Hormones like glucagon and insulin regulate the level of sugar in your blood, thus avoiding diabetes. These two hormones are secreted by your pancreas and are the key in protecting you from diabetes. The most important thing to know in this case is that the production of these two hormones is the ultimate thing that protects us form diabetes or any other sugar related problems that you might suffer from.
First let us talk about the first important hormone in avoiding diabetes; insulin. It is produced by the beta cells of your pancreas. What makes your body produce insulin is of course a high sugar level in your blood. Without the production of this hormone, you will suffer from diabetes. To protect you from diabetes, when the levels of glucose in your blood are high, the insulin produced is higher, and the other way around, thus doing everything it can to protect you from diabetes.
Glucagon, the other hormone that fights against diabetes is produced by the alpha cells of your pancreas. This hormone works the other way around than insulin, because the both are very tighten up together in fitting against diabetes. So if you have a high level of glucose in your blood, than no glucagon will be produced, because at the same time insulin will do its part in avoiding diabetes. The normal level of glucose in a person that does not suffer from diabetes is somewhere between 70 to 100 mg/ dl. Any diabetes test should be taken after fasting, because right after you eat, you level of glucose tends to get a little bit higher, but that does not mean you have diabetes.
Insulin is a very necessary hormone in fighting against diabetes. The type 1 diabetes happens in people whose islet cells do not produce any insulin. The second type of diabetes, the type 2 diabetes develops in people who, somehow, have developed a resistance to insulin. In this second case of diabetes, the levels of insulin that one has are almost the same or even higher than in a person that does not suffer from diabetes. But the difference is that people, who have diabetes, have a problem with their cells, which do not respond to insulin.
Some Enlightening Information about Insulin Resistance, and Insulin Resistance Syndrome
Believe it or not—I was astounded!—well over 60,000 searches are done online each and every month for the term insulin resistance. That means a lot of people are curious, and possibly concerned about this. Here is some information that hopefully will clarify some of the “mysteries” surrounding insulin resistance and insulin resistance syndrome.
Most cases of reactive hypoglycemia (1) are labeled idiopathic, which means “unknown cause”. I believe insulin resistance causes most cases of idiopathic reactive hypoglycemia, and that insulin resistance is caused, in turn, by diet and heredity. Insulin resistance can be an early warning sign of Type II diabetes and studies have shown that Type II diabetics may have been insulin resistant for up to 12 years before diagnosis.
(1. By far the most common cases of chronic hypoglycemia are types of reactive hypoglycemia. Reactive hypoglycemia is also called postprandial hypoglycemia, postprandial syndrome or functional hypoglycemia and symptoms appear two to five hours after you eat. Insulin is supposed to trigger the acceptance of circulating blood sugar (glucose) into the body’s cells, but over time and with an over refined diet; your cells can become insulin resistant. When cells are insulin resistant, it takes increasing amounts of insulin to trigger the acceptance of additional sugar into cells in your body.
Your blood pressure, cholesterol and triglycerides readings go up, and you are now at risk of heart attack.
Syndrome X (aka Insulin Resistance Syndrome) is defined as insulin resistance with high blood pressure and high triglycerides. If you have Syndrome X, you are also at increased risk of developing cancer.
We already know that some people are more likely to get diabetes or cancer or heart disease. The more refined foods, especially sugar, that we eat, the more insulin the pancreas produces. No one should be eating the amounts of sugar that most of us do, but some people’s bodies can resist the effects longer.
Insulin resistance happens when your body has been overwhelmed with too much insulin for so long that your cells stop listening. For the cells of your body, a constantly high level of insulin is just like constant noise in your ears.
Over time, you learn to ignore the noise, and it takes a louder sound to get your attention. Your cells view insulin in the same way. It takes more and more insulin to get your cells to pay attention. When your cells ignore insulin and refuse to “open” to take in sugar from your blood, your pancreas simply sends more insulin until your cells begin to respond. The excess insulin has several effects. First, by the time the cells finally begin to accept sugar, there is so much insulin available that your blood sugar drops too much—hypoglycemia. Second, insulin resistance causes more insulin resistance, so eventually there is a lot of insulin floating around your system all the time.
All that insulin makes it difficult to keep your blood sugar steady. When the insulin resistance train has been accelerating on its track for a while, your body really isn’t handling sugar properly anymore, and you will have an “abnormal sugar metabolism”. One way an abnormal sugar metabolism will show up is in chronic hypoglycemia.
Processing sugar is hard work. Eating a donut or a cookie or a granola bar causes a blood sugar spike that the pancreas must deal with. Every spike requires the release of insulin to get it back under control. If we eat a lot of refined foods containing a lot of sugar, we find ourselves living on the blood sugar roller coaster. Abnormal sugar handling, over time, causes increased insulin resistance.
We know that a high level of sugar in the blood is bad. That’s why diabetics stop eating sweets and take medication. A high level of insulin is also bad, but more insidious. Insulin is not meant to sit around in the body all the time and excess insulin causes a host of problems. For one thing, insulin is a storage hormone, so if you have too much insulin, you will gain weight because excess sugar is stored as fat.
Excess weight is a major risk factor for diabetes, and so is overworking the pancreas by producing too much insulin. In early Type II diabetes, the pancreas is working very hard to keep up with the demand. Insulin levels in the body are abnormally high, and your blood sugar may be alternating between high and low. This leads to full-blown diabetes when the over-worked pancreas simply can’t produce the amounts of insulin needed to overcome the insulin resistance of the body’s cells. This slide into Type II diabetes is much more likely in people who are significantly overweight. Sixty-five percent of people living with diabetes will die of a heart attack or stroke.
In addition to Type II diabetes, insulin resistance can cause an increase in blood pressure, “bad” cholesterol and triglycerides. Dr. Gerald Reaven first recognized that these problems are linked in the late 1980s. In his book, Syndrome X, Dr. Reaven states that Syndrome X “…may be the cause of 50 percent of all heart attacks”. Dr. Reaven also suggests that Insulin Resistance Syndrome “…affects between 60-75 million Americans”. More recently, experts have also come to believe that Syndrome X (aka insulin resistance syndrome) also increases the risk of cancer.
The more of the following risk factors you have, the greater the chance you have Syndrome X:
Overweight, a sedentary lifestyle, over age 40, non-Caucasian ethnicity, a family history of Type II diabetes, high blood pressure or cardiovascular disease, a history of glucose intolerance, a diagnosis of high blood pressure, elevated triglycerides/low HDL cholesterol, or cardiovascular disease.
Consult your physician, and be prepared to change your diet and your lifestyle ASAP to turn back the advance of abnormal blood sugar, insulin resistance and Syndrome X!
First let us talk about the first important hormone in avoiding diabetes; insulin. It is produced by the beta cells of your pancreas. What makes your body produce insulin is of course a high sugar level in your blood. Without the production of this hormone, you will suffer from diabetes. To protect you from diabetes, when the levels of glucose in your blood are high, the insulin produced is higher, and the other way around, thus doing everything it can to protect you from diabetes.
Glucagon, the other hormone that fights against diabetes is produced by the alpha cells of your pancreas. This hormone works the other way around than insulin, because the both are very tighten up together in fitting against diabetes. So if you have a high level of glucose in your blood, than no glucagon will be produced, because at the same time insulin will do its part in avoiding diabetes. The normal level of glucose in a person that does not suffer from diabetes is somewhere between 70 to 100 mg/ dl. Any diabetes test should be taken after fasting, because right after you eat, you level of glucose tends to get a little bit higher, but that does not mean you have diabetes.
Insulin is a very necessary hormone in fighting against diabetes. The type 1 diabetes happens in people whose islet cells do not produce any insulin. The second type of diabetes, the type 2 diabetes develops in people who, somehow, have developed a resistance to insulin. In this second case of diabetes, the levels of insulin that one has are almost the same or even higher than in a person that does not suffer from diabetes. But the difference is that people, who have diabetes, have a problem with their cells, which do not respond to insulin.
Some Enlightening Information about Insulin Resistance, and Insulin Resistance Syndrome
Believe it or not—I was astounded!—well over 60,000 searches are done online each and every month for the term insulin resistance. That means a lot of people are curious, and possibly concerned about this. Here is some information that hopefully will clarify some of the “mysteries” surrounding insulin resistance and insulin resistance syndrome.
Most cases of reactive hypoglycemia (1) are labeled idiopathic, which means “unknown cause”. I believe insulin resistance causes most cases of idiopathic reactive hypoglycemia, and that insulin resistance is caused, in turn, by diet and heredity. Insulin resistance can be an early warning sign of Type II diabetes and studies have shown that Type II diabetics may have been insulin resistant for up to 12 years before diagnosis.
(1. By far the most common cases of chronic hypoglycemia are types of reactive hypoglycemia. Reactive hypoglycemia is also called postprandial hypoglycemia, postprandial syndrome or functional hypoglycemia and symptoms appear two to five hours after you eat. Insulin is supposed to trigger the acceptance of circulating blood sugar (glucose) into the body’s cells, but over time and with an over refined diet; your cells can become insulin resistant. When cells are insulin resistant, it takes increasing amounts of insulin to trigger the acceptance of additional sugar into cells in your body.
Your blood pressure, cholesterol and triglycerides readings go up, and you are now at risk of heart attack.
Syndrome X (aka Insulin Resistance Syndrome) is defined as insulin resistance with high blood pressure and high triglycerides. If you have Syndrome X, you are also at increased risk of developing cancer.
We already know that some people are more likely to get diabetes or cancer or heart disease. The more refined foods, especially sugar, that we eat, the more insulin the pancreas produces. No one should be eating the amounts of sugar that most of us do, but some people’s bodies can resist the effects longer.
Insulin resistance happens when your body has been overwhelmed with too much insulin for so long that your cells stop listening. For the cells of your body, a constantly high level of insulin is just like constant noise in your ears.
Over time, you learn to ignore the noise, and it takes a louder sound to get your attention. Your cells view insulin in the same way. It takes more and more insulin to get your cells to pay attention. When your cells ignore insulin and refuse to “open” to take in sugar from your blood, your pancreas simply sends more insulin until your cells begin to respond. The excess insulin has several effects. First, by the time the cells finally begin to accept sugar, there is so much insulin available that your blood sugar drops too much—hypoglycemia. Second, insulin resistance causes more insulin resistance, so eventually there is a lot of insulin floating around your system all the time.
All that insulin makes it difficult to keep your blood sugar steady. When the insulin resistance train has been accelerating on its track for a while, your body really isn’t handling sugar properly anymore, and you will have an “abnormal sugar metabolism”. One way an abnormal sugar metabolism will show up is in chronic hypoglycemia.
Processing sugar is hard work. Eating a donut or a cookie or a granola bar causes a blood sugar spike that the pancreas must deal with. Every spike requires the release of insulin to get it back under control. If we eat a lot of refined foods containing a lot of sugar, we find ourselves living on the blood sugar roller coaster. Abnormal sugar handling, over time, causes increased insulin resistance.
We know that a high level of sugar in the blood is bad. That’s why diabetics stop eating sweets and take medication. A high level of insulin is also bad, but more insidious. Insulin is not meant to sit around in the body all the time and excess insulin causes a host of problems. For one thing, insulin is a storage hormone, so if you have too much insulin, you will gain weight because excess sugar is stored as fat.
Excess weight is a major risk factor for diabetes, and so is overworking the pancreas by producing too much insulin. In early Type II diabetes, the pancreas is working very hard to keep up with the demand. Insulin levels in the body are abnormally high, and your blood sugar may be alternating between high and low. This leads to full-blown diabetes when the over-worked pancreas simply can’t produce the amounts of insulin needed to overcome the insulin resistance of the body’s cells. This slide into Type II diabetes is much more likely in people who are significantly overweight. Sixty-five percent of people living with diabetes will die of a heart attack or stroke.
In addition to Type II diabetes, insulin resistance can cause an increase in blood pressure, “bad” cholesterol and triglycerides. Dr. Gerald Reaven first recognized that these problems are linked in the late 1980s. In his book, Syndrome X, Dr. Reaven states that Syndrome X “…may be the cause of 50 percent of all heart attacks”. Dr. Reaven also suggests that Insulin Resistance Syndrome “…affects between 60-75 million Americans”. More recently, experts have also come to believe that Syndrome X (aka insulin resistance syndrome) also increases the risk of cancer.
The more of the following risk factors you have, the greater the chance you have Syndrome X:
Overweight, a sedentary lifestyle, over age 40, non-Caucasian ethnicity, a family history of Type II diabetes, high blood pressure or cardiovascular disease, a history of glucose intolerance, a diagnosis of high blood pressure, elevated triglycerides/low HDL cholesterol, or cardiovascular disease.
Consult your physician, and be prepared to change your diet and your lifestyle ASAP to turn back the advance of abnormal blood sugar, insulin resistance and Syndrome X!
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