything down. That would definitely slow the rate of blood sugar rise, and tend to provide a longer, slower insulin spike. Rolled oats fiber are about 50% soluble. Whole wheat bread about 1/3 soluble. Psyllium seed husk powder (Metamucil) is about 2/3 soluble fiber.
Insoluble fiber speeds everything up. It totally does not mix with anything else. It just scoots along like dry sand carrying all the food around it like passengers on the fast lane of your gut. Fibrous veggies are going to be essentially entirely insoluble fiber. I love fresh squash and fresh beets for the insoluble fiber. Long grain brown rice about 3/4 insoluble. Chia seeds are a supplemental powder fiber you can drink if you need to add a lot of insoluble fiber as it's insoluble fiber content is actually much higher than the far more common psyllium seed husk powder.
So soluble fiber with your low fat, low GI carb meals to help slow down the digestion and prevent blood sugar spikes and crash. Good for workout days when carb cycling.
And insoluble fiber on rest days to speed digestion up a bit when you're eating more fat and your digestion is bit more slow.
Every meal should have some fat in it to put the brakes carb conversion to blood sugar, except PWO drinks. If (and only if) you just did a 30 minute or longer session of vigorous exercise you can actually benefit from an insulin spike. If you have qualms about consuming simple carbs even after a workout you can get the same degree of insulin spike with half the simple carbs if you add 3 grams of leucine to your PWO drink.
Insulin is a hormone. I think of it as a shuttling hormone. It moves glucose into the body's cells. Insulin resistance is a relative condition in my opinion. I don't believe it's an all or nothing thing. IR is when the body does not respond quite as efficiently as it should to the secretion of insulin so the pancreas pumps out more.
We are all a bit IR when we are sedentary and a bit more IS (insulin sensitive) when we have very recently engaged in vigorous, extended exercise. The liver and the skeletal muscles can only store so much glucose at at time, so if you've not recently exercised fairly long and hard, (and drained those stores) it's easy to eat too many carbs and get the excess stored into adipose tissue. (Read: your ass and hips)
Which is the basis of carb cycling. Basically, a higher percentage of your total daily calories can come from low GI carbs on workout days, but a higher percentage of your total calories must come from healthy fats on rest days.
So, yeah IR. Couple of symptoms of it are when you feel sleepy and/or foggy 30-45 minutes after eating a low fat low GI carb meal. Ideally that shouldn't happen. (Notice I bolded "low". A crap carb meal will make anyone sleepy. That's normal. Also a symptoms of a crappy diet, but I digress)
The Glycemic Index is a measure of how quickly a carb raises blood sugar, so a low GI carb should raise the blood sugar s-l-o-w-l-y, and trigger a long steady energy boost. If you get sleepy and/or dopey feeling 30 minutes after a low carb breakfast, you could be feeling the effects of IR.
What to do?
Avoid caffeine. It temporarily increases IR. Yeah I like my caffeine too. I dearly feel your pain.
Do not treat the sleepyness and/or foggyness with carby craptastic snacks or more caffeine. Only going to keep you on the blood sugar rollercoaster sister. Hey I'm awake! Hey I'm sleepy again.
Fat, eat it. Fiber, eat it.
Dietary fat slows gastric emptying. That can be a good thing. Fat is a critical nutrient. Cold pressed extra virgin olive oil is like liquid gold for the liver. Flax seed oil even better. Almonds, awesome. Fat can be very nutritious and can slow carb metabolization thereby avoiding insulin spikes and sugar crashes.
Fiber comes in two flavors, and they do very different things to your food. One speeds up digestion, and one slows it down. Did you know that?
Soluble fiber slows gastric emptying a whole lot. Look it up and I guarantee you'll see the word "gel" used to describe what it does to the meal in your stomach. Basically it mixes into your food, maybe a bit like a soft paste. It slows everything down. That would definitely slow the rate of blood sugar rise, and tend to provide a longer, slower insulin spike. Rolled oats fiber are about 50% soluble. Whole wheat bread about 1/3 soluble. Psyllium seed husk powder (Metamucil) is about 2/3 soluble fiber.
Insoluble fiber speeds everything up. It totally does not mix with anything else. It just scoots along like dry sand carrying all the food around it like passengers on the fast lane of your gut. Fibrous veggies are going to be essentially entirely insoluble fiber. I love fresh squash and fresh beets for the insoluble fiber. Long grain brown rice about 3/4 insoluble. Chia seeds are a supplemental powder fiber you can drink if you need to add a lot of insoluble fiber as it's insoluble fiber content is actually much higher than the far more common psyllium seed husk powder.
So soluble fiber with your low fat, low GI carb meals to help slow down the digestion and prevent blood sugar spikes and crash. Good for workout days when carb cycling.
And insoluble fiber on rest days to speed digestion up a bit when you're eating more fat and your digestion is bit more slow.
Every meal should have some fat in it to put the brakes carb conversion to blood sugar, except PWO drinks. If (and only if) you just did a 30 minute or longer session of vigorous exercise you can actually benefit from an insulin spike. If you have qualms about consuming simple carbs even after a workout you can get the same degree of insulin spike with half the simple carbs if you add 3 grams of leucine to your PWO drink.
