This week's lesson will answer a question that some of you may have on your minds after reading the first three lessons (I know I did when I read the first three chapters):
"How did I Become a Carb Addict?"
I must admit, I am not perfect. This addiction also affect me (a very sweet tooth), though, I am
taking the steps to reverse this addiction). Hopefully you will want to do the same thing too once you are done reading these lessons. This craving affects more people than you think. Just look at the food available in grocery stores today and all those countless restaurants and commercials popping up everywhere (not to mention the vast variety of candies, chocolates and chips). You are not alone. As I am typing this, I am eating a sweet piece of chocolate cake that my wife got for her birthday at work (3rd cake in one week). Why? I just "felt" like it. I wasn't really hungry. I've got some work to do too. It's not a quick process so do not worry and don't give up. Take your time and most importantly, continue reading this and all future lessons, we will help each other.The carb cravings that lure and tempt us like a bee to pollen will always pull us back to our old eating habits, no matter what the current "Diet of the Century" we go on. If you want something to change, you have to change something. In this case, we have to change our lifestyle choices. Diets do not change our lifestyle, they just give us a false sense of hope by helping us lose weight until we decide to end the diet (due to lack of funds or lack of will power). In a future lesson, I will expand on this and write about a few diets and why they cause more harm than good. No matter how you look at it, our addiction anchors us to our eating habits.
Most people don't truly understand how addictive sugars and high processed foods can be. I have two children of my own; And since I started reading this book, I noticed that when we gave cookies or cake (Etc) to them they would get great rushes of energy only to have them hungry for more junk a little while later ... Oh and they become very cranky too if they don't get more. I already explained what happens when blood sugars are too high or too low. Our body controls blood sugar using a hormonal system containing insulin and glucagon. Before I continue, let me just quickly review some common terms I will be using:
Carbohydrate (Carb): Chain of sugar which is released in the body at different rates
Glucose: Your body's primary and favorite fuel source (especially the brain)
Glycogen: Readily available glucose stored in the liver and the muscles
Insulin:
- Fat storing hormone secreted by pancrease
- Aids in the transport of glucose from the blood to the muscles, liver and fat cells
- Doesn't transport glucose to the brain, sugar passes on it's own to the brain
- Ensures that the glucose is either used by each cell or stored as glycogen and fat
- Constant high levels of insulin encourages an environment in which glucose is converted to fat and then the cell holds on to stored fat like a sponge
- Fat burning hormone secreted by pancreas
- Stimulated by the intake of protein
- Prevented from being released by the intake of carbs
- Makes your liver, your muscles and the fat under your skin release some of the
glucose stored there when your sugar levels drop too low (balance). - Takes the stored fat and breaks it down into sugar - thus a "fat-burning" hormone
The trick is to keep these two hormones in balance by eating a balance of protein fat and low-glycemic carbs. Now here is the focus of today's lesson: "Why many of us are trapped in the Carb Addiction cycle". To explain, let me give you a quick overview of what happens in our bodies after a high-glycemic meal:
- Insulin shoots through your blood stream to regulate the spike in blood sugar
- Glucagon, fat burning hormone, is held back
- Ridiculous level of insulin directs the excess sugar to your muscles, liver and fat to be either stored as glycogen reserves or "FAT"
- Your insulin does a very efficient job at wiping out the blood sugar that it does it just as quickly as the sugar got in there in the first place.
- The levels of blood sugar are now lower than it was before the meal took place.
- Your system goes into ShoCk due to the drastic loss of sugar that it desperately needs.
- To get the blood sugars back to normal your body releases cortisol (stress hormone), adrenaline, growth hormone and glucagon
- Blood levels are brought back to normal
- Your body is now in the "uncontrollable hunger" stage in which it demands another high glycemic fix.
- The cycle continues and the addiction begins
- Impaired cognitive performance
- Suppressed thyroid function
- Blood sugar imbalances such as hyperglycemia
- Decreased bone density
- Decrease in muscle tissue
- Higher blood pressure
- Lowered immunity and inflammatory responses in the body, slowed wound healing, and other health consequences
All these blood sugar spikes really work your pancreas to levels it wasn't meant for (kind of like lungs weren't meant to process constant "smoke" abuse ... but that is a whole other blog series). Your body adapts to these spikes, of course ... for a while anyways. We're abusing our pancreas' ability to secret insulin. How does it repay us for our "kindness"? Well, that's simple. It turns excess glucose into fat. This abuse turns into a very dangerous addiction.
Your brain needs sugar, so trust it to do whatever it takes to get that glucose it needs to function.
On the flip side, here is a quick overview of what happens in our bodies after a low-glycemic meal:
- Sugar is released slowly and consistently into the bloodstream.
- The muscles get the glucose they need (85-90% of the glucose in your meal)
- The fat cell and liver takes the rest
- Both glucagon and insulin are released into the system
- The fat created by the remaining 10-15% glucose is broken down immediately after being created.
- The best part is that you shouldn't feel hungry for hours.
That's it for me this week. I hope you enjoyed it.
God Bless you all!
Take Care
-Frank Musulinaro-
"Fast Food Rockers"
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