Answer either yes or no to the following questions.
1. Do you wake up tired?
2. Do you rely on a cup of coffee to get yourself started first thing in the morning?
3. Do you crave sweet foods?
4. Do you get irritable, feel faint or get a headache if you skip a meal or don’t eat for several hours?
5. Do you sometimes suffer from blurred vision?
6. Do you tend to feel drowsy after meals?
7. Do you get tired in the late morning or late afternoon?
8. Do you get anxiety attacks or feel depressed sometimes for no reason?
9. Do you have difficulty making decisions?
10. Do you cry easily?
If you answered yes to 5 or more of these questions you may need to support your blood sugar to keep it stable.
Read on
Eating a lot of sugar, white flour and refined processed foods stimulates your pancreas to produce more insulin which your body needs to help break down and metabolise the foods. The more sugar and refined foods that pass your lips, the more insulin the pancreas needs to produce to stabilize your blood sugar levels, until eventually it loses its ability to respond to the constant demand and exhaustion and type II Diabetes results. Eating a lot of sugar and white flour can also lead to a condition called hypoglycemia. Here your body which has been depleted from nutrients like chromium which is needed to support the enzymes involved, can no longer metabolise them and the pancreas becomes trigger happy, creating repetitive abnormally low levels of glucose (sugar) in your blood. It is a form of chronic low blood sugar where you get a feeling of dizziness or fatigue, confusion or restlessness, which pushes you to reach for coffee and sweet or starchy things just to keep going. Low blood sugar is frequently the culprit behind energy swings that we experience during the day, especially around the time of a woman’s menstrual cycle. It can also be responsible for wakefulness at night, night sweats, swollen legs and feet, constant hunger and emotional instability.
So what can I do about it?
Firstly you need to support your pancreas buy giving it a rest from its overworked job of trying to metabolise all those foods. So eliminating sugar, white flour and everything that is made with those ingredients (biscuits, cakes, pasta, etc)
Take the mineral Chromium, experts in functional hypoglycemia insist that a Chromium supplement is essential in helping to stabilize blood sugar by supporting the pancreas to cope with its job.
One of the most important food groups you need to eat more of and frequently throughout the day is protein, preferably every 2 to 3 hours to help stabalise blood sugar swings that cause symptoms. (Good Protein sources are Yogurt, cottage cheese, nuts & seeds, fish, eggs, meat, chicken, tofu, soy or whey protein powder to make yummy smoothies and Spirulina) Proteins take a lot longer to digest fully and help to stabalise blood sugar levels.
Go for Fibre
This does not mean adding wheat bran to every thing you eat, since wheat can cause mild to severe intestinal upset for many people and even make constipation worse in many cases. It means eating wholefoods such as wholegrains, brown rice, porridge oats, salads and fruit which contain natural fibre. Unlike wheatbran, the fibre in oat-bran porridge (which is delicious), as well as fibre supplements like Spirulina, Wheat Grass, or psyllium hulls can all help to slow down hypoglycemic reactions.
Don’t go Hungry
Never let yourself be caught without food. Eat 6 to 8 small meals a day – every 2 to 3 hours. This is not as hard as it sounds if you carry a bag full of mixed sunflower, sesame and pumpkin seeds, with almonds, walnuts, brazil nuts and munch on them every few hours. You could also take to work a piece of chicken or a hard boiled egg with a sprinkling of sea salt, for your mid-morning snack while everyone else is munching a biscuit. If you awaken in the night, eat half a banana or wholegrain oatcake without sugar. It can be useful to have a snack like this before bedtime to improve sleep.
Clean out your Pantry of the rubbish.
Throw out your sugar, refined and processed foods like instant mashed potatoes and instant rice, white flour, spaghetti, gravies, baked beans (too much sugar in the sauce) alcohol and fizzy drinks. Avoid fruit juices and stay away from very sweet fruit such as figs and dates, or any dried fruits, until the problem has cleared itself up.
Don’t forget that regular exercise also helps to stabalise blood sugar levels too, ideally walking 20- 30 minutes a day is a great goal.
References - adapted from the book “Endless Energy” – Susannah & Leslie Kenton
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