What Is Insulin Resistance?
When we eat foods that contain sugar or get broken down into sugar, our blood sugar rises. This triggers the pancreas to release insulin, a hormone that triggers receptors on all cells in the body and causes them to open up their gates and let sugar (glucose) in to either store or use for energy. This then removes the excess glucose from the blood and levels go back to the normal resting state. Ideally, we would consume foods that increase it to about 130 at most (other than the occasional treat), and then levels would return to about 80-90mg/dL.
The Impact Of Excessive Blood Sugar Spikes On Natural Insulin
If we consume foods and drinks that excessively spike our blood sugar well over 130 mg/dL and this happens often on a daily basis, eventually the cells can become “overfull” of sugar. This triggers a change within the cells and the receptors become less responsive to insulin, making it insulin RESISTANT. Or alternatively, it makes it less insulin SENSITIVE. This is done to protect the cell since if more and more sugar would “stuff” the cell, it would cause damage.
How Our Body Copes With Excessive Sugar Spikes
There’s one exception… fat cells. The fat cells can expand and therefore keep taking in more glucose. This can be a good thing because it allows us to “fatten up for the winter” and help protect us during times of famine. That is what is how it was meant to happen, however, we rarely go through these times of famine anymore. Instead, we have a continuous supply of calories in excess, and these fat cells keep on taking in more and more into storage. This is one of the reasons for obesity.
If the frequent blood sugar spikes persist, eventually even the fat cells can’t keep up and they can become insulin resistant. Then blood sugar remains elevated and can no longer go back to the ideal 80-90 range. Instead, it may only go down to 110-120 mg/dL and stay there. To compensate, then body will then start to release more and more insulin. This helps short term perhaps, but then insulin resistance gets more severe and pretty soon the body has to pump out a lot of extra insulin (for example, 30-40 mIU/L vs. 5-10 mIU/L). If this persists, eventually the beta cells of the pancreas burnout, and then insulin injections are necessary (this is insulin dependent diabetes).
This above situation (prior to burnout) also leads to higher amounts of insulin in the blood stream most of the time. Thus, it’s constantly telling the body to put the glucose or energy into storage, making it much more difficult to lose weight and more difficult to function well without relying on eating carbs or sugar every few hours. Not to mention the cravings…
Optimal Vs. Excessive Blood Sugar Spikes
Here’s a graph showing optimal vs. excessive blood sugar spikes and the consequences.
What Causes Insulin Resistance
One cause of insulin resistance is something we covered above, excessive and frequent blood sugar spikes. However, there are other potential causes or contributors as well.
Excessive caloric intake in general can lead to insulin resistance. Eating more calories than we burn in a day will force the body to deal with the excess and store it as fat. This fat, especially around the abdomen, will disrupt hormones and increase inflammation and contribute to insulin resistance.
Other common causes of insulin resistance are poor sleep, inadequate physical activity, aging, suboptimal nutrient levels (chromium, magnesium, Vitamins D, B1, B3, B6, and B12, and zinc), stress from all sources, PCOS, and genetics.
What can be done? Improve insulin SENSITIVITY.
How To Increase Insulin Sensitivity
The key to preventing and reversing insulin resistance and diabetes is to increase insulin sensitivity. This means implementing habits, following a diet, and addressing nutrient needs so that the insulin receptors work better and respond efficiently when insulin is released. This means requiring less insulin to help manage blood sugar levels in a healthy range. This also means that it is much easier to utilize stored energy, leading to less crashes, more even energy and better brain function, and greater ability to “burn fat” and lose weight.
6 Ways To Improve Insulin Sensitivity
Here are ways to increase insulin sensitivity:
- Move, and move often – Research shows that moving for even 5 minutes every hour can have positive effects on health vs. not moving much at all, or moving for 60 min continuously once per day. Reason being, every time we start moving (walking, body weight squats, pushups, etc.) the muscle cells trigger changes to burn and then take in more glucose for energy. Moving often keeps these mechanisms “primed” and ready to go and more insulin sensitive.
- Optimize sleep – Lack of sleep affects the balance of hormones that regulate appetite and glucose metabolism. Specifically, sleep deprivation can increase cortisol levels, which can raise blood sugar levels. Additionally, it disrupts the balance of ghrelin and leptin—hormones that control hunger and satiety. This disruption can lead to increased appetite and cravings for high-carbohydrate, high-sugar foods, contributing to poor glucose control.
- Optimize blood sugar curves – Ideally, we should maintain levels between 80-90 mg/dL between meals, and only go up to about 130-140 mg/dL after eating and then return to baseline within 30-45 minutes at most. This means focusing on lean protein, healthy fats, veggies, nuts and seeds, and some fruit (berries are best). Each person will have their own response to foods, and we highly recommend at least a 3-month subscription to Signos (a continuous glucose monitoring program) to learn your personal reactions so that you can modify your diet accordingly. CLICK HERE to learn more about this program and reach out to our office if you want to participate.
- Lift weights – Resistance training is excellent for a lot of reasons, but especially for improving insulin resistance and lowering blood sugar overall. Not only does it increase sensitivity, but when we work the muscles and really challenge them, especially big muscle groups like the quads when doing squats, the muscle cells activate additional transporters that do not require insulin.
- Reduce caloric intake – This is the simple, boring, “eat less, move more”, or “burn more calories than you take in.” But, it works. This is often easier said than done, but focusing on the foods mentioned above like lean protein and veggies will help fill us up faster on less calories, thus allow us to eat less than if we were to eat mostly processed foods (especially carbs).
- Optimize nutrient levels – Some things we can test for, so we can and if low, supplement. Others we can’t always test for, or they are expensive, and the nutrients are safe, so we’ll recommend them for general support if you have insulin resistance. The recommendations made below will address what we saw as being suboptimal and/or suspected as such based on what showed up for other tests and your symptoms.
Prevent Type 2 Diabetes From Developing
It is time to improve your health with PEAK Integrative Medicine. We can guide you towards PEAK health so your insulin sensitivity improves and your body can function as it should. We want to see you live a long and healthy life. Learn more about our prediabetic health options.