Ask JJ: Type 2 Diabetes

Dear JJ: My doctor just diagnosed me with pre-diabetes. Type 2 diabetes runs in my family, but I will not accept it as my fate. You've written about sugar's detrimental impact, so how can I get this under control so it doesn't blow up into full-blown diabetes? Diabetes doesn't happen overnight or linearly, but when your metabolic machinery breaks, serious havoc ensues. The massive repercussions can become deadly. Every time you eat, you raise blood sugar, which triggers your pancreas to release a hormone called insulin. Every food raises blood sugar, but high-sugar impact foods do it big time. Your pancreas "secretes some insulin in response to protein, but when it sees carbohydrates in the passageway, its eyes light up, and it brings out the big guns and goes to town," writes Dr. Jonny Bowden in Living Low Carb. "(Fat doesn't even rate a 'hello' from the pancreas and has no effect on insulin.)" One of insulin's jobs involves shuttling that sugar (as glucose) out of your blood into your cells, which can use glucose as a quick energy hit or store it as glycogen to use later. Trouble starts when too many high-sugar impact foods keep your blood sugar elevated when it should stabilize. Your overworked pancreas continues to crank out insulin to stabilize that blood sugar, but your cells stop "hearing" its call. "No vacancy," your liver and muscle declare, unable to store any more glucose as glycogen. That excess glucose can't just hang out in your bloodstream or really ba...
Source: Healthy Living - The Huffington Post - Category: Consumer Health News Source Type: news