[g_podcast id="6961394"]
Sugar: friend or foe?
In this episode, I talk about:
Today we are talking more about the physical aspects of sugar, not the psychological ones.
What is sugar?
Sugar comes in many guises. The obvious one is, of course, pure sugar or anything that tastes sweet. But in many products, especially convenience products, you'll find things like maltodextrin, dextrose, caramel coulor, etc. That's sugar too. This is also sugar.
Carbohydrates are ultimately always sugar. This means bread, pasta, rice, but also vegetables and fruit increase your sugar levels. But not everything raises your sugar level equally quickly and equally high! That's why we talk about fast and slow carbohydrates.
A distinction is therefore made between carbohydrates that cause a rapid rise in sugar levels in the blood and carbohydrates that cause a slow rise.
How can you tell if you have a sugar metabolism problem?
There are two main signs. A subjective one (namely cravings) and an objective one (namely a combination of blood values).
The first sign is when you are constantly hungry. For example, you are hungry again 2 hours after eating. Or you have a ravenous appetite for sweets, get shaky or even black out. This is hypoglycemia. And hypoglycaemia only occurs if your sugar level was too high beforehand! People can easily go 5 hours, 8 hours or even longer without eating if their sugar metabolism is in order. If you can't do that, that's the first sign.
The second measurable sign is your blood values.
If your triglycerides (blood lipids) are higher than 100 mg/dl or 1.13 millimoles/liter and your inflammation marker CRP is ultra-sensitive greater than 0.5 and your uric acid is also close to the upper limit, you can actually assume that you already have an initial sugar metabolism problem. This is not yet diabetes, but the first signs of insulin resistance. You may also have high liver values or cholesterol levels.
And you can also check your long-term hbA1c sugar. This should be below 5.
And one last thing on the subject of blood values: always get a copy of them! "There's nothing wrong with you" is unfortunately an often-heard phrase, so I would recommend that you take a look yourself and keep a copy at home.
If you would now like to know what other signs there are, then take our free sugar quiz!
What is harmful about sugar?
It seems very tempting to turn to alternatives, but I'm not such a fan of them. Because if you use less sugar it is particularly important to simply get away from the constant sweet cravings.
There are sweeteners such as xylitol, which hardly affect sugar/insulin levels and are still from a natural source (unlike artificial sweeteners).
But the easiest way to get away from sweet cravings is to give up sweets completely! So it's best to leave out everything that tastes very sweet, I would even recommend leaving out very sweet fruit such as dates, bananas or dried fruit.
Later on, you can have some sugar, maple syrup or something like that again.
I never recommend artificial sweeteners!
5tips on how to get away from sugar consumption
I have written a whole blog article on this topic. Here are the 5 points you should definitely keep in mind.
Read the whole blog article with tips on how to avoid sugar.
In another episode, we will talk about the psychological side of sugar, because of course there are also topics such as childhood imprinting, reward, sadness and much more.
Now I recommend that you subscribe to the podcast so that you don't miss an episode, and if you like what you hear, I would really appreciate a rating on iTunes or Apple Podcast. Because these reviews also help other people to find the podcast so that we can spread the knowledge about gut and health more.
Sugar: friend or foe?
In this episode, I talk about:
- What do I actually mean by sugar and where is it everywhere?
- 2 clear signs that you might have a sugar metabolism problem, one subjective and one OBJECTIVE
- What is supposed to be so harmful about sugar?
- My opinion on sugar substitutes such as stevia, erythritol, xylitol or sweeteners
- 5 tips on the best way to get away from sugar consumption
Today we are talking more about the physical aspects of sugar, not the psychological ones.
What is sugar?
Sugar comes in many guises. The obvious one is, of course, pure sugar or anything that tastes sweet. But in many products, especially convenience products, you'll find things like maltodextrin, dextrose, caramel coulor, etc. That's sugar too. This is also sugar.
Carbohydrates are ultimately always sugar. This means bread, pasta, rice, but also vegetables and fruit increase your sugar levels. But not everything raises your sugar level equally quickly and equally high! That's why we talk about fast and slow carbohydrates.
A distinction is therefore made between carbohydrates that cause a rapid rise in sugar levels in the blood and carbohydrates that cause a slow rise.
How can you tell if you have a sugar metabolism problem?
There are two main signs. A subjective one (namely cravings) and an objective one (namely a combination of blood values).
The first sign is when you are constantly hungry. For example, you are hungry again 2 hours after eating. Or you have a ravenous appetite for sweets, get shaky or even black out. This is hypoglycemia. And hypoglycaemia only occurs if your sugar level was too high beforehand! People can easily go 5 hours, 8 hours or even longer without eating if their sugar metabolism is in order. If you can't do that, that's the first sign.
The second measurable sign is your blood values.
If your triglycerides (blood lipids) are higher than 100 mg/dl or 1.13 millimoles/liter and your inflammation marker CRP is ultra-sensitive greater than 0.5 and your uric acid is also close to the upper limit, you can actually assume that you already have an initial sugar metabolism problem. This is not yet diabetes, but the first signs of insulin resistance. You may also have high liver values or cholesterol levels.
And you can also check your long-term hbA1c sugar. This should be below 5.
And one last thing on the subject of blood values: always get a copy of them! "There's nothing wrong with you" is unfortunately an often-heard phrase, so I would recommend that you take a look yourself and keep a copy at home.
If you would now like to know what other signs there are, then take our free sugar quiz!
What is harmful about sugar?
- Increased fat build-up
- leads to high levels of inflammation
- More stress hormones such as cortisol
- Hormone fluctuations, infertility
- Cravings, overeating
- Vitamin robber
- Problems that can arise from this include obesity, but even worse are imbalances in the intestinal flora, chronic inflammation, immune deficiency, vitamin deficiency, susceptibility to infections, fatigue, infertility, mood swings.
It seems very tempting to turn to alternatives, but I'm not such a fan of them. Because if you use less sugar it is particularly important to simply get away from the constant sweet cravings.
There are sweeteners such as xylitol, which hardly affect sugar/insulin levels and are still from a natural source (unlike artificial sweeteners).
But the easiest way to get away from sweet cravings is to give up sweets completely! So it's best to leave out everything that tastes very sweet, I would even recommend leaving out very sweet fruit such as dates, bananas or dried fruit.
Later on, you can have some sugar, maple syrup or something like that again.
I never recommend artificial sweeteners!
5tips on how to get away from sugar consumption
I have written a whole blog article on this topic. Here are the 5 points you should definitely keep in mind.
- Drink water
- Eat breakfast without sugar
- Spice up your food, it should taste interesting
- Use good fats
- Eat fewer fast carbohydrates
Read the whole blog article with tips on how to avoid sugar.
In another episode, we will talk about the psychological side of sugar, because of course there are also topics such as childhood imprinting, reward, sadness and much more.
Now I recommend that you subscribe to the podcast so that you don't miss an episode, and if you like what you hear, I would really appreciate a rating on iTunes or Apple Podcast. Because these reviews also help other people to find the podcast so that we can spread the knowledge about gut and health more.
