Week five, day two

Insulin 101 

I’m a little frustrated!  I’m sticking to my exercise and diet program, but only losing about a pound a week.  I talked to my trainer, Tim, yesterday and he gave some good pointers.  The main thing I need to do is avoid simple sugars. I did some research and found that the reason why sugar has such a bad rap has to do with insulin. In the body, insulin is secreted in response to elevated blood sugar levels, such as those that occur after a meal, and it pushes that sugar into storage. First to be filled are the tissues of the muscles and the liver where the sugar (which is what your meal has become) is converted to glycogen. Glycogen is the body's fuel of choice for high intensity aerobic activity because it is readily available and because it is quickly converted to ATP for energy.

 Most people only have room to store about 500 calories of glycogen from any given meal. After these storage areas become full, insulin pushes the remaining sugar into the other storage area, FAT STORAGE.

The critical thing is not whether a food has sugar, but how quickly the sugar enters the blood stream. Food is categorized by this rate of entry. This is known as the glycemic index. On this scale table sugar) is given a 100 rating. Foods like honey, cooked carrots, sweet potatoes and other starchy vegetables and fruits including bananas are even higher. Broccoli is rated 34 on the glycemic index. Things like pastas and breads are somewhere in the middle. Fructose or fruit sugar is rated a 20 on the glycemic index (GI). It is one of the lowest GI sugars known.  So, if I get a sweet-tooth, it is much better to eat fruit, which I love anyway.

To reduce the impact carbohydrates you should strive to eat foods low on the glycemic scale. I found it extremely interesting that you can also reduce the GI of foods or meals by eating a combination of protein carbohydrates and fat each time you eat.  This is why Tim wants me to eat 30 g of protein, 25 g of carbohydrates and 8 g of fat five times a day.  Monounsaturated fat (like avocados, almonds and olive oil) are especially good because they do not affect insulin or other hormones and they very effectively lower the GI of other foods by slowing absorption. Adding small amounts of fat to each meal also results in the release of certain hormones from your stomach that will help you feel satisfied and reduce the number of meals you need which will assist you in reaching your ideal weight.  Tim suggested I take two soft gels of fish oil with breakfast and two with dinner.

So, in summary, insulin converts sugar to fat, fruit isn't bad depending upon which fruit you choose; eating protein, fruit and carbohydrates together helps more; and large amounts of any carbohydrate will increase blood sugar levels rapidly which can result in excess fat storage.