Where Does Insulin Fit In To All This?

Insulin control is one of the key benefits of a low carb diet. Why would you want that? Here is a brief explanation of one of the functions of insulin does in the human body. I'll write about some of the other effects in subsequent posts.

How It Works

When you eat sugar or simple carbohydrates your blood glucose level goes up. Glucose floating around in your blood stream is useful for getting energy to cells. However this blood glucose needs to be absorbed through the cell walls in your body before it has a chance to damage the structures that it comes into contact with. Once it is inside it can be used to produce energy, or converted to fat as necessary. This absorption results in a drop in blood glucose and all is safe.

Your cells need to be told to absorb the blood glucose. This message is given by insulin.

In Summary

• eat sugar or simple carbohydrate
• blood glucose goes up
• excess blood glucose is toxic, so needs to be lowered
• insulin released by the pancreas
• cells can now absorb glucose from the blood
• blood glucose level lowers
• all is safe

The Problem

The process by which insulin tells the cells to absorb glucose is not perfect and causes some damage to the receptors on the cell surface. The receptors are the locks to insulin's key. With normal levels of blood glucose this damage is limited and should not become an issue. However in the presence of large quantities of simple carbohydrate (cavemen did not have Monster Energy Drink) the damage becomes a problem. The result is that the cells' response to insulin becomes dulled. They don't get the message to absorb glucose from a given amount of insulin. The response of the body is to produce more insulin to make the cells listen. This sort of works and blood glucose is lowered. However the higher level of insulin required to get the message across results in increased damage to the receptors. This compounds the problem of the cells not listening to the insulin signal.

The Outcome

Given time and a sugary diet the result is insulin resistance. This can lead to excess blood glucose not being dealt with by the normal mechanism. This glucose can then do damage to the body. This results in the all too familiar effects of type 2 diabetes - blindness, limb loss and wounds that won't heal.

Reducing your intake of carbohydrates is the best way to avoid this nightmare scenario.