Re: weight loss

pam_in_sc wrote in message <[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Tony said:

Once the problem (insulin resistance) has gone that far and has developed
into type 2 diabetes, I think you just have to experiment. I'd bet if you
limit your carbs to the metabolic exercise window - during and within 45
minutes right after higher intensity exercise - you won't have the same
problems with spikes. I guess it depends on how far gone the response
mechanisms are. Also what Doug pointed out, slower burning carbs like
maltodextrin might work better for you.

I also remember one NYC marathon runner asking in the group last Fall

about

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

sports drink and/or gels with some protein in it. I believe she was a

type 2

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

diabetic also. That might work for you.

-Tony

Actually I have very little insulin resistance, as measured separately
by a fasting insulin-fasting glucose test and by a c-peptide test.
Unusually for a type 2 my cholesterol panel is excellent--my HDL is
higher than my triglycerides (US numbers). No evidence that I am a type
1--I haven't gotten better or worse in 18 months (during which I lost 60
lbs).

The metobolic window absolutely works during at least two hours of
exercise. I can eat anything and burn up the carbs and not spike. I
eat a breakfast bar (though a moderate carb one) after a 75 minute swim
and never have any trouble. The time I tested every half hour during a
7 hour bike ride, I kept eating and my blood glucose gradually crept up
to a little over 140 (higher than I like to see). My theory is that as
my body gets stressed my liver starts to release too much glucose. When
I rode 100 miles I switched to eating more fat and less carbohydrate
after 3 hours, but then at about 6 1/2 hours found my blood glucose was
down to about 90 and started eating more carbs again.

Have you experiemented with maltodextrin based drinks or protein/carb
combinations?

Since I don't know much about glucose levels, I googled:
http://diabetes.niddk.nih.gov/dm/pubs/hypoglycemia/
"Normal blood glucose levels in people who do not have diabetes
Upon waking (fasting) 70 to 110
After meals 70 to 140"

A little over 140 for how long? and what were you eating when this occurred?

Quoted message said:

Today I rode 64 moderately hilly miles, which took me 5 1/2 hours. It
was hot, so I didn't take my meter with me, and I had parked in overflow
parking 1/4 mile from the race site so didn't test myself right away
when I got back. I ate half a peanut butter and jelly sandwich at each
of four rest stops, and some orange slices and banana (I also drank 4
water bottles of water and took two salt capsules). When I got to the
end of the ride I wanted to try the idea of that 45 minute window after
exercising, so I immediately ate the entire meal they offered: a hot dog
with bun, some tortilla chips, and a serving of canned fruit (probably
packed in heavy syrup). When I got in my car and got it a little cooled
down, maybe 20 minutes later, I tested my bg and I was 164. But one
hour after eating, which is my usual standard test time, it was down to
138, and when I tested a half hour later to check that it was indeed
going down it was 117.

This is interesting in that I begin to want solid food during longer
exercise periods (over 3hrs), usually something with protein and a bit of
fat. This seems to be the experience of many ultra runners as well.
Actually, the so-called metabolic window right after exercise is when the
muscles are supposedly the most receptive to replacing the glycogen. Fats
at that time just slow things down, though some protein is ok. So hot dogs
and tortilla chips are out. I "eat" high-density sports drink, and/or soy
milk, and lowfat snacks like pretzels.

Quoted message said:

So I'm not sure what to make of my experiment. My one hour humber was
ok, and that is what I usually evaluate. But I don't like that brief
spike, though it could have been due to dehydration or dirty hands. A
lot more data would be helpful, but test strips are easily damaged by heat.

It sounds like you're pretty on top of things. I'm somewhat surprized that
your weight loss and careful eating hasn't begun to show signs that your
condition is getting better, but then again I don't know all that much about
it. Based on my reading on low-carb, I'm of the opinion that most cases of
type 2 diabetes result from years of eating far too many carbs, particularly
refined carbs which are calorie dense. I suppose some people have hereditary
risk factors also.

-Tony

Quoted message said:

Pam

Tony said:

Have you experiemented with maltodextrin based drinks or protein/carb
combinations?

No, I haven't--I'm not convinced yet that they will work better for me
than real food that tastes good. Peanut butter and jelly seems like a
pretty good protein-carb combination. Probably when I get to higher
intensities I will find I need something easier to digest.

Quoted message said:

Since I don't know much about glucose levels, I googled:
http://diabetes.niddk.nih.gov/dm/pubs/hypoglycemia/
"Normal blood glucose levels in people who do not have diabetes
Upon waking (fasting) 70 to 110
After meals 70 to 140"

A little over 140 for how long? and what were you eating when this occurred?

There is some debate about the numbers you found, because definining
normal is circular. Someone who has diabetes is above an arbitrary
cut-off line, which keeps being lowered as evidence shows that
complications can develop before you get to the old cut-off line. The
more radical point of view can be found at:
http://www.geocities.com/lottadata4u/index.htm Some people say that
truly normal people never go above 100 no matter what they eat, and
those people who are hitting 140 are on their way to diabetes (though it
may be slow and they may die of something else first). There is some
test tube evidence that anything over 120 does damage to the pancreas
(and large amounts of insulin released by the body to bring it down
causes inflamation of the arteries).

I was 164, and 40 minutes later I was down below 140, so that is not a
big issue. But I would rather avoid any spikes, so next time I would
cut the amount of fast acting carbs I ate: 40 grams in a hot dog roll,
25 in half a cup of canned fruit, and 20 or so in a handful of tortilla
chips.

Quoted message said:

This is interesting in that I begin to want solid food during longer
exercise periods (over 3hrs), usually something with protein and a bit of
fat. This seems to be the experience of many ultra runners as well.
Actually, the so-called metabolic window right after exercise is when the
muscles are supposedly the most receptive to replacing the glycogen. Fats
at that time just slow things down, though some protein is ok. So hot dogs
and tortilla chips are out. I "eat" high-density sports drink, and/or soy
milk, and lowfat snacks like pretzels.

I'm going to try low fat chocolate milk after exercise. I find it
interesting that one would want to eat some fat during exercise, which
does seem to work for me, but then avoid it after. I see the point of
avoiding fat so the food digests faster, but I wouldn't have expected
that to be a big issue with moderate amounts of fat (cheesecake would be
another story).

Quoted message said:

It sounds like you're pretty on top of things. I'm somewhat surprized that
your weight loss and careful eating hasn't begun to show signs that your
condition is getting better, but then again I don't know all that much about
it. Based on my reading on low-carb, I'm of the opinion that most cases of
type 2 diabetes result from years of eating far too many carbs, particularly
refined carbs which are calorie dense. I suppose some people have hereditary
risk factors also.

My jaundiced opinion is that the whole idea that losing weight will
reduce the underlying problem of diabetes (allow someone to go back to
eating more carbohydrates without their blood sugar going too high) is a
myth made up by doctors who are prejudiced against fat people. There is
a study that showed people who starting exercising and lost a little
weight improved their diabetes control, which doctors use to say just
lose weight and maybe the diabetes will go away. But one might question
whether the exercise kept their blood sugar lower rather than that the
underlying problem was reduced. On the other hand, I may just be
atypical, and might even turn out to be a very slowly-developing late
type 1.

The interesting question is, how much of the "epidemic" of diabetes is a
result of the recommendations that people eat high-carb low-fat diets?
One probably needs to have the genetic predisposition, but that may be
fairly common. Before I was diagnosed, I ate whole grain bread and
oatmeal and lots of vegetables, but following the food pyramid I also
tried to eat less meat and more rice (mostly white rice, though we made
brown if we had time) and pasta. I rarely drank sweet drinks. I now
believe that a healthier diet is low in saturated fat but gets more
calories (30% or more) from good fats (olive oil, nuts) and fewer from
carbohydrates than the usual recommendations. You need to get calories
somewhere--low carb vegetables just don't have many calories--and too
much protein is hard on the kidneys.

Pam

pam_in_sc wrote in message <[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Tony said:

Have you experiemented with maltodextrin based drinks or protein/carb
combinations?

No, I haven't--I'm not convinced yet that they will work better for me
than real food that tastes good. Peanut butter and jelly seems like a
pretty good protein-carb combination. Probably when I get to higher
intensities I will find I need something easier to digest.

I'm not convinced they'll work better for you either, just something else to
experiment with. I haven't done a 100 mile running race yet, but when doing
24 hour ROGAINE events (which we hike instead of run), I love muffins, which
are high in both fat and carbs. During longer events you tend to eat what
goes down well.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Since I don't know much about glucose levels, I googled:
http://diabetes.niddk.nih.gov/dm/pubs/hypoglycemia/
"Normal blood glucose levels in people who do not have diabetes
Upon waking (fasting) 70 to 110
After meals 70 to 140"

A little over 140 for how long? and what were you eating when this

occurred?

Quoted message said:

There is some debate about the numbers you found, because definining
normal is circular. Someone who has diabetes is above an arbitrary
cut-off line, which keeps being lowered as evidence shows that
complications can develop before you get to the old cut-off line. The
more radical point of view can be found at:
http://www.geocities.com/lottadata4u/index.htm Some people say that
truly normal people never go above 100 no matter what they eat, and
those people who are hitting 140 are on their way to diabetes (though it
may be slow and they may die of something else first). There is some
test tube evidence that anything over 120 does damage to the pancreas
(and large amounts of insulin released by the body to bring it down
causes inflamation of the arteries).

This is highly possible - that the regular population in the US is skewed
from what really should be normal, and is already largely pre-diabetic.

Quoted message said:

I was 164, and 40 minutes later I was down below 140, so that is not a
big issue. But I would rather avoid any spikes, so next time I would
cut the amount of fast acting carbs I ate: 40 grams in a hot dog roll,
25 in half a cup of canned fruit, and 20 or so in a handful of tortilla
chips.

Quoted message said:

This is interesting in that I begin to want solid food during longer
exercise periods (over 3hrs), usually something with protein and a bit of
fat. This seems to be the experience of many ultra runners as well.
Actually, the so-called metabolic window right after exercise is when the
muscles are supposedly the most receptive to replacing the glycogen.

Fats

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

at that time just slow things down, though some protein is ok. So hot

dogs

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

and tortilla chips are out. I "eat" high-density sports drink, and/or soy
milk, and lowfat snacks like pretzels.

I'm going to try low fat chocolate milk after exercise. I find it
interesting that one would want to eat some fat during exercise, which
does seem to work for me, but then avoid it after. I see the point of
avoiding fat so the food digests faster, but I wouldn't have expected
that to be a big issue with moderate amounts of fat (cheesecake would be
another story).

For me something with protein and a bit of fat is a balance bar, or a big
protein/carb bar that contains a little fat -- as opposed to the sports
drink I normally take along which is pure carbs or mostly carbs and a bit of
protein. The post exercise "carb meal" has some fat sometimes, but peanut
butter is too high-fat for the main purpose of the meal, which is to flush
the system with carbs when the muscles are receptive to storing glycogen.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

It sounds like you're pretty on top of things. I'm somewhat surprized

that

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

your weight loss and careful eating hasn't begun to show signs that your
condition is getting better, but then again I don't know all that much

about

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

it. Based on my reading on low-carb, I'm of the opinion that most cases

of

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

type 2 diabetes result from years of eating far too many carbs,

particularly

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

refined carbs which are calorie dense. I suppose some people have

hereditary

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

risk factors also.

My jaundiced opinion is that the whole idea that losing weight will
reduce the underlying problem of diabetes (allow someone to go back to
eating more carbohydrates without their blood sugar going too high) is a
myth made up by doctors who are prejudiced against fat people. There is
a study that showed people who starting exercising and lost a little
weight improved their diabetes control, which doctors use to say just
lose weight and maybe the diabetes will go away. But one might question
whether the exercise kept their blood sugar lower rather than that the
underlying problem was reduced. On the other hand, I may just be
atypical, and might even turn out to be a very slowly-developing late
type 1.

I also read that in your blog. I tend to agree with you that obesity isn't
the cause but an outcome of both too many calories and a damaged insulin
metabolism from excessive refined carbs eaten over many years. Actually if I
didn't exercise so much I would limit my carbs a great deal more.

Quoted message said:

The interesting question is, how much of the "epidemic" of diabetes is a
result of the recommendations that people eat high-carb low-fat diets?
One probably needs to have the genetic predisposition, but that may be
fairly common. Before I was diagnosed, I ate whole grain bread and
oatmeal and lots of vegetables, but following the food pyramid I also
tried to eat less meat and more rice (mostly white rice, though we made
brown if we had time) and pasta. I rarely drank sweet drinks. I now
believe that a healthier diet is low in saturated fat but gets more
calories (30% or more) from good fats (olive oil, nuts) and fewer from
carbohydrates than the usual recommendations. You need to get calories
somewhere--low carb vegetables just don't have many calories--and too
much protein is hard on the kidneys.

I don't think people pay attention to those reccommendations - at least not
the masses who are pre-diabetic or type 2 now. It's because of the food
companies producing refined starchy/sugary foods that are very tasty and
very addictive, not to mention the soda-drinking culture etc.

I never drink sweet drinks unless it's for exercise. I tend to agree with
your guidelines of getting a generous amount of calories from healthy fats.
I start with adequate but not excessive protien, add vegetables, add whole
grain carbs for some meals, then add the high carb stuff for exercise. For
fats, I normally eat healthy nuts and a bit of cheeze for snacks, cook with
olive oil, etc.

-Tony

Quoted message said:

Pam