Insulin Resistand aka Metabolic Syndrome

 If you read National Diabetes Information Clearinghouse (NDIC) it will tell you that obesity causes metabolic syndrome (ie insulin resistance).  There are plenty of folk who challenge that assertion and think it's the other way around--that insulin resistance causes obesity.  I'm in that camp.  Here's the thing.  If you get a fasting glucose test that tells you your blood sugar is normal, it doesn't speak at all to insulin resistance, which is basically this:

      When you eat a lot of carbohydrates (or any sort) it takes a lot of insulin to handle it all and eventually the cells get tired of 'listening' to insulin yelling at them and put in ear plugs.  Now insulin has to scream to be heard (there's lots more of it produced).  You blood sugar might still be normal, but insulin is elevated.  If you are overweight, you are almost surely insulin resistant.

Why does that matter?  Lots of insulin in toxic. It triggers lots of inflammatory response.  The next step on that road is type II diabetes and more health issues.

If you are insulin resistant, it's almost impossible to lose weight--for two reasons.  Number one is that insulin is the hormone of hunger--you'll be starving all the time.  Nuber two is that when the cells are not listening so well, insulin shuffles those glucose molecules into fat cells at body fat.  Double whammy.

Stomach bypass surgeries cure insulin resistance but those surgeries are simply enforced starvation. So so major fasting intervals also cures insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome.  Low carbs cures it.  Carbs cause it (probably other things too see below), so of course their lack eventually cures it.

But this is the main thing I want to tell you today.  There are some nutrients that are known to help reverse insulin resistance.  I'm going to list them below, but this is the thing I find bizarre.  If they help cure it, why doesn't anyone look into how their lack (deficiency) contribute to the development of insulin resistance --and by implication, the development of diabetes.

Stephen Guyenet, an obesity researcher,  says:
            So what's the ideal fasting insulin level? My current feeling is that we can consider anything             between 2 and 6 uIU/mL within our evolutionary template.      

So My fasting insulin test of a couple months ago was 8.2--clearly in the metabolic syndrome range and I have been having great difficulty losing weight.  Also, it concerns me for the other potential long term effects--none of them good.  So I just had another fasting insulin test this last week and my new score is 3.0.  And I have started to lose weight.

 

What am I doing different?  Several things.  I am working out vigorously and building muscle.  BTW, it is very functional and it feels wonderful to be getting stronger (even at this late age).  I have lowered carbs some and I am more rigorous about intermittent fasting.  (I'm really motivated right now). 

 

But the biggest thing, I'm pretty sure, is that I have added all the supplements on which there is good evidence of reversing insulin resistance.  They are:

                Vitamin K2

                Magnesium

                Choline

                Chromium

                Vanadium

                Vitamin D (high levels are known to prevent insulin resistance, I think it cures it too.

                NAC

If you want to know what levels or brands I've tried, email me privately.

              

Finally

The government who has wrongly told us to avoid saturated fat and cholesterol, drastically cut salt and eat sugars (cleverly disguised as carbohydrates) is now reversing that advice based on the science.

A short excerpt below:

"In short. Cholesterol is healthy, saturated fat is healthy, salt is healthy and sugar is unhealthy. I have pulled those four points out of a press release by the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics"

I recommend you read this blog and I note the information is coming from Scotland not the US where all that crappy advice originated. 

Finally...now if your doctor would just get the word...the blog is found here:

http://drmalcolmkendrick.org/2015/05/20/sorry-seems-to-be-the-hardest-word/

The Cholesterol Hypothesis is not true

 

Borrowed this AM from Dr. Malcolm Kendrick's blog

 

Here is the introduction to the chapter on cholesterol and mortality:

All-cause mortality is the most appropriate outcome to use when investigating risk factors for life threatening disease. Section 1 discusses all-cause mortality according to cholesterol levels, as determined by large epidemiological studies in Japan. Overall, an inverse trend is found between all-cause mortality and total (or low density lipoprotein [LDL]) cholesterol levels: mortality is highest in the lowest cholesterol group without exception. If limited to elderly people, this trend is universal. As discussed in Section 2, elderly people with the highest cholesterol levels have the highest survival rates irrespective of where they live in the world.

I don’t think that I really need to say anything else, other than to repeat this fact. If you have a high cholesterol (LDL) level, you will live longer. This is especially true of the elderly.

Interesting Article about eating organic

This article is interesting in that it tracks pesticide residues in people who ate organic for two weeks
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/14/the-organic-effect_n_7244000.html

If you're not growing your own, it might pay to get organic produce especially of those items that show up on the "Dirty Dozen" list every year. 

"What I discovered about Selenium Supplements"

I started supplementing selenium when diagnosed with fibrocystic breast disease, and the selenium was the cure.  It might be more accurate to say that the disease was a deficiency of selenium. Rather inadvertently I discovered that selenium dramatically improved carpal tunnel as well.  The brand of Selenium I was taking was Life Extension and the form of selenium was two forms:

Se-methyl L-selenocysteine and L-selenomethionine.  It was combined with Vitamin E.

When I ran out I got a different brand and took those for a couple months or more, but noticed the carpal tunnel symptoms were  back slightly.  I no longer have that bottle so I don't know what form it was but it did not have Vitamin E. 

I recently went back to the original brand and type and have seen fairly noticeable improvement in carpal tunnel in about a week or ten days.  I can't say for sure why, but if you want my recommendation, I'd suggest Life Extension brand with the two forms of selenium and Vitamin E. 

On the same note, there is a lot of really worthless fish oil capsules on the market.  For the purists, you might want to try Vital Choice Wild Alaskan Sockeye Salmon Oil, look it up on Amazon and read the reviews.  I have not tried it.  A little spendy for me.  I use Carlson's brand Norwegian Salmon oil.  OK, it's not straight salmon oil.  Their salmon is farmed.  But the quality is good, there is benefit from their product and it's affordable to me.  I have tried many brands over the years and many are a waste of money.  Real Omega 3's are actually effective at reducing inflammation and so reduce pain. Better than aspirin. Carlson's delivers and I choose not to be a purist on this item.

I'd like to hear from any of you who have tried good or bad supplements.  

More Information on Vitamin D

This next quote I think is important.  Our culture--in terms of politics, nutrition and other areas--thrives on promoting fear.  You will hear dire warnings about too much Vitamin D (and other things).  The following is a breath of sanity.

 

 "The evidence is clear that vitamin D toxicity is one of the rarest medical conditions and is typically due to intentional or inadvertent intake of extremely high doses," writes Hollick, a professor of medicine, physiology and biophysics at Boston University School of Medicine.

 

ANd as far as what's a good level, some are recommending 20 as within the normal range.  Bit when studies test levels of Vitamin D in the blood of peoples who live in the sun, we probably get a better idea of what's normal.  So here are two.

 

Many of us have been waiting years for this data. To me, it means that the Vitamin D Council’s recommendation of 50 ng/ml is just about right, although I cannot argue with someone who recommends a level of 55 ng/ml. Remember, when errors in measuring vitamin D are made, they usually are overestimates. Thus, if mean natural levels are around 45 ng/ml, keeping your level around 50-55 ng/ml keeps you within what both the Maasai and the Hadzabe are telling us.

 

AND:

We measured the sum of serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D₂ and D₃ (25(OH)D) concentrations of thirty-five pastoral Maasai (34 (SD 10) years, 43 % male) and twenty-five Hadzabe hunter-gatherers (35 (SD 12) years, 84 % male) living in Tanzania. They have skin type VI, have a moderate degree of clothing, spend the major part of the day outdoors, but avoid direct exposure to sunlight when possible. Their 25(OH)D concentrations were measured by liquid chromatography-MS/MS. The mean serum 25(OH)D concentrations of Maasai and Hadzabe were 119 (range 58-167) and 109 (range 71-171) nmol/l, respectively. Br J Nutr

Also there is evidence that aging per se does not cause poorer conversion of sunlight to Vitamin D, but rather that as people spend less time in the sun they begin to lose the ability to convert sunlight to Vitamin D.   Use it or lose it, apparently.  A good question to ask is if that ability can be restored with more sun exposure.  So far I can't find an answer.