So the upshot of that is a big part of getting fat (the
middle, especially) has to do with the things we eat that digest to sugar—carbohydrates. Eating fat doesn’t make you fat. Eating bread, does. So my recommendation to any who want to lose
weight is, of course, to limit the high density carbohydrates (grains, legumes,
potatoes, alcohol, sweets of all kinds and most certainly sodas.) Want the e-book? See http://mindingthemiddleagedmiddle.com/
The crucial tool for assessing the carbohydrate's ability to raise
blood sugar (and trigger fat storage) is the glycemic load. It is a number telling how fast a
carbohydrate food turns to glucose and how much glucose there is. It is additive--the glycemic loads of things
you eat are added together. Low is less
than 10. Medium is up to 20, and over 20
is high. Keeping it low will certainly
help with losing the middle aged middle.
BUT:
A paper in the American Journal of
Clinical Nutrition
(Am
J Clin Nutr. 2000 Jun;71(6):1455-61. A prospective study of
dietary glycemic load, carbohydrate intake, and risk of coronary heart disease
in US women. Liu S,
Willett WC,
Stampfer MJ,
Hu FB,
Franz M,
Sampson L,
Hennekens CH,
Manson JE.)
Tells us this surprising VERY important finding!
Your risk of heart attack and stroke doubles (DOUBLES, like
twice as risky) if your average daily glycemic load is 206 compared to those
with an average of 117.
Diabetics, with their blood sugar problems, are prone to
heart disease, in fact this is from the American Diabetes website:
People with diabetes have a
higher-than-average risk of having a heart attack or Stroke. These strike
people with diabetes more than twice as often as people without diabetes. There’s
a big link between diabetes, heart disease, and stroke. In fact, two out of
three people with diabetes die from heart disease or stroke…
Blood sugar (as measured by the glycemic load) is
deadly. I can’t for the life of me
figure how there could possibly be any controversy about these findings. If you want a smaller middle, avoid high
glycemic foods (listed above). Look them
up at http://nutritiondata.self.com/ or http://www.glycemicindex.com/foodSearch.php. Not only will it help in minding the middle
aged middle but it will save you from heart disease. Make your carbs be vegetables and fruit with
their relatively low glycemic index and high levels of nutrients, rather than
those with low nutrients and high glycemic load.
For another blog post I will report on what they find
regarding cancer risk and blood sugar levels.
No surprise. Higher blood sugar
equals higher rates of cancer.
