Dr. Greger explains the cause of insulin resistance, p 17 and explains how to reverse heart failure pg 17

Matt Gruber said:
Turns out it is HIGH insulin that damages blood vessels and leads to blindness, etc. Diabetes T2 is when you are insulin resistant and your pancreas works fine and produces more insulin to compensate. People assume it is the high glucose that does the damage, but NO, it is the high insulin.
Click to expand...

Insulin is produced to help metabolize and shuttle around glucose and if you have insulin resistance, you will have an excess of both in the blood stream and the insulin will *eventually* be utilized at a very slow rate and then drive blood sugar too low.
In type 2 diabetics like me, this produces the rollercoaster effect of highs and lows in energy.
Eating mostly fat and protein, i don't ride this rollercoaster anymore. I don't get tired after eating. I only get tired if i haven't eaten for 11 hours, which imagine is pretty normal. Hell, sometimes i just eat huge one meal in the middle of the day and don't notice any difference vs eating 2 or 3.

Only in type 1 diabetes are these mechanics different.

Insulin resistance and diabetes caused by diet do go hand in hand..

Matt Gruber said:
My glucose, 116, and TRYG 168, are both still elevated, BUT it is not until glucose gets to 126 that Drs call it T1D.
Click to expand...

Not too bad numbers i guess.. mine are all ultra low. The only thing that's elevated beyond the normal range is creatinine. My blood sugar hangs out from 75-85 all day. But creatinine is elevated and normally that'd indicate a kidney problem, until you understand the context - i eat a shit ton of red meat and creatinine is produced as a result of consuming creatine in meat ( i like my red meat as rare as i can get it, so that the creatine, B12, etc are not destroyed by heat )

High trigs is actually a byroduct of carbohydrate metabolism. It's something we don't see in fat eaters like me. It might be because your body is turning carbohydrates into fat since your diet does not include much and we do require some fat.

I don't know enough about super low fat diets to be sure of that last statement --^
 
Matt Gruber said:
Researchers tried to reverse insulin resistance with exercise and this did NOT work. UNLESS they were losing weight.
If they maintained a steady weight, no luck. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5569266/
This gives strong evidence that my problem of feeling crappy while trying to gain weight is common. The IR came back, not my immune system killing more beta cells. This is a relief, but not really good news.
Also explains why keto guys sometimes reverse IR. As long as they are losing weight, and get exercise, i see how this works. Once they get down to a steady weight, all bets are off for both of us.
Researchers did not look at diet, but, it may not matter if both 7% fat and very high fat get the same results.
Still don't like the heart disease that high fat can give, but, i bet as long as they are losing weight, maybe they can get away with it. Once they get down to an ideal weight, maybe a normal balanced diet should replace the keto, as the keto job is completed (if a 7% fat diet is too difficult or not appealing). I like the 7% fat diet but i'm willing to go up to 15% for a test to gain weight just to see if the IR comes back again.
Click to expand...
set a record on my bike today, 99% oxygen according to my pulse oximeter at the end of my ride. i don't what that means, but i felt really good, and i'm back to a longer ride, so this confirms when i tried to gain weight, my insulin resistance came back :roll: so now what? i keep losing weight until i disappear :?: raised to 10-15% fat, hard to find any good fats here. using that last jar of peanut butter, and a little more ground flax. maybe i won't disappear :?:
Read there is a cycle where the most insulin is made in the morning, and it trails off late in the day. So i can eat more in the am, than in the pm. I'm the most hungry in the morning, so i can take advantage 8)
Also while the body does need some fat, all the meals i eat contain fat, so there is no need to add fat, as would someone just drinking sports drinks, etc. 8) And insulin requirements go down 70% right after exercise :shock: and can be less for 6-12 hrs, even a little bit less for 18-24 hrs. This is why i feel so good riding my bike, as i'm riding my breakfast kicks in and works fantastic.
.
So i was wrong :oops: that a 7% fat diet is needed to reverse insulin resistance :oops: that is to reverse heart disease. with IR the body uses FIFO accounting. First In, First Out. Anytime there is a calorie excess, the body takes fat and stores it, with IR it stores it in wrong places that increase the need for insulin. BUT when you don't eat enough, it grabs this fat FIRST and uses it for energy. So you can eat anything you like, the result is the same; when excess calories are stored in the wrong places, more insulin is needed to get glucose where it is needed. From what i've read, the longer this has been going on, the more difficult it is to stop the errors. So in my case, decades, well, it may not stay reversed. BUT now i know what to do, and everything becomes easy, once you learn how 8)
 
99% oxygen is good.

I'm repeating myself here but if you have insulin resistance like me, then you should be aware of what macronutrients do in the body..

Fat - needs almost zero insulin required to process - ideal metabolism happens under a ketogenic state of metabolism, IE you've eliminated or reduced carbs to 50g/day or under.
Protein - requires a very small amount of insulin to metabolize and can raise blood sugar a tad. Metabolizes well in any mode.
Carbohydrates - complex, IE whole wheat, fibrous veggies, etc - these require medium amounts of insulin and raise blood sugar at a slower rate than simple carbs.
Carbohydrates - simple, ie sugar, starchy veggies, fruit, etc - these raise blood sugar the most dramatically and quickly and require the most insulin to process. Best metabolized on a ultra low fat diet that includes shit tons of physical activity.

I avoid simple carbohydrates like the plague because i have insane insulin resistance. It got slightly better but is still a notable problem.

I have never seen any scientific proof that insulin resistance can be reduced long term - only short term. A glucose tolerance test which maps out the intensity and length of blood sugar raising and lowering is required to diagnose.

Or you can be like me and avoid increasing insulin beyond the basal rate. If i ate a standard american diet, or worse ( for me ), a high carb, low fat diet, i'd absolutely have to be taking insulin, metformin, and god knows what else.

PS - insulin is also a fat storage hormone, which is why type 1 diabetics can't keep weight on, but type 2 diabetics gain weight very rapidly and have an impossible time dieting when consuming mostly carbohydrates.
 
neptronix said:
Here's an interesting story about someone who is a type 1 diabetic that did both the low carb and high carb approach. I find it really interesting that both approaches worked.

https://diabetesstrong.com/my-high-carb-low-fat-experiment-with-type-1-diabetes/
Click to expand...

good story. thanks for posting it. There are some misleading terms as she points out. Why do cyrus/robbie call it plant BASED, if they really mean plant ONLY. To me plant based means the veggies take the center of the plate, and any meat is really small. (i use 1 oz of chicken in brown gravy, for example) I'm plant based, but not plant only.
.
On wiki i was surprised to see that while T2D is said to be a fasting BG 126+
BUT T1D is 175+ and i'm closer to T1 (weak insulin) BG 116 not anywhere near 175 8)
Anyway, this is an interesting hobby, since it is so easy to try out different ideas. 8)
 
The term 'plant based' is indeed misused all over the place. It bugs the hell out of me.
Technically our government has been pushing, and subsidizing a 'plant based diet' for decades now.

FGPLargeGIF.gif


I'd call it an industrially processed endosperm based diet. :lol:

Matt Gruber said:
BUT T1D is 175+ and i'm closer to T1 (weak insulin) BG 116 not anywhere near 175 8)
Anyway, this is an interesting hobby, since it is so easy to try out different ideas. 8)
Click to expand...

Type 1 vs type 2 has to do with the mechanics of insulin... silly that wikipedia would even say that..
..but yeah, T1D's are not so great at storing fat since they have low insulin. So a T2D tends to gain weight as a means of mitigating the damage from high blood sugar, a T1D tends to shrivel away and accumulate massive damage from perpetually high blood sugars..

High circulating fats is a big problem too, and you tend to see that in people who cannot switch from ketosis to gylcolysis easily anymore, so blood sugar can be high and so can blood fat/cholesterol/etc. Super deadly!!

This food pyramid, plus more fat than recommended, is how most Americans eat. It is the deadliest diet i can imagine.
 
In my "day job" research on T2D, we wanted to test some theories using an animal model. We went with a particular type of mini-pig that can get type 2 with the right diet. The pigs needed to have type 2 first before we could try the treatment. Just sugar or fat alone didn't do it but researchers had found there was an optimum ratio of fat to sugar that maximized the potential for type 2. The pigs were fed a mixture of lard and sugar that was added to the normal pig chow. It was real tasty and the piggies gobbled it up and sure enough they got type 2 within a few months (and they got very obese also).

Diet studies tend to be over simplified and what's really going on is very complex. The microbiota in the gut are a critical factor and explain why some diets work for some people and don't work at all for other people. The gut biota is also very difficult to analyze so we are just beginning to understand the part it plays. The biota also has a large effect on the immune system and endocrine system.

Einstein said "simplify things as much as possible, but not more than that".
 
fechter said:
Just sugar or fat alone didn't do it but researchers had found there was an optimum ratio of fat to sugar that maximized the potential for type 2. The pigs were fed a mixture of lard and sugar that was added to the normal pig chow. It was real tasty and the piggies gobbled it up and sure enough they got type 2 within a few months (and they got very obese also).
Click to expand...

That's super interesting. Every study i've seen in mice that shows that a '"high fat diet" has ruinous effects on health had a macronutrient balance like that - something like half sugar or simple carb, half fat.

And this translates into a lot of scary articles about fat being bad, completely omitting the carbohydrate part of the equation.

This emulates fairly closely how Americans actually eat in practice. AKA 'western pattern diet'.. It's why a hamburger and fries is bad, but a stack of hamburger patties with cheese is not ( which is my ideal weight loss fuel! )

fechter said:
The microbiota in the gut are a critical factor and explain why some diets work for some people and don't work at all for other people.
Click to expand...

In herbivores, we know that they tend to have a large cecum that harbors a lot of bacteria that convert fiber and some other carbohydrates into short chain fatty acids. So they are eating something like grass or leaves and turning it into fat.

We have tiny cecums that are almost useless. I imagine that antibiotics and other things can destroy the colonies that hang out inside, but clearly we are not great at dealing with things like cellulose etc even in ideal situations. Our digestive system looks very similar to that of a classically carnivorous animal!
 
Hi Fechter,
Fat AND sugar? that was one of my top 5 mistakes :roll:
BUT, i stopped eating ice cream last year. am i too late :?:
 
So how can i get away eating 70-75% carbs that others can't?
My eating time is 14 hours and i eat 7 meals, only 150-300 calories at a time. This is often a full plate of food that i find delicious. Enough food, often near 1 pound, that i don't have room for more, unless i were to eat fat, which i mostly don't like, and fat clogs everything up. Could eat meat, but i was only eating it because i thought it was needed for protein, but that is just marketing hype. And meat does not often re-heat or freeze well, except for chicken. I don;t want to have a lot of clean up to do in the kitchen. My favorite meat substitute is lintels, and i never ate them before 2018. Always delicious with whatever sauce i put on them, today it is honey barbecue sauce, for example. Beef has no appeal next to lintels. :shock:
i wanted to gain weight, so i tested 400-500 calories EXTRA from bread, wheat chips and pasta. this was a severe carb overload if you listen to carb haters, yet my fasting glucose only went up 1 point, to 116.
NOW that i realize i could just up my fat to 10-15% and not cause heart disease, i'm adding 1 oz of peanuts or PB, which should bring down the 116. So i'm not totally against fat, i just don't want to clog things up.
 
Dietary fat has no effect on blood cholesterol, so it can't "plug everything up".

Also being just barely under the blood sugar levels which qualify as T2d puts you are a huge risk to a variety of diseases. Better to eat so your blood sugars are 50-60% of that.
 
Triglycerides can be elevated when you're eating the 'mouse diet', IE a certain mixture of fat and carbs actually.
Happens to SAD / western pattern diet eaters all the time.
If there's significant insulin resistance then you can also see elevated blood sugars at the same time.

You can optimize your metabolism for either/or but eating a large % of both carbs and fat is the problem.

Eating 7 tiny meals a day probably works because you're essentially giving your blood sugar little bumps here and there.
When i was in the throes of type 2 diabetes and taking bodily damage from it and trying to manage it w/o drugs, i ate like that. Constantly snacking. It was the only way to prevent my energy from being a rollercoaster. I'd fall asleep in a carb coma after a big meal. It got to the point where i had to eat every hour. 16 meals a day.

I had hit the limit of insulin's ability to shuttle carbohydrates into body fat, and was 280lbs. My fat cells were at capacity.
This is a portrait of the type 2 diabetic body. Unable to metabolize fat or switch between ketosis/glycolysis, and progressively obese.. unable to lose weight and always hungry!


Now i eat 2 meals a day. Sometimes 1. My appetite is finally under control. Zero problems holding my 190lbs weight, outside of a cheat day, of course :thumb: Started going to the gym for the first time in my life and became a weight lifting/cardio maniac.
 
Grantmac said:
Dietary fat has no effect on blood cholesterol, so it can't "plug everything up".

Also being just barely under the blood sugar levels which qualify as T2d puts you are a huge risk to a variety of diseases. Better to eat so your blood sugars are 50-60% of that.
Click to expand...
my cholesterol is now 135 (was 196) no effect :lol:
keep in mind my 116 BG was when i felt awful and went in for tests. I do not have any tests now that i feel good :lol: i don't go to the Dr. when i feel this good. 8) It should be much lower within 7 days of my diet correction 8)
But, thanks for trying to help 8)

Nep
thanks for your input, but we seem to have opposite solutions.
 
There's a lot of data showing that blood cholesterol doesn't matter. It's a way to pitch statins, which are horrifyingly bad drugs that statistically don't do shit to prevent heart disease or heart attacks.

Too low of cholesterol ( <100 ) or extremely high cholesterol ( >300 ) are the only dangerous zones to be in. Low cholesterol is significantly more dangerous than too high.

Look it up if you don't believe me. Google the 'cholesterol U curve' and 'Dave Feldman'.
 
HDL or LDL is what matters, not total.
The foods which are consumed on a clean Keto diet do not raise LDL (the bad stuff).

Statins are a horrible idea compared to correcting dietary problems.
 
Grantmac said:
HDL or LDL is what matters, not total.
The foods which are consumed on a clean Keto diet do not raise LDL (the bad stuff).

Statins are a horrible idea compared to correcting dietary problems.
Click to expand...

LDL is 67 how is that? (was 104 before)
HDL is 43 was 64 before
Never took any statins! changed diet instead 8)
 
Grantmac said:
Reducing HDL is a bad thing and going under 40 significantly increases risk factors. 60-90 is ideal.
Click to expand...

too low could be bad, but recent studies suggest hdl is not a villian. the good range on the data sheet says greater than 40, and since i'm 43, i'm in the green :mrgreen: these are breakdowns of cholesterol which since mine is 135, you can't add the parts together and get more than, in my case, get over 135.
Yours must be higher to get hdl 60-90, and higher chol. means you may need statins. :(
 
Someone needs statins like a hole in the head. Statins have caused more problems than they solve. And they don't solve the original issue either.

Cholesterol is there to repair your body. If it is too low, that repair stops happening. All sorts of deadly symptoms will emerge.
Your body will generate it as needed. It's crucial to have.

Extremely elevated cholesterol is a marker that massive inflammation or damage is being done.

Always research both sides of the story before taking a drug. Your doctor may simply not know, because he's constantly been propagandized by pharma companies and the media outlets they run.

I expect that statins will no longer be prescribed in a decade. The body of evidence against them outweighs the body of evidence for them by a large margin. The medical world just hasn't kept up.
 
Nep
i actually agree with you on statins :shock: :lol: But YOU did not bring them up, it was Grant. He takes statins. i don't take any drugs. :thumb: analysis of statins https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5BYLC3IjBE
And what you said about chol. EXCEPT your conclusion that low is bad. I suppose 1 in a million could have a problem in theory, but i've not read anything like that. LOW like under 100, indicates the person is in fantastic health and does NOT need much repair work 8)
.
interesting krill oil pill being tested lowers TG and HbA1c https://www.acastipharma.com/en/capre
 
I don't take statins or any other presciption drug, I eat healthy and work out. I've had massive injuries then subsequent surgery within the last 12 months and recovered FAR faster than any medical professional thought was possible. That is because I maintain a low inflammation diet primarily based on healthy fats and protein.
When I am not dilligent on keeping carbs to a minimum I can feel those injuries start to ache.
 
people respond differently so they should test various ideas. there is no "one size fits all" when it comes to good health. My purpose in listing my experiments is to encourage the reader to do their homework, and find out what works for them. People that sell food don't care about your health, and most MD's don't care about what you eat. They are mostly after whatever insurance money they can siphon off. :roll: My MD's office sent me a letter that i should come in for a free "tire rotation" :lol: They are just trying to sell me "new shocks" :lol: I'm not going until i need to see a Dr or want updated tests. BUT the Dr is welcome to come here for a visit, if he is really that concerned :lol:
 
Matt Gruber said:
Nep
i actually agree with you on statins :shock: :lol:
Click to expand...

Common ground is nice :thumb:

Matt Gruber said:
And what you said about chol. EXCEPT your conclusion that low is bad. I suppose 1 in a million could have a problem in theory, but i've not read anything like that. LOW like under 100, indicates the person is in fantastic health and does NOT need much repair work 8)
Click to expand...

It happens to long term vegans when their diet does not give them enough building blocks for cholesterol. Or people on statins, where cholesterol synthesis is interfered with.

Low cholesterol does not necessarily indicate someone is healthy at all. It could mean that cell turnover is not happening. Your body needs to repair and recycle cells at a certain rate in order for you to not disintegrate. If not enough

Basically cholesterol doesn't mean as much as they say it does. Cholesterol is the fireman at the scene of the fire, not the cause of it. The number of firemen doesn't tell you if you're dealing with a controlled burn, arson, or something else. You need more information than that.

The krill oil pill is just omega 3. Lack of omega 3 is part of what gives vegans heart issues. The omega 3 in plants is not bioavailable. Good fats have huge benefits..
 
OK Nep,
i'll bite :D what are the "good fats" ?
.
i never heard of any vegans having really low chol. Most eat plenty of fat, like chocolate bars, vegan junk food.
The research i saw was about tribes in africa that ate lots of sweet potatoes and at a wedding they would roast a pig, so some meat now and then. the tribe did not get any western disease :shock: , but they did die from infections and disease from insects. :(
.
STRATEGY to deal with my pancreas that can't properly process fat (fat clogs up my muscle cells, this is known as insulin resistance) IR
Since i stumbled upon the process to reverse IR (lose weight + exercise for 8 weeks) i have an idea on how to avoid IR long term. I weigh 116 so i can't keep losing weight! Plan is to clear out excess fat on a daily or weekly basis by doing mini-fasting. The idea is no food of any kind after dinner, until .....this is the good part ....my muscle cells have used up any fat that is stuck in the cells due to weak insulin not moving this fat elsewhere. I judge my IR and insulin production by how far i can ride my bicycle without fatigue. Anytime i see less range, i will skip breakfast, ride the bike, then eat after the ride. How long i will wait is a good question. Hopefully if i reverse any IR every week, i'll eat within 1/2 hour. Plan is to squeeze as much activity out of a limited amount of calories - i just can't eat more, i have to do less strenuous activity to stop the weight loss. It is similar to a budget - i'm energy poor and have to make the best use of what i have. So too much riding becomes worse than too little. Have to strike a balance. Food timing could extend the budget. Fun to do experiments that don't require a trip to the Dr. :)
Looks like it is better to have 1 bowl of oatmeal w/b after the ride, instead of 2 before https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bt8JbqrK9R8 8) I can't go the speed and distance of a pro, but i do get fatigue just as bad :roll: :lol:
12-20-19 update: so far, so good 8) Have added 1/2 oz a day of peanut butter and have kept my weight steady. No sign of insulin resistance. :mrgreen:
update 11-25-19
Important thing i learned from studies is that during and after exercise, muscles do not need insulin
So when i exercise i can eat more and maintain my weight, plus it makes me hungry, so no fasting after exercise. 8) Insulin needs are lower all day, but eating within 2 hrs is best as needs gradually increase. Pays to read the research. Now i know 1 reason for feeling better when i get up and do something: glucose is drawn into the cells, even without insulin.
.
Good info on how much LDL is best? my 67, down from 104 does not quite hit the goal of 58. so maybe this is behind the weight loss improvements? And my 135 (was 196) total C does not equal the china study average of 127 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXzlrylrFV0
 
Came across a warning to those taking a drug called Bydureon. I was curious about this drug as Dr Ekberg said it can increase pancreas insulin output. I'm not sure how bydureon works, but it reduces BG- blood glucose. The warning is to not drink alcohol too, as you can go hypoglycemic, LOW BG. https://www.drugs.com/bydureon.html
.
Now i see how, 100 years ago, before big pharma took over, alcohol was in every Dr's bag, as it is an effective treatment for high BG. :twisted:
.
Dr. Jason Fung has a chart of c-peptide that shows when IR is reversed, the pancreas comes back to normal!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcLoaVNQ3rc
Very good video where Dr Fung explains fasting https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIuj-oMN-Fk
But, i believe there are 2 types of fat. The good fat is stored under the skin, and the bad fat is stored elsewhere, like veins, the liver and the pancreas, etc. My testing showed that eating way more carbs to gain weight brought back the IR; i lost so much energy, that is when i went in for the blood tests. He says the liver converts excess carbs into fat, and i suspect that this is bad fat as it is not stored under the skin. He says that insulin causes fat to be stored, as, when i eat peanut butter (75% fat) i can easily gain weight, and i suspect that since the liver is not involved, this fat is stored under the skin where i want it. So i tried an 18 hour fast. The idea is to burn some of the bad fat, and since i don't want to lose weight, i ate some PB with lunch and i expect this to be stored under the skin, as good fat. If this fasting can improve my performance, fine, but usually fasting is used by those wanting to lose weight. My 18 hr fast was easy as i painted my garage door in the morning before i ate. It will not be so easy if i'm bored as eating is a good hobby :)
.
Dr Sten Ekberg explains the benefits of HIIT exercise https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irq_-gvLw4Y
This is important because he has learned how to improve insulin sensitivity despite being a LOW CARB guy 8) And he was a Olympic athlete when he was younger, so he knows a thing or 2 about what makes the body work.
And i felt in tip-top shape last june/july when i was doing HIIT. His explanation makes me want to try this again 8) Maybe i can get back to where i was? (i just ignore his low carb diet ideas which don't detract from his HIIT insight, as i was doing very high carbs when i felt tiptop) If his ideas work for me, then i see where i went wrong. When my bike rides left me very tired, i tried to maintain my riding time as best i could, and became OVER tired. WRONG! I will now abandon the longer distance moderate ride, and try HIIT: 30 second bursts of maximum speed- brief recovery- do this 3X at least to engage HGH. This could be the missing hormone that allowed my IR to return. 8) Great idea for the cold windy days of winter! I can use the wind like a hill, since there are few hills in FL.
:D I doubt any of those studies (showing weight loss was needed to reverse IR) were doing HIIT exercise :twisted: I can't imagine HIIT being used; they would use the common 30-60 min workout that is so popular and not recommended by Dr. Ekberg. :twisted:
:bigthumb: 12-5-19 update:47F did HIIT 4X in 15 min. But only 20 sec as i ran out of gearing sooner than expected. even stood up on the pedals for top gear. pulse did jump way up, plan to bring pulse oximeter next time. was still 113 back home a few minutes later. In another video ekberg says 15 sec is good too, so while 20 is short of 30, i did it 4x not just 3x. Felt good to really pour on the speed. Sure to trigger GH (growth hormone). This was a lot more intense than last june; i'm hoping to shorten the time to feeling great, if this HIIT was the cause (was 4-8 weeks before). No pain during the HIIT. at 67 pain can appear at any time, so i'm pleased nothing hurt, and i didn't drop dead LOL
.
some trivia:
amount Quest labs billed $1374.17
amount Humana paid $124.97
my share .00 8)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top