Category: Nutrition

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Blood sugar and me

My grandmother was a type 1 diabetic. My father is type 2. Last time I had bloodwork done my fasting blood sugar was at 110, which is on the cusp of too high.

So, I struggle with high blood sugar.

I became somewhat aware of this during a visit by my parents a couple summers ago. My wife and my father were having a discussion, and my wife said something about being in a “sugar coma”, which is how she playfully described the lethargic feeling one gets after consuming a large amount of carbs.

I had experienced this, but never thought twice about it. I mean, I had felt that state come over me, where I just could not keep my eyes open, had to lie down for twenty minutes. After the lie-down, I was fine.

But only now did I begin to associate that feeling with high blood sugar.

(That’s why I publish this blog, btw. I do a lot of reading about health and fitness, but I never realized this phenomenon was present in me. Even with everything I’ve read, I was ignorant to this very important piece of my personal health. If I can impart any knowledge to you that helps you live longer, I will have succeeded with this blog.)

What to do?

  1. I don’t consumer a lot of sugary items, but I did consume a lot of high-carb items, like breads and pastas. In fact, that was my primary fuel source. I cut back on that, added more fat and protein.
  2. I also took a short nap when I felt the lethargy come over me.

#1 above was a good idea. In fact, I eventually cut out just about all breads and pastas. Completely. Gone from my diet, with rare exceptions.

#2 was a good idea for treating the symptoms, but not for correcting the behavior that led to them. Still, when living on the verge of high blood sugar all the time, it’s difficult to not spike it every once in a while. But a nap? Really?

I stopped napping and started … exercising. Whenever I feel that sugar spike bringing me down, I get up and do a short workout, or even just walk around the house reading a book on my phone (I love my Android-based HTC Incredible!)

This works! The activity uses up the excess sugar (I guess — hey, I’m no doctor), and after a little exercise, I feel good as new. Also, I should note there that I’ve read about studies that suggest if you have a job that keeps you seated much of the day (as I do), it’s a good idea to get up every hour or so and move around for a little bit. This is pretty much “no duh”, but something we just don’t think to do.

Do you feel extremely lethargic after a meal full of carbs? Do you dive into a “sugar coma” soon afterward? Instead of succumbing to that feeling, force yourself to exercise. Do some jumping jacks, run in place, or just walk around the house. See if it doesn’t make you feel better.

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Listen to your body

In my search for the truth about health and nutrition I’ve happened across a lot of different viewpoints. I am quite sure that the vast majority of those viewpoints are driven by money and politics.

For the politics, please read Taubes’s Good Calories, Bad Calories.

For the money, please use your brain.

Let’s say someone like me, for example, starts up a blog in good faith, just as I did. I write this blog to help you in your quest to better health and fitness, and also to help myself stay on track.

Now let’s say that I take a hard core primal stance, like Mark Sisson at Mark’s Daily Apple.

(I am not going to do that, because I am looking for the truth, and I am convinced that once you think you’ve found it, you are surely wrong.)

But let’s say I do. All’s well and good now, because paleo/primal/low carb is all the rage. Even science is finally coming around. Wow, I can now start up my own supplement company, make tons of money on that, write books and cookbooks. Get rich on something that really just started as a hobby.

But wait. A few years down the road the tide turns. New incontrovertible evidence (in the future, I’m conjecturing) shows that primal eating causes cancer of the pancreas and stomach. It is to those organs what smoking is to the lungs. What now? Do I accept this evidence or do I gainsay it and continue making money with my primal attitude?

Well, scientific evidence that is contrary to prevailing opinion has been ignored for many years, proving it’s easy to do, so odds are, if I’m getting rich, I will try to gainsay the science and continue to rake in the bucks from my primal empire.

Now, I am not saying that I would do this — I am a good guy with an honest search for the truth driving me — but the low-fat people have done it for many years, and, in fact, continue to do it, because they are making big money. Am I any better than they are?

(I HOPE SO!)

What’s the point of what I just said? Simply this: LISTEN TO YOUR BODY!

Your body will tell you if your diet and exercise programs are working. Are you losing fat? Are you gaining muscle? Are you hungry all the time? Do you feel weak or tired? All these are indicators of whether or not what you are doing is working for you.

Everyone is not the same. There is no magic to shaping and reshaping your body. There is no miracle to staying healthy. What works for one person may not work for another person. Try things out. Give them a good go, a month or two. If you don’t feel better at the end of that period of time, try something else.

Just because your best friend lost 27 pounds on a low-carb diet, doesn’t mean that’s right for you. (Hey, did she gain all that back and more after she went off that diet? Yeah, that’s what I thought.)

Find what works for you, commit to it, and make it a lifestyle. You’ll be happier and healthier for it.

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About white carbs

White carbs. You may have heard them mentioned as public enemy #1. I dunno about that, but I’m pretty sure they’re not good for you, if your #1 goal is to lose fat.

White carbs, by my definition (based on reading I’ve done), are processed carbs, like sugar and white flour. I avoid them. I also like to avoid white rice and potatoes.

Why avoid them? The problem with white carbs is that they rather quickly increase your blood sugar, which spikes your insulin, which processes the excess sugar into fat. They can also lead to a host of other problems, including cancer, type 2 diabetes, and high blood pressure. If you can read the first 100 pages of  Good Calories, Bad Calories and still think you can consume all the white carbs you want, well, I don’t know what to say.

In that book, acclaimed science reporter Gary Taubes makes a strong argument against white carbs. Perhaps the most compelling evidence is the incidence of type 2 diabetes and cancer in native tribes before and after the introduction of white carbs into their diets. Before white carbs, those diseases were virtually non-existent. After the white carbs were introduced to the natives, well, a few years later, guess what? Yeah, you guessed it.

I have been experimenting with white carbs on my own body.

I was completely off white carbs and, in fact, all grains, for about six months. During that time my weight stayed steady. Recently, I purchased some supposedly carb-inhibiting white pasta by Dreamfields. I’ve also been less cautious about how much white bread I’m eating. I am still, however, completely off anything with sugar added, except for some honey or dates put into a protein shake after weight training.

(The reason for carbs with a protein shake after weight training is that an insulin spike after weight training is good. Insulin, in addition to helping to store fat, also helps the body assimilate proteins, so having it in the body along with some protein right after a workout will build muscle more efficiently.)

My waist size has been creeping up. The creep is slight, a mere one-half- to three-quarter-inch so far, but that’s too much. I was at one waist size for about 8 months, and now it’s moving upward. What’s that about? What’s causing it?

Are the white carbs the cause of the added size? I don’t live in a closed environment, so there could be other causes, but the white carbs are my primary suspect.

I will finish off the pasta — I still have a few boxes — continue to observe my waistline, and then go off white carbs again when it’s gone.

Damn white carbs!

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P90X tips

Here are some tips based on my experiences while doing P90X.

  1. Be in tune with your body. How do you feel today? Can you really push it? Should you take it easy? Listen to what your body is telling you.
  2. Don’t hurt yourself. This is obvious, but it’s also tough to do. Very often when we start an exercise program, we will tend to overdo it. This is especially true when working out with P90X DVDs. Those guys and gals are in shape, and you might not be, but you’ll still want to try to keep up with them. Fight that urge! Don’t be lazy — you gotta BRING IT — but do not push too far.
  3. Write it down. Tony harps on this during the workouts, but that’s because it’s important. Writing down what weight or band you used and other information will help you know where you’ve been, but also will make your workout much more efficient, because you’ll know which weight or band to use next time you do the same workout.
  4. Work through pain. Well, most pain. Sometimes you really are hurt, but there were several times when I felt injured and would have stopped in the past. Instead I worked through it.  In fact, I’ve had triceps/shoulder pain in my left arm that’s been there for months. I’ve been working through it, and it’s been slowly getting better. I could have stopped working it, but I could feel that this was an injury that could be worked through. See #1 above.
  5. Get enough protein. The P90X diet guide recommends a 50/30/20 protein/carbs/fat calorie distribution. This works for me. You may need to add some protein shakes into your diet to get enough protein. I did. Shakeology is pretty good for after a workout, because it has some carbs, but for general use, I prefer Optimum Nutrition 100% Whey Gold Standard Natural Whey in either vanilla or chocolate. I chose that brand because it has no carbs and no artificial sweeters. Vanilla goes best with most of the fruit I mix it with.
  6. Almond milk is great! I have never cared much for cow milk. I think it tastes okay, but it just seems kinda nasty to me. Psychological, I know, but there are alternatives, so I put soy milk on my cereal for many years. Then I discovered almond milk, specifically the no-sugar-added variety. Wow! Delicious! I prefer Blue Diamond. Silk brand is good, but there is no “no sugar added” version available to me, plus I think Blue Diamond’s texture is a little better.
  7. Be smooth when handling dumbbells. Pick them up gently. Put them down when you’re done, then bend and pick them back up to replace them in the rack. Don’t be jerking them around or you could tear something.
  8. You can get a good workout with the bands. If you don’t have a few hundred bucks to spend on dumbbells, get some bands. I found a set of Ironman adjustable dumbbells at Costco for $300. They work great. I have used the resistance bands from Beachbody, too. They also work great.
  9. Commit to the program. The infomercials tell you to “Press play every day.” Do it. My first time through P90X, it was week 9 before I felt comfortable missing a workout. I was dedicated to it, dedicated to getting fit.
  10. Commit to the diet. The vast majority of your body composition is determined by your diet, so leave the junk food alone. You can take a break from the diet plan every so often, but make sure you keep it at only “every so often.” I know from experience, it’s very easy to fall off the wagon. Very easy.
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My goal for this year is to lose this waist fat

If you’ve read “about the author” you know that my weight peaked at 235 — pretty huge for a 5’10” guy. I lost 50 pounds by restricting calories and walking and I thought I was stuck there, but then my brother turned me on to P90X and I found out I could lose even more fat while also adding muscle.

… HOWEVER …

While I lost 4.5″ off my waist after the first round of P90X, I am stuck at that waist size. I cannot seem to lose these final few pounds of fat.

Fortunately, my chest, shoulders, and back are all much larger, so that diminishes the waist fat, but, really, I’m not happy with that. Getting larger up top so my middle appears to be smaller is not acceptable.

I am at a bit of a loss on how to lose the waist fat. I’ve read all kinds of books on the subject, and I’ve experimented with my body. I am pretty sure that carbs are a primary factor in fat storage, but I also know that I feel like total and utter crap without carbs. Plus, as you may realize, I am not a fitness fanatic. I like my relaxation and I prefer to live my life without obsessing about whether or not I was able to get a workout in or whether or not I can eat exactly perfectly healthy all the time.

So here’s my plan:

PART 1: Eat lower carb (no more than 150 carbs a day), lower fat (not obsessively, just keep an eye on the fat), and high protein (aiming for 50% of calories from protein). When I started P90X, I was on their recommended eating plan, which was 50/30/20 (protein/carbs/fat). I lost fat fast on that diet, but I turned to a primal diet about six weeks into it after reading Mark Sisson’s The Primal Blueprint.

I went totally off grains (no rice, corn, wheat, rye … nothing) for 6 months and increased my fruit intake. The fruit was not necessarily in keeping with Sisson’s ideas — he likes to get most of his carbs from veggies, with only some fruit thrown in — but it’s much easier to eat fruit, which I primarily do with frozen fruit in my protein shakes, than to eat lots of veggies. Plus, okay, I’m not a huge fan of vegetables.

The upshot is that I’m fairly happy with my diet, but it’s not getting me where I want to be. I’m not going to restrict calories — that just doesn’t work for me in the long run — so 50/30/20 (or thereabouts) is where I’m headed.

I also, however, feel that I need to step it up on the exercise side. That leads me to …

PART 2: I’m going to give Insanity a try. I bought it at the end of 2010 with this in mind. I checked out one of the DVDs a few weeks ago, and, whoa, it is tough. Yes, tougher than P90X. But I’m pretty sure it’s what I need, or, anyway, I’m pretty sure there’s no way to be sure without trying it, so I’ll give it a go.

After one round of Insanity — which is a 60-day program — I plan to go back to P90X with other Tony Horton DVDs thrown in to mix it up, keep the muscles confused.

I have to admit that I am a bit concerned about my knees. I have some weakness in my right knee and some arthritis in my left one. I keep the arthritis pain and stiffness away with a low-grain, high-activity lifestyle, so I’m not worried about that, but the right side may prove problematic. Still, one of my favorite sayings is, “There are always good reasons not to do something. Successful people often ignore those reasons.” I could just write off Insanity as impossible with my knees. But. Not. Gonna. Do. It. Is this a no-guts-no-glory attitude? Is it foolish? Perhaps, but I will never know until I try.

I still have another month to go on this current round of P90X, so I’m going to wait to start Insanity until after I’m done with that, but I’m really looking forward to this new challenge. I’ll keep you posted on my progress.